μανδραγόρας Ancient Greek · revision 3235

+ {{infobox|confidence=unknown|attested=5th–4th century BC, Plato and Xenophon}}

+

+ ==Pronunciation==

+ * IPA (5th-century BC Attic): /man.dra.ɡó.raːs/^(Wiktionary)

+ * IPA (4th-century AD Koine): /man.draˈɣo.ras/^(Wiktionary)

+ * IPA (10th-century Byzantine): /man.draˈɣo.ras/^(Wiktionary)

+

+ ==Forms==

+ '''μᾰνδρᾰγόρᾱς''' (mandragórās) ''m'' (genitive μᾰνδρᾰγόρου); first declension^(Wiktionary)

+

+ ==Etymology==

+ The origin is unexplained.^(Beekes 2010)^(Frisk 1960) E. Fraenkel suspected that the plant was named after a person, perhaps a physician.^(Beekes 2010)^(Frisk 1960) Following Lagarde, Schrader and Nehring hesitantly compared the Persian name of the plant, meaning “plant of humans”; the root was called “man-shaped” by a Greek writer and “half-man” by Columella.^(Beekes 2010)^(Frisk 1960) It may be a foreign word reshaped by folk etymology.^(Beekes 2010)^(Wiktionary) The CGL calls it perhaps a loanword.^(CGL 2021)

+

+ ==Earliest recorded meaning==

+ Plato, Xenophon and Demosthenes mention it as a plant from which a sleep-inducing drug was made.^(CGL 2021)^(Beekes 2010)

+

+ ==Semantic evolution==

+ Theophrastus describes the plant.^(Beekes 2010)^(Frisk 1960) It was thought to be an aphrodisiac: Hesychius records ''Μανδραγορῖτις'' as a name of Aphrodite, Dioscorides speaks of mandrake wine, and Alexis wrote a comedy called “The Woman Drugged with Mandrake”.^(Beekes 2010)^(Frisk 1960) In the Septuagint the mandrakes are the plants that Rachel obtains from Leah in Genesis.^(Lust 2003)

+

+ It was borrowed into Latin as [[m|la|mandragorās]], into Syriac, Armenian, Georgian and Old Church Slavonic, and became the source of English ''mandrake''.^(Wiktionary)^(Beekes 2010) Modern Greek [[m|el|μανδραγόρας|tr=mandragóras]] is a learned word for the plant, known for its narcotic properties and its man-shaped root.^(Triantafyllidis 1998)

+

+ ==Timeline==

+ * 5th–4th century BC – Plato and Xenophon mention it as a drug that causes sleep.^(CGL 2021)

+ * 4th century BC – Demosthenes mentions it.^(CGL 2021)

+ * 4th–3rd century BC – Theophrastus describes the plant.^(Beekes 2010)

+ * 3rd–1st century BC – The Septuagint uses it for the mandrakes of Genesis.^(Lust 2003)

+ * 1st century AD – Dioscorides mentions mandrake wine.^(Beekes 2010)^(Frisk 1960)

+

+ ==Meanings==

+ ===Noun===

+ # The [[m|en|mandrake]], ''Mandragora officinarum'', a plant used to make a [[m|en|soporific]] drug.^(CGL 2021)^(Wiktionary)

+

+ ==Related words==

+ * [[la|mandragoras]]

+ * [[en|mandrake]]

+

+ ==References==

+ {{reflist}}