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Concept
Mandragora
Résumé
Mandragora is a plant genus belonging to the nightshade family (Solanaceae). Members of the genus are known as mandrakes. Between three and five species are placed in the genus. The one or two species found around the Mediterranean constitute the mandrake of ancient writers such as Dioscorides. Two or three further species are found eastwards into China. All are perennial herbaceous plants, with large tap roots and leaves in the form of a rosette. Individual flowers are bell-shaped, whitish through to violet, and followed by yellow or orange berries.
Like many members of the Solanaceae, species of Mandragora contain highly biologically active alkaloids that make the plants poisonous. Their roots in particular have a long use in traditional medicine. Mandrakes are involved in many myths and superstitions.
Species of Mandragora are perennial herbaceous plants. They have large vertical tap roots, sometimes forked. Their stems are short or virtually absent. The leaves form a rosette at the base of the plant. The flowers are sometimes borne on a short stalk (scape), and are solitary, with whorls of five parts. The sepals are joined at the base, as are the petals, both in the shape of a lobed bell. The stamens are shorter than the petals, joined to the floral tube towards the base. The ovary has two chambers (locules). After fertilization, a yellow or orange fruit forms (botanically a berry).
The genus Mandragora was first used in 1753 by Carl Linnaeus in the first edition of Species Plantarum where the Mediterranean species Mandragora officinarum was described, which is thus the type species of the genus. (Linnaeus later changed his mind and in 1759 placed M. officinarum in the genus Atropa as A. mandragora.)
Jackson and Berry (1979) and Ungricht et al. (1998) have documented the subsequent confusion over the number of Mediterranean species of Mandragora and their scientific names. Dioscorides was among those who distinguished between "male" and "female" mandrakes, a distinction used in 1764 when Garsault published the names Mandragora mas and Mandragora foemina.
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