Realms of Fantasy and Myth: Week 54 - Mandrakes

Jun 18, 201321 min read

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Published: Jun 18, 2013

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Realms of Fantasy and Myth: Week 54 - Mandrakes

Welcome to issue #54 of my fantasy features!
These are now part of a collection in a group created specifically for this project. If you like this feature, you can find more gorgeous artwork at the group, including some never featured in these articles before.

I hope you enjoy it, and please, show the featured artists some love and recognition through pageviews,

's and

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This week's creature feature is: Mandrakes

Note: The legends and lore involving Mandrakes, or Mandragora, vary according to source. This feature describes the "screaming plant", as well as the scientific one, as the former is directly derived from the latter. This is really just to appreciate the artwork, not so much to educate.
Also, to keep this article from having to be listed as mature, several aspects of the creature have been omitted. So please don't point out what I have left out in the comments!

From Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandrago… :

Mandrake is the common name for members of the plant genus Mandragora, particularly the species Mandragora officinarum, belonging to the nightshades family. The roots sometimes contain bifurcations causing them to resemble human figures.
[They are a] parasympathetic depressant, hallucinogen, and hypnotic. Most hypnotics produce low alphoid and spindle alpha brain-wave activity, similar to that found in REM sleep, or the dreaming state. This rhythm does not allow deep sleep to occur although it does lower brain patterns. Mandrake root causes delirium and hallucinations. In high doses, it can even send the user into a coma.
According to the legend, when the root is dug up it screams and kills all who hear it. Literature includes complex directions for harvesting a mandrake root in relative safety.
For example Josephus (c. AD 37 Jerusalem – c. 100) gives the following directions for pulling it up:
"A furrow must be dug around the root until its lower part is exposed, then a dog is tied to it, after which the person tying the dog must get away. The dog then endeavours to follow him, and so easily pulls up the root, but dies suddenly instead of his master. After this the root can be handled without fear."

Shakespeare refers four times to mandrake and twice under the name of mandragora.
"...Not poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou owedst yesterday."
Shakespeare: Othello III.iii

"Give me to drink mandragora...
That I might sleep out this great gap of time
My Antony is away."
Shakespeare: Antony and Cleopatra I.v

"Shrieks like mandrakes' torn out of the earth."
Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet IV.iii

"Would curses kill, as doth the mandrake's groan"
King Henry VI part II III.ii

Now, for the features! Works are featured from various categories, in no particular order:

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MonsterGirlMonth 07 - Plant Girl by Ekuneshiel

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HARRY POTTER: MANDRAKE by Jerome-K-Moore

1:12 Miniature Mandrake Roots by NJD-Miniatures

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Hangmans Hill creature, Arkham MA What is it? by vonmeer

Verona Barrella OOAK POLYMER CLAY SCULPT MANDRAKES by veronabarrella

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Thank you so much for viewing, and come back next time for a different inhabitant of the Realms of Fantasy and Myth!