ARTICLES

The Poisons, Potions, and Charms of

Shakespeares Plays

by Allison Meier on April 5, 2016

John Gerard, Robert Davies, Thomas Johnson, Robert Priest, John Payne, and Rembert
Dodoens, The herball or Generall historie of plantes (London, 1633), printed by Adam Islip
Joice Norton and Richard Whitakers (courtesy Currier Museum of Art Library and Archives)

Potions, poisons, and symbolic herbs are frequent plot devices in the plays of William
Shakespeare, and reflect the medical knowledge of his time. Herbals recorded the
plant-based concoctions, and through these rare books we can connect
his references to remedies of the 16th and 17th century, whether the potent sleeping
draught consumed by Juliet, or the rosemary for remembrance perfuming Ophelias
bouquet.

Engraving by W. Byrne after Edward Edwards of the three witches of Macbeth concocting a
potion in their cauldron (1773) (via Wellcome Images/Wikimedia) (click to enlarge)

Input from the emerging professions of physicians and barber surgeons coexisted
with folk medicine, which was familiar to Shakespeare and his contemporaries,
Meghan Petersen, a librarian and archivist at the Currier Museum of Art in New
Hampshire, explained to Hyperallergic. Women were expected to plant and tend
their own gardens complete with herbs to address basic healthcare needs of the
household. Shakespeares audience would have understood the basic qualities of
many of the plants he referenced but certainly, as evidenced by his writing, he
employed these plants and herbs in specifically effective and atmospheric ways.

Petersen curated Shakespeares Potions, on view at the Currier Museum of Art,

which pairs historic herbals from its library with film stills, showing two ways of
visualizing the potions. The small show joins a horde of Shakespearean happenings
around the world this year marking 400 year since his death from the display of
his only surviving handwritten manuscript, to a digital recreation of the 18th-century
Shakespeare Gallery. The Currier Museum of Art is also hosting a rare First Folio,
starting April 9.
Petersen saw potions as an accessible introduction to both a deeper meaning
in the plays and the history of herbals. As it turns out, many of the volumes in our
collection are some of the most significant English herbals published during the time
Shakespeare lived, she stated. Shakespeare took dramatic advantage of the natural
world and used herbs not only for twists in plot, but for characters names.

Arthur Rackhams illustration of Titania asleep in A Midsummer Nights Dream (1909)

(via Wikimedia)

Titania, the fairy queen of A Midsummer Nights Dream, has four followers named for
household remedy ingredients: Cobweb, Peaseblossom, Mustardseed, and Moth.
Oberon also sees Titania sleeping on a bank where the wild thyme blows, / Where

oxlips and the nodding violet grows, / Quite over-canopied with luscious
woodbine, / With sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine. The aromatic language
precedes Oberon placing a love potion in her eyes. Petersen noted that while herbals
relayed cures, they additionally included herbs for provoking lust, such as sea holly,
mustard, and peas.
Shakespeares Potions also explores perhaps the most famous of the Bards brews:
the witches cauldron of Macbeth. The sorceresses announce aloud their dark
ingredients for this charm of powerful trouble: In the cauldron boil and bake; / Eye
of newt and toe of frog [.] / Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf / Witches mummy, maw
and gulf / Of the ravined salt-sea shark, / Root of hemlock digged ith dark.

John Gerard, Robert Davies, Thomas Johnson, Robert Priest, John Payne, and Rembert
Dodoens, The herball or Generall historie of plantes (London, 1633), printed by Adam Islip
Joice Norton and Richard Whitakers (courtesy Currier Museum of Art Library and Archives)

While some of the components are outlandish, hemlock was a poison well-known in
herbals, the digged ith dark emphasizing, as Petersen stated, the belief that plants
harvested in the dark without the light of the moon took on evil and villainous
powers. The toxic plant also appears in Hamlet with this emphasis: Thou mixture
rank, of midnight weeds collected.
Beyond just showing the context of these herbs, Shakespeares Potions also aims to
connect the worlds of the plays to everyday life in the Elizabethan era, when

knowledge of natural remedies and belief in their power was recognized across
classes.
Some of these books are dirty, they have bits and pieces of biological matter in
them, Petersen said. There are drawings of leaves and stems tucked inside and
annotations and marginalia on the pages themselves. These books were used and as
physical objects, they carry visible signs of human interaction.

A depiction of Romeo buying a poison from an apothecary (via Wellcome Images/Wikimedia)

John Gerard, Robert Davies, Thomas Johnson, Robert Priest, John Payne, and Rembert
Dodoens, The herball or Generall historie of plantes (London, 1633), printed by Adam Islip
Joice Norton and Richard Whitakers (courtesy Currier Museum of Art Library and Archives)

Shakespeares Potions continues at the Currier Museum of Art (150 Ash Street,
Manchester, New Hampshire) through June 26 .