8 ms·

The transformation of tobacco and cannabis into early modern global obsessions

67 points by benbreen 6y ago

feralimal 6y ago
"A dance of “glorious and strange beauty” took place in a wintry garden in the south of England on January 6, 1614." So specific!! And that's just the first line! Is it just me, or are they just telling stories about the 16th century? Historians themselves will say history is an interpretative act. 'History' is for us in the present - it only lightly relates to what may or may not have occurred in the past, even if it presented as a fait accompli. I don't think it is possible to get this detail about what went on back then. I see this sort of article as 'myth making'. Its not to do with reality - no sources are provided for us to check. Its just presented as a ready narrative, and we are meant to accept it. So, what if that is the myth what are meant to take from it? I think we are meant 'edu-tained'. We can laugh at the fools back then who were literally blowing smoke up each others arses, in reclined splendour. We can enjoy a cannabis narrative - this talks to how we legalise it nowadays. These sorts of myths support the idea of how we are progressed, superior, etc.
- Synaesthesia 6y ago
  There's nothing about how we have progressed or become superior in this article. We've just acquired smoking as a habit. I'm pretty sure everything here is historically accurate. I'm aware of some of the anecdotes mentioned in the piece.
- benbreen 6y ago
  Author here - was it really glorious and strange and beautiful? All subjective judgements, so who can truly say. But I can tell you that those judgements are at least drawn from an actual primary source, published in 1614: the stage directions for the performance itself. The link: https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Maske_of_Flowers/qCQ_AQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=glorious https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Maske_of_Flowers/qC... Incidentally, that source is linked in the article more than once, along with others.
  - Woberto 6y ago
    Perhaps similar to the OP, I'm accustomed to more explicit citations, so throughout the article it's really unclear to me what source applies to which quote. Is that standard practice in your domain?
    - benbreen 6y ago
      I much prefer footnotes myself, where you can see directly what is being cited. Unfortunately there's a wide range of practices for online writing, but the norm I've found is usually just hyperlinks to digitized sources. The Appendix, the online history journal I helped create back in the day, tried to experiment with a more detailed way of doing in-line citations, via small icons that you can click to see images, citations of primary source texts, even music or films on occasion. You can see it in action here: http://theappendix.net/issues/2013/10/made-in-taiwan-an-eighteenth-century-frenchmans-fictional-formosa http://theappendix.net/issues/2013/10/made-in-taiwan-an-eigh...
  - feralimal 6y ago
    Thanks for the link. You also say "January 6, 1614". Very specific again! Where did you get that from? There are no dates that I can see, nevermind the 6th of January. Did you read the cover page? Not where it confirms that the book is a reproduction of another book held at Chatworth House. Ie not an original. I mean the bit where it says: "By the Gentlemen of Graies-Inne, at the Court of White-hall, in the Banquercing House, vpon Twelfe night, 1613." Here's a link: https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Maske_of_Flowers/qCQ_AQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=1613 https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Maske_of_Flowers/qC... This says to me that the book although published (perhaps) in 1614 relates to a time in 1613. Whenever I look into this stuff, I get more uncomfortable.
    - benbreen 6y ago
      Correct. There were two recorded performances, one in December, 1613, the second in January, 1614. I went ahead and described the second because it's better documented. I got the exact date from a journal article by a garden historian. [0] These are the kind of things that footnotes are helpful for - if I were writing this up as an academic paper, I'd get into the weeds with these details, but unfortunately it just doesn't work when you're writing it as a straight-ahead narrative without footnotes. That's especially true because it was basically just an introductory anecdote, not the focus of the piece. I agree though, digging deep into historical sources, I think, should make us all uncomfortable. As you said, historians should never claim to have direct access to historical truth. It's all mediated and all potentially corrupted by the bias of observers/recorders. That's just a fact of doing history, and it's why we're not humanists, not scientists. It's also why I find it so endlessly interesting. [0] https://www.jstor.org/stable/25472393?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents https://www.jstor.org/stable/25472393?seq=2#metadata_info_ta...
naravara 6y ago
It's interesting how early European accounts of Native American tobacco smoking don't seem to bear much similarity to my experiences of tobacco use. In this it describes the Taino becoming "almost drunk" off it. But the only time tobacco made me exhibit anything like that was when I accidentally inhaled way too much of a cigar and became physically ill and delirious. The experience was an extremely unpleasant one involving vomiting, tremors, having difficulty standing up, and slurring speech. But there was none of the "fun" parts of inebriation. I wasn't disinhibited or "loosened up," I just felt like my heart was pounding out of my chest and that I might die. I simply could not imagine anyone putting themselves through that on purpose as recreation. I also never experienced hallucinations, which is another thing early accounts said Native Americans experienced with tobacco use. I can only imagine they were taking extremely large doses frequently enough that they had been pretty desensitized to it. I can't imagine what cancer rates must have been like!
- DebtDeflation 6y ago
  Wild tobacco (Nicotiana rustica) contains around 9% nicotine whereas domesticated tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum) only contains around 2%. It also contains a number of other alkaloids not present in the domesticated version. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotiana_rustica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotiana_rustica Search YouTube for Thuốc lào which is rustica smoked out of a bamboo water pipe and you'll find plenty of videos of people falling over unconscious seconds after taking a single hit.
  - naravara 6y ago
    Interesting. I'm surprised it's not grown commercially then, especially for the more intentional nicotine delivery systems like gum and patches. Falling over unconscious after a hit also seems like a strange thing to do recreationally, but whatever floats their boat I guess.
    - DebtDeflation 6y ago
      It is. You can buy Rustica in bulk. I smoke pipes as well as cigars and Rustica is starting to become more popular in the pipe world - Mac Baren just released an HH Rustica series. The whole falling over unconscious thing seems to be more from people taking a massive bong hit of it and holding it in forever, near as I can tell from Youtube. Not how I enjoy my tobacco.
h2odragon 6y ago
> Tobacco is indeed native to the Americas, and early modern Europeans, Africans, and Asians did encounter tobacco smoking as a new practice without precedent in ancient texts or preexisting social conventions. But, as archaeologists and anthropologists have been documenting for decades, tobacco was not the only drug that the peoples of the Old World smoked—even before the voyages of Columbus. that was harder to say when "Tobacco is Evil" propaganda dominated any discussion of smoking. Some of the old school mixtures are rough I'd rather smoke sawdust.
- eurasiantiger 6y ago
  And it would make you just as content as a smokable, because like tobacco smoke, sawdust smoke contains MAO inhibitors.
  - fnordian_slip 6y ago
    Seconding the request for more information, a quick Google search didn't yield any results for sawdust being a MAOI. But this is so far out of my area of expertise that my search was probably worthless anyway, because I may not have been able to properly assess any sources anyway.
    - eurasiantiger 6y ago
      It’s not sawdust per se, rather the smoke from it — more exactly, the pyrolysis products of certain amino acids: heating L-tryptophan, for example, produces various Harmala alkaloids. The effects are also dependent on the type of wood, as some woods do naturally contain tannins which act as MAO inhibitors. Harmala alkaloids, of course, are naturally present in Penganum harmala, one of the two traditional ingredients of Ayahuasca. The inherent psychoactivity of this family of compounds cannot be overstated.
      - fnordian_slip 6y ago
        Thanks a lot for the reply, this really is a fascinating topic.
schoen 6y ago
Hey, I have your book Age of Intoxication! When I was in Lisbon I'd visited the Museu da Farmácia (mostly because my grandfather was a pharmacist), but after reading your book I realized that (despite also having spent a little time there) I'd overlooked multiple things going on in the park across the street.
4gotunameagain 6y ago
> The story of smoking in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is capacious enough to include the distillation apparatus of the alchemist, the water pipe of the cannabis smoker, and even medicinal smoke enemas. I had no idea this was a thing, that's disturbing lol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_smoke_enema https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_smoke_enema
- xyzelement 6y ago
  Hence the phrase "blow it out your ass" :)
- maccard 6y ago
  Yikes: > Tobacco resuscitation kits consisting of a pair of bellows and a tube were provided by the Royal Humane Society of London and placed at various points along the Thames.[4] European physicians furthermore employed these enemas for a range of ailments Tobacco enemas using a public kit on the banks of the filthiest river imaginable before hygiene was considered a priority in medical circles..
  - pablovidal85 6y ago
    Did this practice result in accidental fecal transplants?
  - EGreg 6y ago
    Filthiest river, you say? https://benjaminleslie.wordpress.com/2011/01/09/river-of-shit/amp/ https://benjaminleslie.wordpress.com/2011/01/09/river-of-shi...
  - pjc50 6y ago
    An ancestor of the public defibrilator! Just without the, you know, actually proven to work aspect.
    - peteradio 6y ago
      I'd be pretty perky if someone poked a bellows in me bum.

67 points by benbreen 6y ago

"A dance of “glorious and strange beauty” took place in a wintry garden in the south of England on January 6, 1614." So specific!! And that's just the first line! Is it just me, or are they just telling stories about the 16th century? Historians themselves will say history is an interpretative act. 'History' is for us in the present - it only lightly relates to what may or may not have occurred in the past, even if it presented as a fait accompli. I don't think it is possible to get this detail about what went on back then. I see this sort of article as 'myth making'. Its not to do with reality - no sources are provided for us to check. Its just presented as a ready narrative, and we are meant to accept it. So, what if that is the myth what are meant to take from it? I think we are meant 'edu-tained'. We can laugh at the fools back then who were literally blowing smoke up each others arses, in reclined splendour. We can enjoy a cannabis narrative - this talks to how we legalise it nowadays. These sorts of myths support the idea of how we are progressed, superior, etc.

Synaesthesia 6y ago
There's nothing about how we have progressed or become superior in this article. We've just acquired smoking as a habit. I'm pretty sure everything here is historically accurate. I'm aware of some of the anecdotes mentioned in the piece.
benbreen 6y ago
Author here - was it really glorious and strange and beautiful? All subjective judgements, so who can truly say. But I can tell you that those judgements are at least drawn from an actual primary source, published in 1614: the stage directions for the performance itself. The link: https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Maske_of_Flowers/qCQ_AQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=glorious https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Maske_of_Flowers/qC... Incidentally, that source is linked in the article more than once, along with others.
- Woberto 6y ago
  Perhaps similar to the OP, I'm accustomed to more explicit citations, so throughout the article it's really unclear to me what source applies to which quote. Is that standard practice in your domain?
  - benbreen 6y ago
    I much prefer footnotes myself, where you can see directly what is being cited. Unfortunately there's a wide range of practices for online writing, but the norm I've found is usually just hyperlinks to digitized sources. The Appendix, the online history journal I helped create back in the day, tried to experiment with a more detailed way of doing in-line citations, via small icons that you can click to see images, citations of primary source texts, even music or films on occasion. You can see it in action here: http://theappendix.net/issues/2013/10/made-in-taiwan-an-eighteenth-century-frenchmans-fictional-formosa http://theappendix.net/issues/2013/10/made-in-taiwan-an-eigh...
- feralimal 6y ago
  Thanks for the link. You also say "January 6, 1614". Very specific again! Where did you get that from? There are no dates that I can see, nevermind the 6th of January. Did you read the cover page? Not where it confirms that the book is a reproduction of another book held at Chatworth House. Ie not an original. I mean the bit where it says: "By the Gentlemen of Graies-Inne, at the Court of White-hall, in the Banquercing House, vpon Twelfe night, 1613." Here's a link: https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Maske_of_Flowers/qCQ_AQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=1613 https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Maske_of_Flowers/qC... This says to me that the book although published (perhaps) in 1614 relates to a time in 1613. Whenever I look into this stuff, I get more uncomfortable.
  - benbreen 6y ago
    Correct. There were two recorded performances, one in December, 1613, the second in January, 1614. I went ahead and described the second because it's better documented. I got the exact date from a journal article by a garden historian. [0] These are the kind of things that footnotes are helpful for - if I were writing this up as an academic paper, I'd get into the weeds with these details, but unfortunately it just doesn't work when you're writing it as a straight-ahead narrative without footnotes. That's especially true because it was basically just an introductory anecdote, not the focus of the piece. I agree though, digging deep into historical sources, I think, should make us all uncomfortable. As you said, historians should never claim to have direct access to historical truth. It's all mediated and all potentially corrupted by the bias of observers/recorders. That's just a fact of doing history, and it's why we're not humanists, not scientists. It's also why I find it so endlessly interesting. [0] https://www.jstor.org/stable/25472393?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents https://www.jstor.org/stable/25472393?seq=2#metadata_info_ta...

naravara 6y ago

It's interesting how early European accounts of Native American tobacco smoking don't seem to bear much similarity to my experiences of tobacco use. In this it describes the Taino becoming "almost drunk" off it. But the only time tobacco made me exhibit anything like that was when I accidentally inhaled way too much of a cigar and became physically ill and delirious. The experience was an extremely unpleasant one involving vomiting, tremors, having difficulty standing up, and slurring speech. But there was none of the "fun" parts of inebriation. I wasn't disinhibited or "loosened up," I just felt like my heart was pounding out of my chest and that I might die. I simply could not imagine anyone putting themselves through that on purpose as recreation. I also never experienced hallucinations, which is another thing early accounts said Native Americans experienced with tobacco use. I can only imagine they were taking extremely large doses frequently enough that they had been pretty desensitized to it. I can't imagine what cancer rates must have been like!

DebtDeflation 6y ago
Wild tobacco (Nicotiana rustica) contains around 9% nicotine whereas domesticated tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum) only contains around 2%. It also contains a number of other alkaloids not present in the domesticated version. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotiana_rustica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotiana_rustica Search YouTube for Thuốc lào which is rustica smoked out of a bamboo water pipe and you'll find plenty of videos of people falling over unconscious seconds after taking a single hit.
- naravara 6y ago
  Interesting. I'm surprised it's not grown commercially then, especially for the more intentional nicotine delivery systems like gum and patches. Falling over unconscious after a hit also seems like a strange thing to do recreationally, but whatever floats their boat I guess.
  - DebtDeflation 6y ago
    It is. You can buy Rustica in bulk. I smoke pipes as well as cigars and Rustica is starting to become more popular in the pipe world - Mac Baren just released an HH Rustica series. The whole falling over unconscious thing seems to be more from people taking a massive bong hit of it and holding it in forever, near as I can tell from Youtube. Not how I enjoy my tobacco.

h2odragon 6y ago

> Tobacco is indeed native to the Americas, and early modern Europeans, Africans, and Asians did encounter tobacco smoking as a new practice without precedent in ancient texts or preexisting social conventions. But, as archaeologists and anthropologists have been documenting for decades, tobacco was not the only drug that the peoples of the Old World smoked—even before the voyages of Columbus. that was harder to say when "Tobacco is Evil" propaganda dominated any discussion of smoking. Some of the old school mixtures are rough I'd rather smoke sawdust.

eurasiantiger 6y ago
And it would make you just as content as a smokable, because like tobacco smoke, sawdust smoke contains MAO inhibitors.
- fnordian_slip 6y ago
  Seconding the request for more information, a quick Google search didn't yield any results for sawdust being a MAOI. But this is so far out of my area of expertise that my search was probably worthless anyway, because I may not have been able to properly assess any sources anyway.
  - eurasiantiger 6y ago
    It’s not sawdust per se, rather the smoke from it — more exactly, the pyrolysis products of certain amino acids: heating L-tryptophan, for example, produces various Harmala alkaloids. The effects are also dependent on the type of wood, as some woods do naturally contain tannins which act as MAO inhibitors. Harmala alkaloids, of course, are naturally present in Penganum harmala, one of the two traditional ingredients of Ayahuasca. The inherent psychoactivity of this family of compounds cannot be overstated.
    - fnordian_slip 6y ago
      Thanks a lot for the reply, this really is a fascinating topic.

schoen 6y ago

Hey, I have your book Age of Intoxication! When I was in Lisbon I'd visited the Museu da Farmácia (mostly because my grandfather was a pharmacist), but after reading your book I realized that (despite also having spent a little time there) I'd overlooked multiple things going on in the park across the street.

4gotunameagain 6y ago

> The story of smoking in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is capacious enough to include the distillation apparatus of the alchemist, the water pipe of the cannabis smoker, and even medicinal smoke enemas. I had no idea this was a thing, that's disturbing lol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_smoke_enema https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_smoke_enema

xyzelement 6y ago
Hence the phrase "blow it out your ass" :)
maccard 6y ago
Yikes: > Tobacco resuscitation kits consisting of a pair of bellows and a tube were provided by the Royal Humane Society of London and placed at various points along the Thames.[4] European physicians furthermore employed these enemas for a range of ailments Tobacco enemas using a public kit on the banks of the filthiest river imaginable before hygiene was considered a priority in medical circles..
- pablovidal85 6y ago
  Did this practice result in accidental fecal transplants?
- EGreg 6y ago
  Filthiest river, you say? https://benjaminleslie.wordpress.com/2011/01/09/river-of-shit/amp/ https://benjaminleslie.wordpress.com/2011/01/09/river-of-shi...
- pjc50 6y ago
  An ancestor of the public defibrilator! Just without the, you know, actually proven to work aspect.
  - peteradio 6y ago
    I'd be pretty perky if someone poked a bellows in me bum.