Ancient Greece Revisited and Survive the Jive at Temple of Poseidon

Michael and I discussed philosophy, history, religion and psychedelic drugs

The ancient Indo-European Cannabis Cult

Who were the first cannabis users in history? Cannabis sativa has been cultivated by humans for thousands of years both as a narcotic and also for making hemp fabrics. Brand new genetic and archaeological evidence places the original domestication event in China, but indicates that the plant was mainly spread by Indo-European peoples such as the Yamnaya and the Scythians. Cannabis was used in the funerary and religious rites in many pagan religions as well as in ancient Jewish rites in Israel.

Art

Waking of sky tree - Stonehenge shaman

A Forest of Shadows Art & Illustration  - Arda Viraf's dream

Sources

I was aided in research for this video by Chris Bennett of cannabisculture.com to whom I am very grateful

• Anthony, D., ‘The Horse, the Wheel, and Language’ 2007.
• Bennett, C., ‘Cannabis and the Soma solution’ Trine Day (2010)
• “Cannabis van 4200 jaar oud in graf Hanzelijn”
• Damgaard, et al (2018). ‘The first horse herders and the impact of early Bronze Age steppe expansions into Asia’. Science.
• Ecsedy, Istvan. People of the Pit-Grave Kurgans (1979).
• Eran Arie, Baruch Rosen & Dvory Namdar (2020) Cannabis and Frankincense at the Judahite Shrine of Arad, Tel Aviv
• Haak, W., Lazaridis, I., Patterson, N. et al. Massive migration from the steppe was a source for Indo-European languages in Europe. Nature 522, 207–211 (2015).
• Herodotus, The Histories, (Penguin Books,1972)
• Hoffmann, K., Aufsätze zur Indoiranistik II, Wiesbaden, 1976. Georg Holzer, “Namen skythischer und sarmatischer Stämme,” Anzeiger der philosophisch-historischen Klassse der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften 125, 1988, pp. 193-213.
• Hollard, C. et al. (2018). New genetic evidence of affinities and discontinuities between bronze age Siberian populations. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 167 (1): 97–107.
• Kershaw, K., ‘The one-eyed god: Odin and the (Indo-)Germanic Männerbünde’ (Journal of Indo-European studies monograph) 2000.
• Long, T., et al., (2017). Cannabis in Eurasia: origin of human use and Bronze Age trans-continental connections. Vegetation History and Archaeobotany. 26.
• Mandihassan, S., “Etymology of Names-Cannabis and Ephedra,” Journal: Studies in the History of Medicine, Vol.6, 1982
• Mallory, J. P. and Adams, Douglas Q., Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture, (Taylor & Francis, 1997)
• Merlin, M. 2003. Archaeological record for ancient Old World use of psychoactive plants. Economic Botany 57(3)
• Narasimhan VM, Patterson NJ, Moorjani P, et al. The Genomic Formation of South and Central Asia. bioRxiv. (2018).
• Ning, et al. (2019), ‘Ancient Genomes Reveal Yamnaya - Related Ancestry and a Potential Source of Indo-European Speakers in Iron Age Tianshan’
• Ren, M., et al. (2019). The origins of cannabis smoking: Chemical residue evidence from the first millennium BCE in the Pamirs. Science Advances. 5.
• Ren, G., et al. Large-scale whole-genome resequencing unravels the domestication history of Cannabis sativa. Sci Adv. 2021 Jul 16;7(29):eabg2286.
• Rosetti Dinu V. Movilele funerare de la Gurbăneşti (r. Lehliu, reg. Bucureşti) / Les tumulus funéraires de Gurbăneşti. In: Materiale şi cercetări arheologice, N°6 1959. pp. 791-816;
• Ruck, Carl, affidavit in Bennett v The Attorney General for Canada and the Minister of Health for Canada, (2009)
• Rudgley, Richard, The Encyclopedia of Psychoactive Substances, (Little, Brown and Company, 1998)
• Sarianidi V., Temples of Bronze Age Margiana: traditions of ritual architecture. Antiquity, (1994)
• Sherratt, Andrew, “Alcohol and its Alternatives:Symbol and substance in Pre-Industrial cultures,” in Consuming Habits: Drugs in History and Anthropology, by Jordan Goodman, Paul E. Lovejoy, Andrew Sherratt, Contributor Jordan Goodman, (Routledge, 1995)
• Sherratt, A. G., “Sacred and profane substances: the ritual use of narcotics in later Neolithic Europe” in E Garwood, D. Jennings, R. Skeates, andJ. Toms, eds., Sacred and profane: proceedings of a conference on archaeology, ritual and religion. Oxford University Committee for Archaeology Monographs. (1995)
• Xie, M. et al, (2013) Interdisciplinary investigation on ancient Ephedra twigs from Gumugou Cemetery (3800 B.P.) in Xinjiang region, northwest China. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23564427
• Yang, Y. (2019), ‘Shifting Memories: Burial Practices and Cultural Interaction in Bronze Age China A study of the Xiaohe-Gumugou cemeteries in the Tarim Basin’
• Zhang He, “Is Shuma the Chinese Analog of Soma/Haoma?” Sino-Platonic Papers, 216 (October, 2011)

Indo-European Pagan use of Psychedelic Drugs

A couple of good talks have come out recently on this subject which you can see below. I also already made a video and a blog post on the Hyperborean Hallucinogen subject a few years back. 

Magic Mushrooms

I took these photos of magic mushrooms growing in my Mum's garden a couple of years ago. The mouse was sitting nearby. I don't like mice so my initial reaction was to stomp on it, but I didn't. I don't know what he was doing there nor why he wasn't afraid of me. It's possible he was a drug user and had lost his natural fear of man. If I ever encounter that mouse again, I will teach it to fear man.