Witchcraft Medicine: Healing Arts, Shamanic Practices, and Forbidden Plants (69 page)

²
“That evil people sometimes use certain substances from which a desired effect ensues, and that various credible, if peculiar, examples were performed by Harsdörf in his great show-place, cannot be doubted. But whether or not such effects are natural or supernatural has not yet been decided. At the very least these substances are as dangerous as they are unreliable; in that they commonly lead to illnesses, robbing of the senses, loss of memory, if not death …” was the explanation offered as recently as 1738 in volume 17 of the
Grosses vollständiges Universal-Lexicon aller Wissenschaften und Künste
[Great Complete Universal Dictionary of All Sciences and Arts].

³
“It must be assumed that without the proper words the ingestion of the medicinal plant did not help” (Graf, 1996: 69). The same holds true for the medicine of the druids: “The magical songs did not work on their own, the two healing methods of magic and plant medicine worked only in unison” (Guyonvarch and Le Roux, 1996: 183). This concept is still widespread among shamans of the Central and South American Indians. They are all in agreement that plants heal only in combination with rituals and magical sayings (see Rätsch, 1997c).

⁴
The Hippocratics based their work on the Greek doctor Hippocrates of Kos (c. 460–377 B.C.E.), who developed the teachings of the four humors. They have been preserved by him and his students in numerous essays
(Corpus Hippocraticum).
The Hippocratic teachings influenced the Western medicine practiced by men through the early modern era (Krug, 1993).

⁵
Foreign and new healing methods have always been considered competition for the established methods, and those who use the established methods have always feared the new ones. It comes as no surprise that “alternative” medicine continues to be intellectually and scientifically restricted (see also the description of Jütte, 1996).

⁶
Anaphrodisiacs were mostly used for birth control!

⁷
All psychoactive substances are communicators. They are used to communicate with oneself, with others, with ghosts, with ancestors, and with the gods.

⁸
“Therefore the standard purpose of a curse is to suppress someone under your will and make it impossible for him to act on his own” (Graf, 1996: 110). Defixions are richly represented in archaeological material.

⁹
Death magic—causing an enemy or sacrifice to die with a curse—is one of the particularly feared practices of the “witches,” Voodoo priests, and black shamans throughout the world (cf. Biedermann, 1974; Christensen and Martí, 1979; David-Neel, 1984; Evans-Pritchard, 1988; Favret-Saada, 1979; Hall and Kingston, 1979; Kapur, 1983; Kluckhorn, 1967; Knab, 1995; Lehmann and Myers, 1989; Lewis, 1989; Mann, 1994; Marwick, 1975; Multhaupt, 1990; Scheffler, 1983; Sepulveda, 1983; Simmons, 1980; Walker, 1989; Wiemann-Michaels, 1994; Winkelman, 1992), and late antiquity as well (Graf, 1996).

¹⁰
The name Hecate almost sounds like
Hexe
(witch).

¹¹
The pre-Socratic philosopher Heracleitus of Ephesus (c. 500
B.C.E.
) classified the magoi with the
nyktipoloi,
the “night wanderers” (Graf, 1996: 72). Heracleitus was an adept of Artemis, for he brought his book
On Nature
to her temple as an offering. Petronius calls them
stridentes,
“those who are floating about” (Wolf, 1994: 39).

¹²
“The evil plants are the poisonous plants which could have sprung solely from diabolical knowledge” (Gawlik, 1994: 245).

¹³
In the Roman literature magical substances were called
veneno,
which means “poison.” The woman who makes poisons was a
venefica
(cf. Hyginus,
Myths
).

¹⁴
“Magical substances are vehicles of a mystical power which can be addressed using words, spells, or formulas. The substances receive orders and carry them out” (Multhaupt, 1990: 85).

¹⁵
In antiquity the ability to put people into a trance or to be able to heal them was enough to be convicted of being a magoi (Graf, 1996: 74).

¹⁶
These plants were still named in the early modern era as important ingredients of love potions (Kräutermann, 1725: 100).

¹⁷
Cf. Lucian,
Dialogues of the Hetaerae
VIII.

¹⁸
There is also an
Eighth Book of Moses
written on an Anastasi papyrus from the fourth century C.E., which describes a magical ritual (cf. Graf, 1996: 13).

¹⁹
In archaic Greece this mountain was actually identified with Olympus. Later the term
Olympus
was considered metaphoric and was also used for other mountains (Parnassus, Helicon, Ida, etc.) and as a synonym for heaven, Elysium, paradise, the beyond, and so on (Petermann, 1990: 13).

²⁰
Also spelled
dodekatheon, dodecatheum
.

²¹
Although the primrose
Primula elatior
grows in Greece, apparently the plant was not mentioned in any antique sources. The only primrose (Primulaceae) described by Greek and Roman authors was
cyclaminonn,
the Greek sowbread (
Cyclamen graecum
Link.). Theophrastus, known as the father of botany, wrote that the plant’s roots were used for medicine as well as for aphrodisiacs (
On Plants
IX.3, 9). The root powder was moistened with wine and formed into small disks. Dioscorides wrote, “Mixed in the wine it makes you drunk. … It is said that the pounded roots are used for making love potions, being fashioned into pastilles for this purpose” (
Materia medica
III.193). Pliny added that “[primroses] should be grown next to all houses, if it is true that there where it grows no magic is effective, which is why it is also called amulet
[amuletum]
” (
Natural History
XXV.9, 66).

²²
According to folk mythology the plant was created by Saint Peter’s key chain when it dropped and fell to the earth (Marzell, 1935: 23f).

²³
In South America there are numerous mescaline-containing species of cacti in the genus
Trichocereus
(syn.
Echinopsis
) including San Pedro, “Saint Peter.”

²⁴
He also wrote a book about the divinatory methods of witches and sorcerers, but published it cautiously and defamed those methods as “forbidden art” (Hartlieb, 1989a and 1989b).

²⁵
Rosemary “grows in the ocean regions and in gardens; before incense [frankincense] was known, the people soothed [the gods] with this plant” (
Medicina antiqua
fol. 83v).

²⁶
In Nepal there is also a Saint John’s wort (
Hypericum choisianum
Wallich ex N. Robson), which is consecrated to the great goddess Kali, the Asian correspondent of Hecate.

²⁷
In classical Athens there was a place known as
oi kepoi,
or the garden. In the garden was a temple to Urania, the muse or sky goddess, a shrine to Aphrodite, and a sacred statue of Aphrodite of Alcemenes. Next to this was another Aphrodite “who stands close to the temple; her form is as square as that of a herm. The inscription says that Aphrodite Ourania is the oldest of the so-called Moirae” (Pausanias,
Itinerary of Greece
I.2, 19).

²⁸
“As an enveloping and nurturing area, therefore as ‘healing’ and ‘sacred,’ the garden has always been the symbol of culture—therewith thought as well” (Schmölders, 1983: 9). “The earthly garden is the vision of the heavenly paradise” (Zuylen, 1995).

²⁹
For more information see the extensive literature on the subject: Hansen, 1981; Harner, 1973; Hauschild, 1981; Kiesewetter, 1982; Kuhlen, 1980 and 1984; Lussi, 1996; Metzner, 1994; Perez de Barradas, 1957; Pollio et al., 1988; Schultes and Hofmann, 1995.

³⁰
In Turkey the psychoactive substance mandrake (
Mandragora officinarum
L.), which was the sacred plant of Aphrodite in antiquity and grew in her
heiros kepos
(sacred garden), is still referred to as “the root of Adam” or “the root of the [first] humans” (cf. Rätsch, 1994).

³¹
Hecate was the first goddess on the island of Aigina, which lies on the coast of Attica and on the Isthmus of Corinth. According to legend it is the place where Orpheus established Hecate’s mysteries: “Of all the gods the Aiginete honor Hecate the most, and every year they celebrate a festival of Hecate and say that Orpheus, the Thracian, had initiated the festival. Within their surrounding wall is a temple. The religious symbol is a work of Myron made from wood, and includes the face and the entire body on one piece. In my opinion, Alcemenes was the first to make images of Hecate with three on one another, who the Athenians call Epipyrgidia” (Pausanias,
Itinerary of Greece
II.30.I). The sacred mysteries of Isis or Hecate were also written down on papyrus in late antiquity (Graf, 1996: 164).

³²
The author, born in the African province of Madaura (now Mdaourouch, Algeria), successfully defended himself at his “witch trial” between 156 and 161 C.E. His defense
(Apologia),
which has been preserved, shows him to be a word artist, a
philisophus Platonicus,
and an excellent student of the natural worlds. Thanks to his rhetorical arts his accusers were forced to set him free (Graf, 1996: 61–78). The accusations included the use of a poisonous
lepos marinus
(sea hare,
Aplysia depilans
) and of oath formulas to heal. Apuleius argued, “My opponents must prove that it is necessary to be a sorcerer or
venificus
[black magician] in order to be able to heal” (Graf, 1996: 73).

³³
In “enlightened” Rome most initiatory cults and secret rites were forbidden because they could not be controlled: “Nightly sacrifices by the women should not take place without permission with the exception of those that are performed for the Roman people. And no one should initiate anyone except as it is commonly done for Ceres [Demeter], according to Greek ritual” (Cicero,
On Law
II.21).

³⁴
Traditional Greek scholars usually vehemently deny the “drug hypotheses” as an explanation of the mystical experience in the initiatory rituals (cf. Burkert, 1990 and 1997). However, their drug paranoia undoubtedly stems from the long-standing campaign to demonize psychoactive substances (see “Witches’ Medicine—Forbidden Medicine,” page 198).

³⁸
In Berlin in the Egyptian Museum there is a fantastic statue of Isis as the royal cobra that dates from late antiquity.

³⁹
It is similar to
Eisenhut
(iron hat), the German word for
Aconitum napellus.
It is usually assumed, for instance, according to Marzell (1935: 79), that this name refers to “the helmet or the hat-shaped form of the upper petals.” But the earliest example of this name is found in Hieronymus Bock (1539); here the plant is called
Isenhutlein
, which translates as “little iron hat,” but more likely means “hat of Isis.”

⁴⁰
Kallimochos left a remarkable note behind. According to it, Hecate was created in Ephesus out of a woman who had been executed, after Artemis hung her own jewelry on the hanged woman (Burkert, 1997: 96). Five centuries after Hesiod, the Roman Cicero discussed whether or not Asteria and Hecate were really gods (Cicero,
The Nature of the Gods
III.46).

⁴¹
“Thales of Miletus (650–560) saw the world full of demons who brought the humans dreams and diseases. According to Xenocrates they live in the region beneath the moon and mediate the interactions between the gods” (Wolf, 1994: 34).

⁴²
Aegolethron, the pontic rhododendron (
Rhododendron ponticum,
syn.
Azelea ponticum
; Roman field rose), which produces psychoactive honey, also belongs to the sacred plants of Hecate (Dierbach, 1833: 197).

⁴³
“The name of this plant comes from the name of the hill Aconitos in Pontos, where Hercules brought Cerberus, the hound of hell, up from hell. … An extremely interesting plant, important in homeopathy for all conditions that have to do with fear brought on by the hounds of hell” (Gawlik, 1994: 148 f.).

⁴⁴
In Ovid the god Apollo said of himself, “Because of me what’s going to happen, what has happened, and what’s happening right now are all known. Because of me words and music make perfect harmony” (
The Metamorphoses
I.515ff.).

⁴⁵
Zotter (1980: 91) identified the apollinaris of Pseudo-Apuleius as ashwaganda (
Withania somnifera
[L.] Dunal, syn.
Physalis somnifera
L.,
Solanum somniferum
nom. Nud.). Hunger (1935) considered this apollinaris to be the lily of the valley (
Convallaria majalis
L.). Interestingly, it was written in the
Herbarium
of the Pseudo-Apuleius that this apollinaris was called
dicea
or
strigmon manicon
by the Greeks.
Dicea
is usually identified with mandrake (
Mandragora officinarum
L.),
strigmon manicon
with the nightshades (
Solanums
pp.), belladonna (
Atropa belladonna
L.), thorn apple (
Datura stramonium
L.), or nux vomica (
Strychnos nux-vomica
L.).