The Duda Uprooting Ceremony

From: Daphne Amotz (2025)
"The Duda in Judaism - Etymological, Ethnobotanical and Historical Aspects."
Argaman-Meitav Publishing House. Ganei Tikva.

In the book of Enoch 1 (8:3) it is written: "Shimchezi [one of the angels] learned sorcery and cut down [uprooted] roots." The translators comment on this: "to cut down roots and plants for the purpose of sorcery in matters of love between spouses." Hence, knowledge originating from higher powers was needed in order to collect magical herbs. Medicinal plants, especially those related to sexuality, fertility, melancholy, and madness (such as the duda), were considered to be connected to the dark forces of the underworld. In the Middle Ages, it was believed that the devil or demons resided in the roots of plants, hence the terrible danger that lurked for those who harmed the plant. The uprooting of these plants was accompanied by unique mysterious rituals and gestures intended to protect the uprooters from all harm and revenge.

Josephus describes the ceremony of uprooting the duda and emphasizes that "anyone who touches the root is mortal, unless he carries the root while it is hanging down in his hand. However, there is also another way to capture the root without harm, and this is the way: They dig in the ground around it until a little of it remains in the ground, and then they tie up a dog, and when the dog wants to follow its owner, it will easily uproot the root. Although the dog will die quickly, as if it had given its life as atonement for the man who tells it to pull up the root, from now on there will be no fear in the eyes of the one who touches it."

Theophrastus (ancient Greek botanist, 371–287 BCE) gives precise instructions on how to remove the yam so that the diggers are not harmed: "It is said that someone should draw three circles around the yam with a sword, and cut it while facing west, and while cutting the second piece he must dance around the plant and say as many things as possible about the mysteries of love."

Another description of the ritual (the manuscript is from the ninth century but the original is several centuries older, probably the second century AD) states: "When you come to the plant, you will notice it in the following way: the head of the plant shines like a lantern at night, when you see it immediately surround it with an [iron] chain so that it cannot escape, the ability of the plant is so great that it can escape from any person who is not clean. Therefore surround it with a chain and dig around it so that you do not touch the chain, then be very careful to remove the earth from around the plant with an ivory stake. And when you see the feet and hands of the duda, and finally tie a new rope to the plant. After you have tied it [the rope] to the plant, then tie it to the neck of a dog that you have starved.

Place the dog's food a little way from him so that by reaching for it he can uproot the plant [...] They say that the plant is so powerful that whoever uproots it dies immediately [...]". These three ancient sources still do not mention the deadly scream heard when uprooting the mandrake. A fifteenth-century Hebrew manuscript written in northern Italy describes: "And it shall be gathered in the month of May, the third day of the new moon, and it shall be taken out with a dog or other animal, and be careful that whoever digs it does not touch it and eats... [missing in the original] its hands and feet, immediately tie it to a rope and hang the end of the rope around the dog's neck and stand very far away so that it does not hear the mandrake's scream, which is very loud, because the dog will die from the force of the scream."

The scream is an expression of the humanoid roots, which scream when they are harmed while uprooting them. Based on this ancient tradition, it is told in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets that Professor Pomona Sprout warns Harry Potter and his classmates about the deadly scream of the mandrake when uprooting mandrake seedlings.

The Ritual of Uprooting the Duda – The danger involved in uprooting the Duda is first mentioned by Josephus, as well as by several other Jewish sources and many foreign sources. It should be noted that Josephus is the only source that indicates that the Duda may escape and must be dealt with before the uprooting begins.

Why a dog? In the explanation of the ritual of removing the duda in Armenia, the use of a dog is explained by the belief that this animal has supernatural powers that are particularly effective against death. Therefore, it was used so that the removers themselves would not die during the removal of the duda. One researcher who has dealt with this issue explains that the dog is at the same time an animal that helped the farmer and merchant with their work, but equally a wild animal that mythology has marked as a demonic creature in the service of the dark forces. Dogs were considered loyal on the one hand and connected to the underworld on the other, and were therefore considered animals that were permissible to sacrifice in the ritual of removing the duda. This ancient tradition, which links the dog to the removal of the duda, has remained in the names of the duda in several languages.

In Persian, the duda is called Sag-kanak (سگ کنک), meaning 'dog killer', Sag-kuš (سگ کش), meaning 'dog slaughterer' and Sag-šikan / sag shekan (سگ شکن), meaning 'dog breaker' and in Arabic 'قُتُل الُلُب' (قاتل الُلُب), the dog killer. According to some scholars, these names allude to the ritual of displacement, which indicates that the origin of the story of displacement by a dog is in Iran. In various European languages, the duda is called 'dog apple' (Latin: Mala canina, Dutch: Hondsappel, French: Pommes de chien, German: Pommes de chien, Hungarian: Ördögalma, Italian: Mela canina and Turkish: Köpek otu), as well as 'dog plant' (Köpek otu) and 'dog testicles' (Köpektaşağı) in Turkish.

We should note that all the general sources known to us mention the use of a dog to dislodge the mulberry, and only in our sources is another animal mentioned – the donkey. One researcher suggests that the use of the donkey as it appears in the Midrash Agada (twelfth-thirteenth centuries) and in the Myrrh Bundle (fifteenth century) was brought in as a counter-reaction to the tradition that mulberry is a magical plant. She emphasizes that Reuven noticed the mulberry only after its deadly effect on the donkey. In other words, he was not familiar with the mulberry and the magical ritual and tied the donkey at random. In this way, the midrashim overcame a misconception about the popularity of mulberry as a magical plant.

It is assumed that they knew about the magical properties of the duda and therefore let the donkey do the 'dirty work.' This explanation does not fit the later midrash presented in the book 'Moshav Zakenim' (fifth century CE), where it explicitly mentions taking the donkey for the purpose of uprooting the duda, and this is also implied by the description of uprooting the duda by Baruch Paitushi (eighteenth century).

A completely different objection to the use of a donkey to uproot the mandrake is raised by Dov Ashbel: "If the mandrake is the mandrake plant [...] the plant does not have any trunk or branches to which a donkey or other animal can be tied." Note that Josephus wrote: "They dig a trench around it until only a small part of the root remains hidden in the ground. Then they tie a dog to it, and when the dog runs after its owner, the root is easily uprooted," which is an answer to Dov Ashbel's objection if it is indeed a donkey.