RANDOLPH. — MANDRAGORA IN FOLK-LORE AND MEDICINE. 503 



Evidence of belief in the mandragora's aphrodisiac properties, as well 

 as in its power to produce fecundity are found in two passages in the 

 Septuagint version of the Scriptures, where the Hebrew dudd'im, mean- 

 ing literally lot'C-apples, is translated by fjuavSpayopaL or ixrjka fxavSpayoptuv. 



In the seventh of the Canticles, 10-13, we read : 



I am my beloved's, 



And his desire is toward me. 



Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field; 



Let us lodge in the villages. 



Let us go up early to the vineyards ; 



Let us see whether the vine hath budded and its blossom be open, 



And the pomegranates be in flower : 



There will I give thee my love. 



The mandrakes give forth fragrance. 



And at our doors are all manner of precious fruits, new and old, 



Which I have laid up for thee, O my beloved. 



Here both the meaning of the Hebrew diida'im, and the context indicate 

 that an aphrodisiac is referred to. 



The other passage. Genesis 30. 14-16, is as follows : 



And Reuben went in the days of wheat harvest, and found mandrakes in 

 the field, and brought them unto his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to 

 Leah, Give me, I pray thee, of thy son's mandrakes. And she said to her, 

 is it a small matter that thou hast taken away my husband ? and wouldest 

 thou take away my son's mandrakes also? /Vnd Rachel said. Therefore he 

 shall lie with thee to-night for thy son's mandrakes. And Jacob came 

 from the field in the evening, and Leah went out to meet him, and said, 

 Thou must come in unto me ; for I have surely hired thee with my sou's 

 mandrakes. 



Why Rachel wanted the dudittm, was a source of much discussion to 

 the fathers who wrote commentaries on Genesis. The theory commonly 

 accepted by these writers, that the dudd'im were supposed to promote con- 

 ception,* is evidently the correct one. In the first place, Rachel's bar- 

 fruit. Compare the interpretation of Michael Glycas, Script. Hist. Byz., vol. 26, 

 p. 100 f. 



Compare with this story about the elephant the statement of Dioscorides 

 (1. 572) : /xaXdcradv 5e Kal f\i(pavra \iyeTai 7) pi^a crvi/eipofifi/r] aur^ (ttI S>pas g', Kol 

 tvirKacTTOv ainhv eis o &y Tis 0ov\r]d'p crxvi^^ irapaaKevd^eiy. Can there be any 

 connection ? 



* Accepting this theory, and identifying duda'im and mandragora, the fathers 



