Messalina, the wife of the Roman Emperor Claudius, was infamous for her licentiousness, her intrigues, and her obscene amours. Historical testimony relates that she had amorous encounters with fourteen athletes, and in consequence assumed the honorific of _Invincible_. In commemoration of the episode she also dedicated fourteen wreaths to the Priapic god.
Apuleius, the Roman novelist who flourished in the second century A.D., alludes to an ancient Roman list of ingredients in the preparation of love-potions:
They dig out all kinds of philtres from everywhere: they search for the agent that arouses mutual love: pills and nails and threads, roots and herbs and shoots, the two-tailed lizard, and charms from mares.
A certain philtre, according to the testimony of Girolamo Folengo in his _Maccaronea_, published in 1519, was composed of black dust from a tomb, the venom of a toad, the flesh of a brigand, the lung of an ass, the blood of a blind infant, the bile of an ox, and corpses rifled from graves.
It is unusual to discover a decided anti-aphrodisiac, recommended as an antidote, for banishing lust. The following prescription appears in the _Secrets of Albertus Magnus_, a medieval magic manual:
Turtur, a Turtle, is a birde very well knowne. It is called Merlon of the Chaldees, of the Greeks Pilax. If the heart of this foule be borne in a Wolves skin, he that weareth it shall never have an appetite to commit lechery from henceforth.
In the same magic manual attributed to Albertus Magnus the medieval philosopher, there is a description of a philtre that has a number of properties, both medicinal and amatory:
The seventh is the herb of the planet Venus, and is called Pisterion, of some Hierobotane, id est, Sterbo columbaria et Verbena, Vervin.
The root of this herb put upon the neck healeth the swine pockes, apostumus behinde the eares, and botches of the neck, and such as cannot keepe their water. It healeth cuts also, and swelling of the evil, or fundament, proceeding of an inflammation which groweth in the fundament.
It is also of great strength in veneriall pastimes. If any man put it into his house or vineyard, or in the ground, he shal have great store of increase.
Another love charm, from Albertus Magnus’ _Book of the Marvels of the World_, is designed to stabilize a woman’s affection: