Ancient Natural Painkillers

Mandragora

One of the first anesthetics to actually render patients unconscious appears to be Mandragora. Greek physician Dioscorides (AD 40–90) wrote of this effect in the first century AD when referring to Mandragora wine. The wine was made from the mandrake plant and caused a profound sleep to overtake surgical patients. Dioscorides described the sleep thus induced as “anesthesia.” In 13th-century Italy, Ugo Borgognoni (Hugh of Lucca) introduced the use of the “soporific sponge” (aka “sleep sponge”) to induce an anesthetic sleep. “A sponge was soaked in a dissolved solution of opium, Mandragora, hemlock juice, and other substances [before being] dried and stored.” After being moistened, it was held over the patient’s nose until its fumes caused him to lose consciousness.