Chapter Man of December to Manfred of M by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Mandrake The root of the mandragora often divides itself in two, and presents a rude appearance of a man. In ancient times human figures were often cut out of the root, and wonderful virtues ascribed to them. It was used to produce fecundity in women (Gen. xxx. 14-16). Some mandrakes cannot be pulled from the earth without producing fatal effects, so a cord used to be fixed to the root, and round a dog's neck, and the dog being chased drew out the mandrake and died. Another superstition is that when the mandrake is uprooted it utters a scream, in explanation of which Thomas Newton, in his Herball to the Bible, says, “It is supposed to be a creature having life, engendered under the earth of the seed of some dead person put to death for murder.”

“Shrieks like mandrakes' torn out of the earth.”
Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet, iv. 3.

   Mandrakes called love-apples. From the old notion that they excited amorous inclinations; hence Venus is called Mandragoritis, and the Emperor Julian, in his epistles, tells Calixenes that he drank its juice nightly as a love-potion.
   He has eaten mandrake. Said of a very indolent and sleepy man, from the narcotic and stupefying properties of the plant, well known to the ancients.

“Give me to drink mandragora ... That I might sleep out this great gap of time My Antony is away.” Shakespeare: Antony and Cleopatra, i. 5.

   Mandrake. Another superstition connected with this plant is that a small dose makes a person vain of his beauty, and conceited; but that a large dose makes him an idiot.

Mandricardo King of Tartary, or Scythia, son of Agrican. He wore Hector's cuirass, married Doralis, and was slain in single combat by Rogero. (Orlando Innamorato, and Orlando Furioso.)

Manduce (2 syl.). the idol Gluttony, venerated by the Gastrolaters, people whose god was their belly.

“It is a monstrous ... figure, fit to frighten little children; its eyes are bigger than its belly, and its head larger than all the rest of its body, ... having a goodly pair of wide jaws, lined with two rows of teeth, which, by the magic of a small twine ... are made to clash, chatter, and rattle against the other, as the jaws of St. Clement's dragon (called graulli) on St. Mark's procession at Metz.”- Rabelais Pantagruel, iv. 59.

Manes To appease his Manes. To do when a person is dead what would have pleased him or was due to him when alive. The spirit or ghost of the dead was by the Romans called his Manes, which never slept quietly in the grave so long as survivors left its wishes unfulfilled. The 19th February was the day when all the living sacrificed to the shades of dead relations and friends.
   Manes (2 syl.) from the old word manis, i.e. “bonus,” “quod eos venerantes manes vocarent, ut Græci chrestous.” (See Lucretius, iii. 52.) It cannot come from maneo, to remain (because this part of man remains after the body is dead), because the a is long.
   In the Christian Church there is an All Souls' Day.

Manfred Count Manfred, son of Count Sigismund, sold himself to the Prince of Darkness, and had seven spirits bound to do his bidding, viz. the spirits of “earth, ocean, air, night, mountains, winds,” and the star of his own destiny. He was wholly without human sympathies, and lived in splendid solitude among the Alpine mountains. He once loved the Lady Astarte (2 syl.) who died, but Manfred went to the hall of Arimanes to see and speak to her phantom, and was told that he would die the following day. The next day the Spirit of his Destiny came to summon him; the proud count scornfully dismissed it, and died. (Byron Manfred.