Читать книгу Love Potions Through the Ages: A Study of Amatory Devices and Mores онлайн

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The name satyrion is evidently associated with the Greek satyr, a wood spirit, partly goat-like, and partly human. Attendants to the rustic god Pan, the satyrs were known as bestial and lustful creatures, symbolic of the basic sexual passion of man.

Botanically, satyrion is a plant with smooth leaves, red-tinted, and equipped with a two-fold root. The lower part of this root was credited anciently with promoting male conception, while the other part was conducive to female conception. In its modern counterpart, satyrion has been associated with the Iris florantina.

There is another variety of satyrion, called Serapias. This has pear-shaped leaves and a tall elongated stem. Its root consists of two tubers that have the appearance of testes. Unquestionably, the association of the plant as an aphrodisiac derives from the orchidaceous configuration of the root.

Remarkable properties were attributed to the root of satyrion. When it was dissolved in goat’s milk, the erotic effect was so vigorous and urgent that, as the Greek philosopher Theophrastus asserts in his Enquiry into Plants, the potion produced, on a particular occasion, some seventy consecutive coital performances.