ABSTRACT
In culture, a potato is hardly associated with sexual virility; yet, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the tuber was considered to be a powerful aphrodisiac. The aphrodisiacal attributes of the potato derive from the tuber’s origin in the Americas, a source that was well established in early modern texts. In the sixteenth century, European countries exploring the New World concentrated heavily on the commodities that came from the Americas: commodities that could be produced, transported, marketed, and sold throughout the world. The agriculture of indigenous peoples shaped European society, and subsequently English literature, in new and startling ways. Indeed, the study of botany in Europe began after vessels returned with numerous new plants from the New World; the first modern medical garden was founded in Padua in 1545. Europeans might have succeeded in colonizing the New World, but potatoes succeeded in colonizing the stomachs and libidos of the Old World.
