Scopolia carniolica , the henbane bell, is a poisonous plant from the family Solanaceae

Solanaceae

Solanaceae are a family of flowering plants that include a number of important agricultural crops as well as many toxic plants. The name of the family comes from the Latin Solanum "the nightshade plant", but the further etymology of that word is unclear...

 with dark violet flower

Flower

A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in flowering plants . The biological function of a flower is to effect reproduction, usually by providing a mechanism for the union of sperm with eggs...

s on long hanging stems. It grows to 60 cm in height. It is poisonous as it contains abundant quantities of tropane alkaloid

Tropane alkaloid

Tropane alkaloids are a class of alkaloids and secondary metabolites that contain a tropane ring in their chemical structure...

s, particularly atropine

Atropine

Atropine is a naturally occurring tropane alkaloid extracted from deadly nightshade , Jimson weed , mandrake and other plants of the family Solanaceae. It is a secondary metabolite of these plants and serves as a drug with a wide variety of effects...

. The quantity of atropine is the highest in the root

Root

In vascular plants, the root is the organ of a plant that typically lies below the surface of the soil. This is not always the case, however, since a root can also be aerial or aerating . Furthermore, a stem normally occurring below ground is not exceptional either...

.

Scopolia carniolica grows on wet soils in beech

Beech

Beech is a genus of ten species of deciduous trees in the family Fagaceae, native to temperate Europe, Asia and North America.-Habit:...

 forests of southeastern Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

 from lowlands till the mountainous zone. In Slovenia grows also the rare form Scopolia carniolica f. hladnikiana, recognizable after having the inside and the outside of the corolla of green-yellow color.

Scopolia carniolica was first described by the botanist Carl Linnaeus and named in the honor of the physician Giovanni Antonio Scopoli

Giovanni Antonio Scopoli

Giovanni Antonio Scopoli was an Italian physician and naturalist.-Biography:...

 as Hyoscyamus scopolia. Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin

Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin

Nikolaus Joseph Freiherr von Jacquin or Baron Nikolaus von Jacquin. was a scientist who studied medicine, chemistry and botany....

classified it in the genus Scopolia.