Sacred Mushroom of Visions

by Ralph Metzner

  ARCHAEOLOGICAL EVIDENCE OF HUMAN USE OF PSYCHOACTIVE MUSHROOMS

  At an archaeological site in the Non Nak Tha region of northern Thailand, the bones of Bos indicus cattle were recently unearthed in conjunction with human remains. We know that Psilocybe cubensis flourishes in the manure of cattle in this region of Thailand. Terence McKenna has suggested that the temporal and physical relationship between the human bones and the bones of cattle is conclusive evidence that psychoactive mushrooms were known to the people who frequented this region around 15,000 B.C.E. (McKenna 1992). He suggested that the consumption of these types of mushrooms provided a certain impetus to humanity’s intellectual evolution.

  On the Tassili Plains in northern Algeria, cave paintings dating as far back as 9000 B.C.E. (Samorini 1992; Gartz 1996) portray anthropomorphic figures with mushroom images on their bodies, evidence that mushrooms were known and used in a mystic manner. Emboden (1979) describes, among traditional folk remedies from the second century Chin dynasty in China, a cure for “the laughing sickness,” mushroom intoxication attributed to the accidental ingestion of psilocybian mushrooms. In eleventh century Japanese folklore there is a story of a group of woodcutters and nuns who became lost, hungry, and then quite inebriated after consuming what is believed to have been psilocybin-containing fungi. This exciting tale is recorded in the Japanese classic Tales of Long Ago (Sanford 1972).

  HISTORICAL DOCUMENTATION OF FUNGAL SACRAMENTS

  Amanita muscaria

  The earliest record of the possible use of Amanita muscaria as an inebriant is in the ancient Vedic hymns of India. Urine drinking associated with mushroom intoxication is mentioned in the Rig Veda (ninth and tenth mandalas).

  Travelers and explorers in Siberia reported this practice during the late seventeenth and eighteenth century. In her books, Windmills of the Mind and Hallucinogens: Cross Cultural Perspectives, Marlene Dobkin de Rios (1976, 1984) discusses the custom of Amanita-related urinedrinking by the reindeer herdsmen of Siberia. It is likely that some psilocybian mushrooms were also historically used in Siberian shamanism (Wasson 1968). Recent research shows that certain isolated groups of Finn-Ugrian people, the Ostyak and the Vogul of western Siberia, today employ this mushroom shamanically, as do the Chukchee, Koryak, and Kamchadal people of northeastern Siberia (Heizer 1944; Brekham and Sam 1967; Wasson 1968; LaBarre 1975).

  The contemporary use of Amanita muscaria is not restricted geographically to Siberia (Arthur 2000; Ruck and Staples 2001). Graves (1960) and Schultes (1976) have revealed that some Finns, Lapps, and Afghanis use this species (Graves 1960; Schultes 1976). Its use is also well documented in Japan and the Philippines.

  Among some groups of North American Indians (Wasson 1979), the Dogrib Athabascan (Schultes and Hofmann 1979) and the Ojibway of northern Michigan and Ontario (Keewaydinoquay 1978, 1979, 1998; Wasson 1979), use of Amanita species as a sacrament dates back over four hundred years. Several tribes (Ojibway, Chippewa, Iroquois, and others) have stories of little people associated with mushrooms, which imply a hidden widespread knowledge of entheogenic mushrooms among North American tribes.

  The active ingredients isolated from Amanita muscaria include ibotenic acid and muscimol (Saleminck 1963; Eugster, Muller, and Good 1965). The same causative agents have also been isolated from a similar species, Amanita pantherina (Takemoto, Nakajima, and Sakuma 1964). Both species are sometimes employed recreationally in the Pacific Northwest region of North America (Ott 1978; Weil 1977, 1980) and in Europe (Fericgla 1992, 1993; Festi and Bianchi 1991). There are several other species of Amanita, which also contain these classical agents (Ott 1993; Guzmán, Allen, and Gartz 2000), but have no history of sacramental or recreational use.

  Claviceps purpurea and LSD

  A psychoactive fungus, Claviceps purpurea, is the most likely basis of another historically significant sacramental substance, the kykeon beverage of the ancient Greek rites of Demeter and Persephone, which were held annually for over two thousand years at Eleusis, outside of Athens. This ergot fungus is found on several wild grasses common in the Mediterranean region (Ott 1978; Wasson, Ruck, and Hofmann 1978; Schultes and Hofmann 1973, 1979), as well as on cultivated barley, rye, and wheat. Lysergic acid is a component of ergot, a small purple fungus that deforms the grains (Hofmann 1980, 1983). From this, Albert Hofmann derived LSD in the Sandoz laboratories in Basel, Switzerland, in 1938.

  Boletus, Heimiella, and Russula

  There is substantial evidence of the continuing use on the islands of New Guinea of several other families of fungi, Boletus, Heimiella, and Russula (Singer 1958; Reay 1959, 1960; Singer 1960; Heim and Wasson 1964, 1965; Nelson 1970; Heim 1972; Rios 1976, 1984). The Kuma people of the Western Highlands know these mushrooms as nonda. Tribes belonging to the Nangamp group call them nong’n. Effects attributed to these mushrooms include chronic states of hysteria and madness that may last for up to two days, for which the term therogen (becoming a beast) has been coined.

  Copelandia cyanescens is a common species found in the manure of four-legged ruminants, with a worldwide distribution in the tropics and neotropics of both hemispheres. (Photo by John W. Allen)

  PSILOCYBIAN MUSHROOM USE IN MESOAMERICA

  Central and North American psychoactive and other mushrooms were first documented in the writings of early Spanish chroniclers, which included naturalists, botanists, and clergy. As the conquest spread through Central America to Mexico, they observed the Aztec priests and their followers being served the sacred fungi at festivals and other celebrations. The Nahuatl-speaking Aztec priests called the mushrooms teonanácatl (teunamacatlth), translatable as “Flesh of the Gods.” The Spanish were a very mycophobic (mushroom-fearing) people and they deplored the Aztec rituals and the priests who employed mushrooms and other magical plants as divinatory substances (Sahagún 1956).

  Various stages of the growth and development of Psilocybe cubensis, a species common in manure, with a worldwide distribution. (Photo by John W. Allen)

  The magic mushroom was one of many fungi described in codices written by the Spanish in the fifteenth century. They relate that the mushrooms were often administered among the common people, merchants, and visiting dignitaries. The wealthy consumed them served with honey or chocolate. Botanists and historians, eager to please their masters back in Spain, reported the effects of the mushrooms in diabolical terms. They described the effects of these mushrooms and other plants as leaving their users in uncontrollable fits, claiming that when under the influence, native people would commit violent acts toward themselves and each other. They reported that many would fall into rages or into a stupor. To god-fearing Europeans of those days, this was reason enough for destroying devil-possessed natives.

  Over the intervening centuries, the native people concealed their use of their sacred mushrooms from outsiders. Thus the sacred mushrooms remained a secret until the Wassons celebrated velada with Dona María Sabina in 1955. In the High Sierra region of the southern Mexican, indigenous Mazateca curanderos still use the sacred mushrooms today as they have always done. The Nahua, who are direct descendants of the Olmecs, Toltecs, and Aztecs, employ more than two dozen species of entheogenic Psilocybe mushrooms for the purpose of healing and curing (Wasson and Wasson 1957; Schultes 1939, 1940; Singer 1958).

  Psilocybe semilanceata is known as the “liberty cap” mushroom. It is the most common species sought after by psilophorian enthusiasts for its tranquil effects. (Photo by John W. Allen)

  Guzmán (1997) reported more than two hundred common names that were used by various groups of Mexican Indians living in the Sierra Mazateca of Oaxaca. The rare word teonanácatl, first reported by Sahagún (1569–1582), is now used by Western scholars to refer to any of the Mexican hallucinogenic fungi. However, no present day Indians use this epithet. Among the most common Spanish names used to refer to the sacred mushrooms are: San Isidros (a saint of agriculture), pajaritos (“little birds”), and derrumbes (“landslides”) (Guzmán 1997; Guzmán, Allen, and Gartz 2000; Alle
n 1997).

  MUSHROOM CULTURE IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

  The use of entheogenic fungi for laudable purposes first gained public recognition through research initiated by Timothy Leary, Richard Alpert, Ralph Metzner, and others at Harvard University in the early 1960s (Graves 1962; Weil 1963; Leary 1968). Timothy Leary had consumed seven sacred mushrooms while on vacation with friends in Cuernavaca, Mexico. He believed that the mushrooms could be a beneficial tool in psychiatric medicine. Ten years after Leary brought psilocybin to Harvard, mushroom use had spread from Mexico (Ott 1975; Sandford 1973; Pollock 1977–1978; Weil 1973, 1975–1976) to the northeast United States and Australia (Stocks 1963; McCarthy 1971; Southcott 1974), and then from Bali (Schultes and Hofmann 1980 [1973]) to Hawaii (Pollock 1974). Fifteen years after the announcement of the rediscovery of the ceremonial use of sacred mushrooms in Mexico, recreational use of psilocybian fungi had become widespread in the mainland United States. The recreational use of entheogenic mushrooms, Psilocybe semilanceata was reported in British Colombia by Heim et al. in 1966.

  By the late 1960s, entheogenic mushroom awareness had arrived in the British Isles (Young et al. 1982; Harries and Evans 1981; Peden et al. 1982), spreading to Scandinavia (Christiansen et al. 1981, 1984; Ohenoja et al. 1987), and other European countries (Gartz 1993). In the early 1970s, psilocybian mushrooms gained large followings in Indonesia, South Asia, and Southeast Asia. Such use is now widespread amongst tourist populations in several third world countries (Allen and Gartz 1997). Liberty cap mushrooms (Psilocybe semilanceata) are common in Peru as is Copelandia cyanescens. Both Psilocybe cubensis and Psilocybe subcubensis are common in Colombia and other South American countries and several new species have recently been identified from Brazil.

  Tourists with a desire to purchase magic mushrooms have influenced many poor Mexicans. Singer (1958, 1978) reported that Mexicans were debasing the mushroom rites of the Mazateca people of Oaxaca. For many poor people residing in undeveloped regions of Mexico, central and South America, the mushrooms were a welcome economic boon. Predictably, by the early 1960s various scoundrels had learned the art of selling mushrooms that had no entheogenic properties, though this deception appeared to have subsided by the late 1970s.

  As more people became aware of and experimented with hallucinogenic mushrooms, unenlightened governments of many countries proceeded to forbid their use and commerce. However, in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Australia, thousands of individuals continue using the mushrooms recreationally. Illicit cultivation of the tropical Psilocybe cubensis and the Pacific Northwest cold weather species Psilocybe azurescens is now reported in Europe. Psilocybe cubensis, Copelandia (Panaeolus) cyanescens, and Psilocybe tampanensis are legally cultivated and sold in “smart shops” in Holland. Fresh mushrooms are cultivated clandestinely and sold openly in shops in Denmark. Until 2002, fresh and dried mushrooms were sold in vending machines and shops in Japan. In the British Isles, possession and cultivation of fresh magic mushrooms is not illegal as long as the mushrooms are fresh. Additionally, possession of fresh specimens of Psilocybe cubensis is legal in the state of Florida.

  Travelers became aware that entheogenic mushrooms were common on the island of Bali, they communicated this message to their friends, and eventually Balinese natives learned the economic value of the mushrooms. By the early 1980s, magic mushroom omelets and smoothies had become popular at several resort locations in Thailand, Nepal, and on both coasts of the Indian continent. It was recently reported that some species of magic mushrooms are now being served to tourists in the Philippine Islands.

  Acknowledgments

  The authors would like to thank Dr. Gastón Guzmán of the Instituto de Ecologia, Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico for the use of the map of the worldwide distribution of species and Kathleen Harrison for her rendition of the lifecycle of a mushroom. All photographs are by John W. Allen.

  References

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