fly agaric

Definition of fly agaric

: a medium to large poisonous amanita mushroom (Amanita muscaria) with a usually bright red cap

Examples of fly agaric in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web My favorites are fly agaric mushrooms, with white stalks and bright red tops. — National Geographic, "The dreamlike fungi that thrives in nature’s damp corners," 5 Nov. 2020 Historians have long assumed that fly agaric, a hallucinogenic mushroom, was the berserkers’ drug of choice. — National Geographic, "How to cook a violent Viking stew—and a giant geode," 11 Feb. 2020 One of the more hotly contested hypotheses is that the berserkers ingested a hallucinogenic mushroom (Amanita muscaria), commonly known as fly agaric, just before battle to induce their trancelike state. — Jennifer Ouellette, Wired, "How Vikings Went Into a Trancelike Rage Before Battle," 21 Sep. 2019 One of the more hotly contested hypotheses is that the berserkers ingested a hallucinogenic mushroom (Amanita muscaria), commonly known as fly agaric, just before battle to induce their trance-like state. — Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, "Viking berserkers may have used henbane to induce trance-like state," 18 Sep. 2019 Reindeer historically have tripped on them too, and in some places fly agaric has even been associated with Christmas. — Joanna Klein, New York Times, "A Mushroom Out of a Fairy Tale That You Might Find in the Forest," 17 Oct. 2017 Recently mushroom hunters and nature lovers have been sharing photos of their fly agaric finds on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. — Joanna Klein, New York Times, "A Mushroom Out of a Fairy Tale That You Might Find in the Forest," 17 Oct. 2017 The fly agaric is the quintessential mushroom of fairy tales. — Joanna Klein, New York Times, "A Mushroom Out of a Fairy Tale That You Might Find in the Forest," 17 Oct. 2017

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'fly agaric.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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Last Updated

26 Nov 2020

Cite this Entry

“Fly agaric.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fly%20agaric. Accessed 22 Jan. 2021.

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More Definitions for fly agaric

fly agaric

noun

Medical Definition of fly agaric

: a poisonous mushroom of the genus Amanita (A. muscaria) that has a variably colored but typically bright-red pileus with a warty white scurf on the surface that with the related death cap is responsible for most cases of severe mushroom poisoning, that has been used as a source of poison for flypaper, and that is extensively used chiefly in northeastern Asia as an intoxicant especially for the hallucinatory effects that it produces

— called also fly amanita, fly mushroom