Aconite napellus Jupiter's helmet plant

Anecdotes

Aconitum napellus was considered a magical plant associated with black magic.
According to legend, Jupiter's helmet is feared like the plague by werewolves, vampires and demons. In the past, certain bonesetters prescribed aconite to unfortunate people who believed themselves to have been transformed into wolves.
➥If ingested, it causes burning of the mouth, a feeling of tingling, headaches, dizziness, nausea, colic, a sensation of numbness of the skin of the face. Causes paralysis and heart failure. It was the plant poison par excellence in antiquity. According to the writings of a disciple of Aristotle, the toxic substance could be dosed in such a way that the poisoned person would only die after two, three, or even six months, through progressive paralysis.

➥Antiquity knew of plants with hallucinogenic or dream-inducing effects. Among them there are aconite, belladonna, hemp, foxglove, mandrake, jimsonweed... Aconite was used in the preparation of philters, ointments or magic potions.

➥ In ancient Europe and Asia, Aconite was used to poison the enemy's water supply. In addition, hunters used its juice to poison their spears, their arrowheads and the bait for their traps.

➥ It would heal people bitten by a snake but would poison healthy people.

➥ Aconite is said to have been born from the drool vomited by Cerberus, the dog who guarded the Underworld, when during his twelve labors, Herakhles had pulled him out, foaming with rage, in order to bring him back to Eurystheus. From this dried slime a flower was born among the bare rocks and dust: akoniton designates in Greek a plant growing in the rocks.

➥ It appears in Antiquity to have been one of the first plants used as an infusion, like hemlock, for the execution of those condemned to death. but it is not only in infusion that it can be fatal.

➥ Hungry soldiers found roots in nature similar to those of turnips which they ate only to die immediately. The same drama was to recur in 1960, with French soldiers abandoned in the Pyrenees for a "survival operation" which had not been preceded by botany teaching. Despite this great toxicity, it has been recognized for less than two centuries as having sedative and analgesic properties.