Mexican Phantastica—A Study of the Early Ethnobotanical Sources on Hallucinogenic Drugs

INTRODUCTION The use of drugs which affect the higher cerebral functions was in the heritage of every civilization. The most commonly known of such substances were intoxicating liquors, produced by alcoholic fermentation from a wide range of materials. The Egyptians obtained buza, the precursor of beer, from barley; the Japanese sakC from rice; the Europeans wine from grapes; the Aztecs pulque from agave; the Incas chicha from maize; and even the Australian eolithic cultures managed to obtain an intoxicating drink from eucalyptus leaves. Drugs which produced mental stimulation were also used in every civilization, frequently as a complement to diet and always intimately related to social patterns : tea has been used from time immemorial in Asia, coffee in the near East, kola in Africa, mat6 in South America and cocoa in Central America, all of which were found to improve mental and muscular performance in the individual. Their use accounted for the great care exercised in the cultivation, processing, and commerce of these substances which achieved considerable economic importance. Yet man has always lived under the stress of pain and anxiety, and it might be said that these twin factors have influenced man’s actions more than any other. Hence the discovery of natural drugs such as opium, capable of at once abolishing physical pain and of relieving anxiety, became endowed with immense cultural significance in the Old World. On the other hand, the civilizations of the New World possessed a long tradition of natural drugs which affect the mind by stimulation of sensorial perceptions, thus imparting a new cosmic dimension to the individual. Long before the arrival of the Spaniards in ancient Perc the use of coca was well established and its effects were clearly distinguished. In other areas of South America inhaling cohoba snuff infusions and imbibing of yagd were common among aboriginal tribes seeking to induce hallucinations. However, of all the American civilizations Mexico was the cultural horizon with the greatest variety of phantastica drugs.