BOOK XXV. xciv. 147-149 



XCIV. Some " physicians used to employ the Mandrake 

 mandrake also ; afterwai*ds it was disearded as a {^J. ''^* ^^^*' 

 medicine for the eyes. What is certain is that the 

 pounded root, with rose oil and wine, cures fluxes 

 and pain in the eyes. But ^ the juice is used as an 

 ingredient in many eye remedies. Some give the 

 name circaeon to the mandrake. There are two 

 kinds of it : the white, which is also considered male, 

 and the black, considered female. The leaves are 

 narrower than those of lettuce, the stems hairy, and 

 the roots, two or three in number, reddish,'' white 

 inside, fleshy and tender, and almost a cubit in length. 

 They bear fruit of the size of filberts, and in these are 

 seeds Hke the pips of pears. When the seed is 

 white the plant is called by some arsen,'* by others 

 morion, and by others hippophlomos. The leaves of 

 this mandrake are whitish, broader than those of the 

 other,^ and Uke those of cultivated lapathum. The 

 diggers avoid facing the wind, first trace round the 

 plant three circles with a sword, and then do their dig- 

 ging while facing the west. The juice can also be ob- 

 tained from the fruit, from the stem, after cutting oif 

 the top, and from the root, which is opened by pricks 

 or boiled down to a decoction. Even the shoot of its 

 root can be used, and the root is also cut into round 

 slices and kept in wine. The juice is not found 



vnav, evSoOev 8e XevKaL But even if foris can represent /card 

 TTjv iTTi^aviLav, nigris foris was most unlikely to be cor- 

 rupted to rufulis. The word fieXas often means " of the 

 colour of port wine," and rufulus is not very far away from 

 that. 



"^ "Male," Greek apa-qv. Fee thinks that the morion was not 

 the mandrake but Atropa belladonna. 



' After alterius we can understand foliis. It is not necessary 

 to insert it, nor to add quam before alterius. 



241 



