Recreational Drugs... 1600's - 1700's

[sutlerjon]

umm... uh.... I forgot what I was gonna say.

wow, I forgot what yoo was gonna sayhncjk.aLCD;TPFD; two.

)COUGH ..... cough ...... (

pass me yur liter, nEll ....... sorry.. Krispy ... not you .....

my skull

Wait, Sterling, (dang pirate hunters) you pulled me over .....

You gonna eat that??

Why is everyone out to get us? Better go Hide out somewhere.

My mouth is really dry .... almost cottony...

Better drink more rum the water can make you very ill in these days (although I won't understand why for a couple hundred more years), when I make it in to alcohol I don't get sick ...... that lasts for days ..... except for a little while until I don't know why I'm waking up smellin' like puke and in someone else hammock ..... any idea why that happens??

[NVBarbossa]

MMMMMM Betel nut, swallows the red juice in his mouth and gets even more of a buzz and a warm feeling going , it is a thng you must try. But be careful, too much lime and it will burn the mouth badly.

[Quartermaster James]

MMMMMM Betel nut, swallows the red juice in his mouth and gets even more of a buzz and a warm feeling going , it is a thng you must try. But be careful, too much lime and it will burn the mouth badly.

Hmm, well, now that there's shared interest, let us elucidate:

The nut is Areca Catechu, the leaves of Piper Betle. The are commonly used together, along with lime (the mineral, not the fruit), and more recently tobacco.

Areca nuts can sometimes be found in certain Asian grocers, labeled Palm Nuts, in the frozen section. The fresh betel leaves are sometimes in the produce section. The dried leaves are not recommended.

[Jib]

Anyone know if they chewed tabacco as a recreational drug or if the desired method of consumption was smoking?

[Rumba Rue]

umm... uh.... I forgot what I was gonna say.

wow, I forgot what yoo was gonna sayhncjk.aLCD;TPFD; two.

)COUGH ..... cough ...... (

pass me yur liter, nEll ....... sorry.. Krispy ... not you .....

my skull

Wait, Sterling, (dang pirate hunters) you pulled me over .....

You gonna eat that??

Why is everyone out to get us? Better go Hide out somewhere.

My mouth is really dry .... almost cottony...

Better drink more rum the water can make you very ill in these days (although I won't understand why for a couple hundred more years), when I make it in to alcohol I don't get sick ...... that lasts for days ..... except for a little while until I don't know why I'm waking up smellin' like puke and in someone else hammock ..... any idea why that happens??

ROTFLMAF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Fox]

From the miscellaneous papers of Royal Society scientist Robert Hooke, published after his death, 1726.

'[Cannabis] grows very common in India, and the Vertues, or quality thereof, are there very well known; and the Use thereof (tho' the effects are very strange, and, at first hearing, frightful enough) is very general and frequent: and the Person, from whom I received it [East India Company captain Robert Knox], hath made very many Trials of it, on himself, with very good Effect. 'Tis called, by the Moors, Gange, by the Chingalese, Comsa, and by the Portugals, Bangue. The Dose of it is about as much as may fill a common Tobacco-Pipe, the Leaves and Seeds being dried first, and pretty finely powdered. This Power being chewed and swallowed, or washed down, by a small Cup of Water, doth in a short Time, quite take away the Memory and Understanding; so that the Patient understands not, nor remembereth any Thing that he seeth, heareth, or doth, in that Extasie, but becomes, as it were, a mere Natural, being unable to speak a Word of Sense; yet he is very merry, and laughs, and sings, and speaks Words without any Coherence, not knowing what he saith or doth; yet he is not giddy, or drunk, but walks and dances, and sheweth many odd Tricks; after a little Time he falls asleep, and sleepeth very soundly and quietly; and when he wakes, he finds himself mightily refresh'd, and exceeding hungry.'

Hooke met Knox in 1681, and delivered the above address to the Royal Society in December 1689.

[Jib]

I always thought "Mary Jane" was native to the New World... I guess the mighty herb is around the globe!

[Quartermaster James]

To the best of my knowledge, Cannabis is native to central Asia and not native to the Americas.

Early on (1580's) a "hemp-like" plant was noted in what would become Virginia, but it proved to be Acnida cannabinum, a species of Dogbane, not Cannabis (Schaffer Library of Drug Policy).

Any resources documenting that Cannabis was not first brought to the Americas by colonists would be greatly appreciated.

Edited March 26, 2009 by Quartermaster James

[MarkG]

I know they found plenty of clay pipes in the ruins of Port Royal. I wonder if they found anything else that could have been used in recreational drug usage?

The pipes were almost certainly tobacco pipes. Tobacco was very popular at the time. Keep in mind that the tobacco of the time had a much higher nicotine content than modern tobacco so smoking a pipe would give you a nicotine buzz.

Several years ago someone I know bought up the crop of period tobacco that they grow at Saint Mary's City. He and a friend sold it as period twists. He said that he got a contact high just from handling the stuff. Someone else I know tried smoking it and said that he was just about talking to spirits from that stuff. I don't smoke but I have one of the twists for my display of period items.

Mark

[Cannibal Chrispy]

I wish someone with access would test some of these pipes, I am sure you would find more residue than just tobacco.

[Rumba Rue]

I wish someone with access would test some of these pipes, I am sure you would find more residue than just tobacco.

No doubt.........and it was probably rolled up and sold as hash/hash oil.

[Matty Bottles]

I wish someone with access would test some of these pipes, I am sure you would find more residue than just tobacco.

I'm not sure how trustworthy this is, but it looks as though somebody has.

Did Shakespeare Inhale?

[Jib]

Besides tobacco which drugs are native to the New World? The cocca leaf I would guess but was that well known?

[John Maddox Roberts]

Peyote is native to the New World and known to its natives, but as far as I know it grows only in northern Mexico and the American Southwest. The psilocybin mushroom grows here, too.

[Jib]

Peyote is cactus-like plant?

[Quartermaster James]

Peyote is cactus-like plant?

Yes. It is probably the most well known of mescaline producing plants.

Besides tobacco which drugs are native to the New World? The cocca leaf I would guess but was that well known?

Well, it seems you have two different questions here:

1)Which drugs are native to the New World?

2)When did they become well known?

Ayahuasca is a New World drug, but I can't cite any period references to it. Same too Salvia Divinorum. Actually, there are a lot of New World plants to consider; too many to list here.

If you include Polynesia as New World, then you also have Kava to consider. Again, I have no period sources to offer.

There are other New World plants that were used medicinally, such as Pau d'Arco (Tabebuia avellanedae) and the popular Echinacea Purpurea, but I gather your interest is in recreational drugs. This distinction is worthy of consideration in its own right. For example, I don't believe traditional uses of Peyote and Ayahuasca are properly considered recreational, whereas traditional Kava use might be.

Chocolate, of course, is a New World drug.

Edited April 8, 2009 by Quartermaster James

[Jib]

Chocolate is a very good recreational drug! Thanks for the reminder!

I believe the Aztecs drank chocolate mixed with vanilla.

[William Brand]

Peyote is cactus-like plant?

No. Peyote is a cactus-like, technocolor train wreck in slow motion in 3, sometimes 4-D.

[Mission]

I was reading my copy of Dr. Professor Señor E.T. Fox's Pirates In Their Own Words and I came across this quote in the court testimony of Thomas (middle name probably Michael) Bagley,

"...afterwards they sailed to the Coast near Cape Commoroome [Footnote 94: Cape Cormorin], and there in or abt the month of Dec: 1698 they found a Moorish Vessel abt 200 Tonns towing a shoare with boates, whereupon some of ye said ship the Pellicanns Company went off in their Boate and brought her off, the said ship having some Opium and Cotton aboard, and because their owne ship was leaky they burnt her and

__

went all aboard the sd Moorish ship, and they sold the goods abd her to the Natives of the Coast of Commoroome, and this Examinate had abt Fifty peeces of Eight for his share..." [Emphasis mine] (Fox, p. 94-5)

Now, admittedly, this is a court testimony, but I find two things of interest here.
1. There's nothing about celebrating afterwards, which you sometimes see when they take a cargo of liquor.

2. They simply refer to the opium and cotton as "the goods ab[oar]d her", which is not the way they seem to regard liquor.

While I wouldn't call it proof positive that drugs weren't used recreationally (it's much harder to prove a lack of something than it is it's presence - the dog that didn't bark and all that), it at least suggests that opium was regarded as just another cargo.

[Littleneckhalfshell]

Did I miss something, or misunderstand the direction of this thread?

Is not Cannabis just the more potent member of the Hemp family, which was a major commodity in the days of sail ?

So it should have been somewhat present in many societies.

But did everyone just miss a very recreational drug that was mixed with alcohol all the time by pirates? Nutmeg!

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2011/sep/06/hallucinogenic-foods

""Even without the addition of an illegal substance many foods have psychotropic qualities, some more frequently exploited than others. In 1946, prior to his conversion to Islam, Malcolm X was serving time in Charlestown prison. In the early years of his incarceration, Malcolm X, like so many other convicts of the time, found escape in the most apparently unlikely place - a penny matchbox full of nutmeg. In The Autobiography of Malcolm X he wrote: "I first got high in Charlestown on nutmeg. My cellmate … bought from kitchen worker inmates penny matchboxes full of stolen nutmeg … stirred into a glass of cold water, a penny matchbox full of nutmeg had the kick of three or four reefers."""

[jendobyns]

Chocolate is a very good recreational drug! Thanks for the reminder!

I believe the Aztecs drank chocolate mixed with vanilla.

Chocolate was mixed with a number of things, including chili in the new world. Not sure when the vanilla gets mixed in, I don't think it was a New World spice (books are still in storage, long saga, needless to say much alcohol is being consumed)

A native plant that was adopted by Europeans fairly early, is Jimson Weed/datura. Besides it's medicinal uses, it is quite hallucinogenic, causing delirium, has been (and probably still is) used ceremonially to induce visions and can be toxic way to easily to be used casually. During Bacon's Rebellion it was mixed with some food the occupying forces were consuming, the results weren't pretty. It's impossible to eradicate with herbicides as the seeds are so genetically diverse there is no way to target them all. Besides the use as a weapon of sorts during Bacon's Rebellion, I don't know if there are references to it in the GAoP, but it might be worth checking.

Edited August 18, 2014 by jendobyns