The mushroom was traditionally used to make poisoned bait for flies. This practice is documented in Germanic- and Slavic-speaking parts of Europe, as well as in the Vosges region on a the France-German border and in parts of Romania.

Albertus Magnus first mentioned it in his work De vegetabilibus shortly before 1256, that ‘the fungus called muscarum is poisonous; if it is mixed with milk, the flies that alight upon that milk and taste it swell up and die. The 16th-century Flemish botanist Carolus Clusius wrote that "These mushrooms are often found in the old forests around Frankfurt am Main, where they are collected by peasant women and carried into town for sale. Most buyers are familiar with them and buy them to kill flies. Since, as I have said before, flies love to sit on them, people scatter pieces of these mushrooms on the floor. Attracted by their scent, flies drink the mushroom juice, which is poisonous to them, and soon die."

Carl Linnaeus reported this use of the mushroom from Småland in southern Sweden, where he had lived as a child. English mycologist John Ramsbottom reports that Amanita muscaria was used to kill insects in England and Sweden, and records the old alternative name for this species, bug agaric. Eugène Rolland describes how peasants in the commune of Le Val-d'Ajol, in the Vosges Mountains, hang fly agarics from the ceiling, where, they say, the mushrooms "suck the flies to death."

Linnaeus described this species in the second volume of Species Plantarum in 1753, giving it the name Agaricus muscarius, with the specific epithet derived from the Latin musca, meaning "fly." The mushroom received its current scientific name in 1783, when Jean-Baptiste Lamarck assigned it to the genus Amanita. Thus, the it's current full scientific name is Amanita muscaria (L.) Lam.

French mycologist Pierre Bulliard reported that he had unsuccessfully attempted to reproduce the insecticidal action of this mushroom (Histoire des plantes vénéneuses et suspectes de la France, 1784) and therefore proposed a new binomial name, Agaricus pseudo-aurantiacus. The substance 1,3-diolein (1,3-di(cis-9-octadecenoyl)glycerol) has been found in the mushroom; it attracts insects but does not kill them. However, muscimol, which is also present in the mushroom, affects the nervous system of flies, temporarily rendering them flightless. In this state, flies can drown in the milk used as bait. If the flies are removed from the trap, they recover and fly again once the effect of the substance wears off.

An alternative explanation of the name suggests that the element "fly" refers not to the insects themselves but rather to the delirium that resulting from human consumption of the mushroom. This interpretation is based on a medieval belief that flies could enter a person's head and cause mental illness.

Wasson, R., Wasson V. P. Mushrooms, Russia and History. New York: Pantheon Books (1957)

Magnus A. (1256). "Book II, Chapter 6; p. 87 and Book VI, Chapter 7; p. 345". De vegetabilibus.

Ramsbottom, John (1989). Mushrooms and Toadstools. Penguin, p. 44.

Clusius C. "Genus XII of the pernicious mushrooms". Rariorum plantarum historia.

Linnaeus C.. Flora svecica [suecica] exhibens plantas per regnum Sueciae crescentes systematice cum differentiis specierum, synonymis autorum, nominibus incolarum, solo locorum, usu pharmacopæorum (in Latin). Stockholm: Laurentii Salvii.

Linnaeus C. Species Plantarum. Vol. 2. Stockholm: Laurentii Salvii. p. 1172.

Simpson DP (1979). Cassell's Latin dictionary (5th ed.). London: Cassell Ltd. p. 883..

Hawksworth, David L. (2001). "The Naming of Fungi". In McLaughlin, David J.; McLaughlin, Esther G.; Lemke, Paul A. (eds.). Systematics and Evolution. pp. 171–192. doi:10.1007/978-3-662-10189-6_6. ISBN 978-3-642-08576-5.

Benjamin, Denis R. (1995). Mushrooms: poisons and panaceas—a handbook for naturalists, mycologists and physicians. New York: WH Freeman and Company., pp. 306–307.

Samorini, Giorgio (2002). Animals and psychedelics: the natural world and the instinct to alter consciousness. Inner Traditions/Bear. 823/1251 (67%) in Kindle edition. ISBN 978-0-89281-986-7.

Michelot D; Melendez-Howell LM. (2003). "Amanita muscaria: chemistry, biology, toxicology, and ethnomycology". Mycological Research. 107 (Pt 2): 131–46. Bibcode:2003MycR..107..131M. doi:10.1017/S0953756203007305.