Originally published at Lughnasa 1998. Henbane, whose botanical name is Hyoscyamus niger, is a member of the Solanaceae order of plants which includes such innocuous members as the humble potato and tomato but also highly poisonous and notorious ones such as belladonna, mandrake and the daturas.
St. Bartholomew's Day massacre. English: The St. Bartholomew's Day massacre (Massacre de la Saint-BarthÃ©lemy in French) was a wave of Catholic mob violence against the Huguenots (French Protestants).
In France, the Wars of Religion between Catholics and Huguenots raged for more than 30 years and included the most infamous massacre of Protestants in European history: the slaughter of thousands of Huguenots in Paris on St. Bartholomew's Day -- August 23, 1572.