Witchcraft Medicine: Healing Arts, Shamanic Practices, and Forbidden Plants (35 page)

On a classical vase Medea is depicted brewing her elixir of youth. In the cauldron is a goat. The image can be interpreted in two ways: Either the symbolic rejuvenation of the goat is depicted or the goat is a symbol of the Golden Fleece. It was said that the autumn crocus (
Colchicum autumnale
L.) first sprouted out of the ground where a few drops of Medea’s magical drink fell. The name
ephemeron
(“one-day flower”) indicated that death would occur within one day if this plant was eaten (Carl, 1995: 85). It was called
venena Colcha
(Horace,
Odes
II.13), a phrase that is usually translated by philologists as “witches’ poison.”

The magical plant of Medea, which was used to make the dragon who guards the Golden Fleece fall asleep, was called
kolchikon
in antiquity. Linnaeus chose this as the genus name for autumn crocus (
Colchicums
pp.) (Baumann, 1982: 111). However,
ephemeron
could not have been identical to the colchicum (Engel, 1978: 18). Of ephemeron Virgil reports that Moeris, the shepherd with magical knowledge, used it to transform himself into a wolf (lycanthropy):

This herb here, this poison, gathered earlier,

Moeris himself gave to me; it grows abundantly on Pontis.

With it—often I saw this—Moeris transformed himself into a wolf

and hid in the forest; with it he captures the souls

from the grave, with it he could even transform the crops (Aeneid).

The transformation from man into wolf was well known in antiquity and was usually traced back to eating human flesh (Burkert, 1997: 98ff.).

This magical plant of Medea was a popular medicine in antiquity.

Ephemeron has the leaves of a lily, but smaller, a stem of the same length, a blue flower, a seed of no value, a single root the thickness of a thumb, a sovereign remedy for the teeth if it is cut up into pieces in vinegar, boiled down, and used as a mouth wash. And the root also by itself arrests decay if forced into the hollow of a decayed tooth (Pliny,
Natural History
XXV.170f.)

The plant was also used externally. “The leaves of the ephemeron are applied in the form of liniments to tumors and swellings that are still able to be dispersed” (
Natural History
XXVI.122).

Autumn crocus is a remarkable plant: It blooms in the fall and produces its leaves and seeds in the spring. Because time is reversed for this plant,
Herbstzeitlose
(fall timelessness), the Germans’ common name for it, persists. Through the present time in German folk customs the notion that the autumn crocus is a “docket” (puppet, girl) or a “naked virgin” has been preserved. The common names for the plant have obvious erotic interpretations:
Nacktarsch
(naked ass; Eifel region),
Nackte Hure
(naked whore; Thuringia, Franconia),
Faule Fotze
(lazy cunt; Alsace-Lorraine),
Tittenwecke
(tit-loaf; Gotha),
Hundshoden
(dog’s balls), and
Oschsenpinsel
(ox penis). In English it is known as naked ladies. The withered capsule of the autumn crocus contains a brown powder that holds the tiny seeds. These capsules were called
Teufelsküche
(devil’s cake) in Ertingen and
Hexenfurz
(witches’ fart) in Biberach (Aigremont, 1987: vol. 2, 25f.). Thus in folk traditions the plant is connected with witchcraft medicine. The farm women of Upper Hesse still cook the leaves of the autumn crocus as a vegetable or prepare a salad from them for Walpurgis Night (Marzell, 1943: 1083).

Alkanet As Medicine

Alkanet (
Anchusa tinctoria
L., Boraginaceae) grew in the garden of Medea; it has a fleshy root that contains a bloodred pigment. When touched it turns the hands red. The juice from the root was also used as makeup for the cheeks. It was used in antiquity as a vaginal suppository to “draw down the embryo,” as well as for the treatment of jaundice, kidney problems, hypochondriasis, and infected wounds. It was one of the most important ingredients for salves: “The salve makers use the roots to thicken the salves” (Dioscorides,
Materia medica
IV.23). According to Dioscorides, alkanet was called “weasel seed” by the prophets, and when “it is placed in wine it is said to cause a good mood” (
Materia medica
IV.126). Pliny also praised the psychoactive effects of alkanet.

Akin to the plantain follows the buglossos, which is like the tongue of an ox. The most conspicuous quality of this is that thrown into wine it increases the exhilarating effect, and so it is also called euphronsynum, the plant that cheers (
Natural History
XXV.81).

He added: “This plant is called this
[buglossos]
because the raw leaves have a sort of ox-tongue. Some also call it sibillum. It has rough, dark leaves which spread out from the earth. It is used as a cooked food for vegetables and ground as a seasoning” (
Medicina antiqua,
fol. 137r).

The Garden of Circe

Circe, the daughter of the sun god Helios, sister of Hecate, and aunt of Medea, lived on the island of Aiaia, or Lussin (Homer,
The Odyssey
X.135ff.). “Circe with splendid braids, the powerful, commanding goddess,” was a master of poisons (pharmaka). According to Theophrastus, Circe lived in Lazio, a region in west-central Italy
⁹³
that produced “the special medicinal herbs” (
On Plants
IX: 15). Today Monte Cicero, the sacred mountain of Circe, still stands on the Italian coast above Sicily.

Tales everywhere are widely current about Medea of Colchis and other sorceresses, especially Circe of Italy, who has even been enrolled as a divinity. This also explains that Aeschylus, one of the earliest poets, declared that Italy abounds with potent herbs, and may have said the same of Circeii where she lived. Strong confirmatory evidence exists even today in the fact that the Marsi, a tribe descended from Circe’s sons, are well-known snake-charmers (Pliny,
Natural History
XXV.11).

The divine sorceress was worshipped in a grove and was clearly a goddess of death and a guide of the souls.

This [grove] is called Circe’s; and here in line grow many willows [
Salix alba
L.] and osiers [tamarisk,
Tamarixs
pp.] on whose topmost branches hang corpses bound with cords. For even now it is an abomination with the Colchians to burn dead men with fire; nor is it lawful to place them in the earth and raise a mound above, but to wrap them in untanned oxhides and suspend them from trees far from the city (Apollonius,
Argonautica
III.200ff.).

“All Circe’s magic potions, all Medea’s drugs

and all the herbs that sprout in Thessaly, horse-madness too, that exudation from the mare in season

when Venus breathes her longing into the wild herds

and a thousand other simples, brewed by

Nemesis, I’d drink

if only to find favor in her eyes.”

—T
IBULLUS
,
E
LEGIES

Tamarisks and willows were well-known medicinal plants. The willow, or, more precisely, the white willow (
Salix alba
L.), was used for birth control; thus it was a typical witches’ plant. “The willow is a tree known to all; its fruit, leaves, bark, and the juice have astringent power. The finely crumbled leaves, with some pepper and wine, is used for intestinal blockages; taken with water, it prohibits pregnancy” (Dioscorides,
Materia medica
I.135).

Another sacred tree of Circe was the alder (probably the black alder,
Alnus glutinosa
[L.] Gaertn., syn.
Betula alnus
L. var.
glutinosa
L.). “Alders surrounded Circe’s Aiaia” and grew on her island (Ranke-Graves, 1984: 101, 139). We can assume that there had been an archaic alder cult that by the Hellenic times had already been suppressed.
⁹⁴
Alders were considered transformed sisters of Phaeton, the son of Helios and brother of Circe.

The sacred incense of Circe was the good-smelling juniper (
odorata cedrus
—as it is called by Virgil,
The Aeneid
VII.13); therewith it is in the vicinity of archaic shamanism. Juniper is one of the oldest incense materials of the Eurasian shamans (Rätsch, 1996c).

The “glass-shimmering-captivating Circe” (Horace,
Odes
I.17), the “divine Circe,” the “daughter and mother of darkness and horror” (Bruno), the “noble sorceress” who was also “compassionless,” was originally a healing goddess.

Ah, if only it pleased the sky, that for us today, like once long ago in happier centuries, this ever magical Circe would appear, who would be able to put an end to things with plants, minerals, poisons, and the magic of nature. I am certain, that despite her pride she was merciful with regards to our misery (Bruno, 1995: 101).

Moly: The Magical Plant of Circe

Moly was the most famous plant of Circe. In antiquity the wondrous moly was considered psychoactive and aphrodisiac.
⁹⁵
The Homeric moly, like the magical plant of Circe, was interpreted quite early as mandrake,
Mandragora officinarum
L. (Dierbach, 1833: 204; Kreuter, 1982: 29). Dioscorides passed down the name
circeon
for mandrake, as well as
Mandragora Circaea,
the herb with which Circe transformed the men of the Odysseus into “pigs” (this probably means sexually aroused men)
⁹⁶
: “The mandrake. Some call it
antimelon
[“in place of an apple”], others
dirkaia,
also
kirkaia
[plant of Circe/Kirke], because the root seemed to be effective as a love potion” (Dioscorides,
Materia medica
IV.76).

Pliny writes something similar: “Some give the name circaeon to the mandrake. There are two kinds of it: the white, which is also considered male, and the black, considered female. … When the seed is white the plant is called by some arsen, by other morion, and by others hippophlomos” (Pliny,
Natural History
XXV.147).

According to Apollodorus (second century B.C.E.), the most important scholar of his times, it was the κιρκαια ριζα, the plant of Circe, that was an amulet against the black magic of Pasiphae, a daughter of the sungod Helios (Circe was also a daughter of Helios), wife of King Minos, and mother of Ariadne and the Minotaurs (Library frag
.
II.15).