23-04-2021, 03:52 AM
(20-04-2021, 09:36 PM)geoffreycaveney wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Cassytha (translingual) - "love vine: any of various Cassytha species alleged to have aphrodisiac properties"
One problem with this is that Cassytha is a tropical plant (see You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. for a distribution map), which was presumably unknown in England around 1400. It also apparently wasn't called Cassytha before the 18th century, You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. attributes the name to his student Pehr Osbeck. Wiktionary calls the name a "doublet of Cuscuta", so before that the word Cassytha was probably used, if at all, simply as another name of Cuscuta (dodder). The two plants look very similar although they're not related.
I also haven't found any reference to the use of Cassytha as an aphrodisiac outside the Caribbean. You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. lists a number of things it's used for in the Pacific but not as an aphrodisiac.