Mandrakes and The hand of glory

[alshainofthenorth]

No: HPFGUIDX 96033

Here's an interesting coincidence I stumbled across a few weeks ago, 
and I don't think I've ever seen a Harry Potter site make the 
connection before. I thought people might be interested to find out.

The etymology of the Hand of Glory goes like this: 

The Latin name for mandrake is Mandragora Officinalis. In the French 
vernacular, 'mandragore' was corrupted to 'main de gloire' (which 
means exactly 'hand of glory', and the root looks a bit hand-shaped --
well, it looks a lot more like a hand than a human body.)

http://www.themystica.com/mystica/articles/h/hand_of_glory.html
http://www.dangerousthings.net/extras/tour/folkloreshome.shtml
http://monsters.monstrous.com/mandrake.htm

Mandrakes and the Hand of Glory have other things in common as well. 
You obtain a Hand of Glory from the corpse of a hanged man, 
preferentially a murderer, and the mandrake was said to sprout from 
the ground beneath the gallows, out of the semen from the hanged.   

I'm beginning to think it isn't a coincidence that JKR introduces 
mandrakes and the Hand of Glory in the same book and can't help 
thinking that this is somehow significant. But *what* does it signify?

Alshain the bewildered