Newsgroups: alt.drugs,alt.hemp,alt.psychoactives
From: [al 2032] at [csc.albany.edu] (LUTINS ALLEN H)
Subject: Some examples of ancient marijuana use...
Date: Sat, 8 Jan 94 15:05:02 GMT

...this thread started on sci.anthropology/sci.archaeology and i
thought it best to move it here...

Here's a short article from the Albany (NY) Times Union of 20 May 1993
(atributed to Newsday) on the abovementioned find:

     The first physical evidence that marijuana was used as a
     medicine in the ancient Mideast was reported Wednesday by
     Israeli scientists who found residue of the drug with the
     skeleton of a girl who apparently died in childbirth 1,600
     years ago.

     The researchers said the marijuana probably was used by a
     mid-wife trying to speed the birth, as well as ease the
     pain.

     Until now, the researchers wrote in a letter to the journal
     Nature, "physical evidence of cannabis (marijuana) use in
     the Middle East has not yet been obtained."

     The seven researchers--from Hebrew University, the Israeli
     Antiquties Authority and the National Police Headquarters
     forensic division--said references to marijuana as a
     medicine are seen as far back as 1,600 B.C. in Egyptian,
     Assyrian, Greek and Roman writings.  But physical evidence
     that the hemp weed, cannabis sativa, was used for that
     purpose has been missing.

     The researchers' examination of an undisturbed family tomb
     near Jerusalem dating to the fourth century AD indicated the
     girl, about 14, died because herpelvis was too small to
     permit normal birth.

That reminded me of the following, from Natural History 96(12) {Dec.
1987} entitled "How Carthage Lost the Sea," concerning the wreck of a
3rd century B.C. Carthaginian shipwreck discovered off the town of
Marsala in western Sicily.  Author Honor Frost notes (pp. 61-63):

     The most surprising discovery, however, was the stems of a
     grass whose yellow color stood out among the dunnage (the
     layer of branches tht protected the bottom of the hull from
     ballast stones).  Ther was so much of this plant mat4erial
     that we could do no more than bag random samples for
     analysis at the Jodrell Laboratory, Royal Botanic Gardens,
     Kew...after excavating two basketfuls of them, we made a
     special request for their identification.  The answer was,
     probably Cannabis sativa.  The doubt was due to the decay of
     the minute hairs that would have differentiated these stems
     from two other plants:  hops and stinging nettles.  Given
     the choice, I accept cannabis:  baskets of stinging nettles
     seem improbable and there is no record of Punic hop
     cultivation, whereas Herodotus, writing in the fifith
     century B.C., already refers to cannabis smoking.

Caroline T. Miller suggested in a follow-up letter ("Letters",
_Natural History_ 97(7) {July 1988}) that the cannabis found was
likely the remains of extra sails/rigging material (since hemp
was a commonly-used material for this purpose).  This was refuted
in an editor's note (ibid.) wherein was noted:

     According to Honor Frost...rope was found on the ship, but
     all of it was made, not from hemp, but from a type of grass. 
     The two small baskets of cannabis on board would not have
     been suitable or sufficient for rope making.

Now, can anyone come up with that Herodotus quote on ancient pot
smoking?  :)

                                   -allen
-- 
***************************************************************************
"Do you know the difference between worry  | allen h. lutins
 and concern? Worry is destructive, but    | [vu 0350] at [bingsuns.cc.binghamton.edu]
 concern is a thinking mind solving a problem." -- Duke Ellington