Hyoscyamus niger

Hyoscyamus niger, commonly known as henbane, black henbane, or stinking nightshade, is a poisonous plant in the nightshade family Solanaceae. It is native to temperate Europe and Siberia, and naturalised in Great Britain and Ireland. The name henbane dates at least to AD 1265. The origins of the word are unclear, but "hen" probably originally meant death rather than referring to chickens. Other etymologies of the word associate it with the Indo-European stem *bhelena whose hypothetical meaning is 'crazy plant' and with the Proto-Germanic element bil meaning ‘vision, hallucination; magical power, miraculous ability’. Henbane was historically used in combination with other plants, such as mandrake, deadly nightshade, and datura, as an anaesthetic potion, as well as for its psychoactive properties in "magic brews". These psychoactive properties include visual hallucinations and a sensation of flight. It was originally used in continental Europe, Asia, and the Arab world, though it did spread to England in the Middle Ages. The use of henbane by the ancient Greeks was documented by Pliny, who said it was "of the nature of wine and therefore offensive to the understanding", and by Dioscorides, who recommended it as a sedative and analgesic. The plant, recorded as Herba Apollinaris, was used to yield oracles by the priestesses of Apollo. Recently evidence for its use in the earlier British Neolithic has been debated. John Gerard's Herball states: "The leaves, the seeds and the juice, when taken internally cause an unquiet sleep, like unto the sleep of drunkenness, which continueth long and is deadly to the patient. To wash the feet in a decoction of Henbane, as also the often smelling of the flowers causeth sleep." The plant was also purportedly used as a fumigant for magical purposes. Albertus Magnus, in his work De Vegetalibus (1250), reported that necromancers used henbane to invoke the souls of the dead as well as demons. Henbane was already being demonized as early as the Late Middle Ages when it became inseparably associated with witchcraft and malefic practices.

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Related concepts (16)

Deliriant

Deliriants are a subclass of hallucinogen. The term was coined in the early 1980s to distinguish these drugs from psychedelics and dissociatives such as LSD and ketamine, respectively, due to their primary effect of causing delirium, as opposed to the more lucid and less disturbed states produced by other types of hallucinogens. The term generally refers to anticholinergic drugs, which are substances that inhibit the function of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine.

Solanaceae

The Solanaceae (ˌsɒləˈneɪsi.iː,_-ˌaɪ), or the nightshades, are a family of flowering plants that ranges from annual and perennial herbs to vines, lianas, epiphytes, shrubs, and trees, and includes a number of agricultural crops, medicinal plants, spices, weeds, and ornamentals. Many members of the family contain potent alkaloids, and some are highly toxic, but many—including tomatoes, potatoes, eggplant, bell and chili peppers—are used as food. The family belongs to the order Solanales, in the asterid group and class Magnoliopsida (dicotyledons).

Mandragora officinarum

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