Across medieval Germany the most feared plant was not poisonous. It was the mandrake — Alraune in German — whose forked, humanoid root was believed to be a tiny earth-bound spirit growing in the soil where a hanged man's last drops of life had fallen.
Folk magic across the German-speaking world treated the Alraune as a household familiar. Dressed in scraps of silk, kept in a small carved box, fed bread and wine and bathed every Friday, the root was said to bring its owner wealth, healing, foresight and protection from witchcraft. It would even answer questions if you knew how to listen.
But getting one was the trick. The legend was strict. Pulled from the earth, the mandrake would let out a scream so terrible that any human who heard it would die or go mad. So the harvester would arrive at midnight, plug their ears with wax, loosen the soil around the root, tie a hungry black dog to it with a length of rope, and walk away holding a piece of meat. The dog lunged for the meat, ripped the root free, and died from the scream — sparing the human.
The cruelty of the story tells you how badly people wanted what the root promised. The Alraune sat at the crossroads of medicine, magic and money. Apothecaries sold them. Witch-hunters confiscated them. Wills mentioned them. They were inherited from mother to daughter like a piece of jewellery you fed.
Modern botany now knows the mandrake's narcotic alkaloids really did cause hallucinations, paralysis and sometimes death — so its reputation as a dangerous, intelligent, almost-conscious plant was not entirely invented.
Wear the Alraune and you wear the oldest German story about how dearly the earth charges for its power.