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Golden's guide. ..

AGARA
(Galbulimima belgraveana) is a tall forest tree of Malaysia and Australia. In Papua, natives make a drink by boiling the leaves and bark with the leaves of ereriba. When they imbibe it, they become violently intoxicated, eventually falling into a deep sleep during which they experience visions and fantastic dreams. Some 28 alkaloids have been isolated from this tree, and although they are biologically active, the psychoactive principle is still unknown. Agara is one of four species of Galbulimima and belongs to the Himantandraceae, a rare family related to the magnolias.

ERERIBA
, an undetermined species of Homalomena, is a stout herb reported to have narcotic effects when its leaves are taken with the leaves and bark of agara. The active chemical constituent is unknown. Ereriba is a member of the aroid fomily, Araceae. There are some 140 species of Homalomena native to tropical Asia and South America.

KWASHI
(Pancratium trianthum) is considered to be psychoactive by the Bushmen in Dobe, Botswana. The bulb of this perennial is reputedly rubbed over incisions in the head to induce visual hallucinations. Nothing is known of its chemical constitution. Of the 14 other species of Pancratium, mainly of Asia and Africa, many are known to contain psychoactive principles, mostly alkaloids. Some species are potent cardiac poisons. Pancratium belongs to the amaryllis family, Amaryllidaceae.

GALANGA or MARABA
(Kaempferia galanga) is an herb rich in essential oils. Natives in New Guinea eat the rhizome of the plant as an hallucinogen. It is valued locally as a condiment and, like others of the 70 species in the genus, it is used in local folk medicine to bring boils to a head and to hasten the healing of burns and wounds. It is a member of the ginger family, Zingiberoceae. Phytochemical studies have revealed no psychoactive principle. They can kill you instintly if you abuse this.

TURKESTAN MINT
(Lagochilus inebrians) is a small shrub of the dry steppes of Turkestan. For centuries it has been the source of an intoxicant among the Tajik, Tartar, Turkoman, and Uzbek tribesmen. The leaves, gathered in October, are toasted, sometimes mixed with stems, fruits, and flowers. Drying and storage increase their aromatic fragrance. Honey and sugar are often added to reduce their intense bitterness.

Valued as a folk medicine and included in the 8th edition of the Russian pharmacopoeia, it is used to treat skin disease, to help check hemorrhages, and to provide sedation for nervous disorders. A crystalline compound isolated from the plant and named lagochiline has proved to be aditerpene. Whether or not it produces the psychoactive effects of the whole plant is unknown. There are some 34 other species of Lagochilus. Members of the mint family, Labiatae, they are native from central Asia to Iran and Afghanistan.

KANNA
(Mesembryanthemum expansum and M. tortuosum) is the common name of two species of South African plants. There is strong evidence that one or both were used by the Hottentots of southern Africa as vision inducing narcotics. More than two centuries ago, it was reported that the Hottentots chewed the root of kanna, or channa, keeping the chewed material in the mouth, with these results: "Their animal spirits were awakened, their eyes sparkled and their faces manifested laughter and gaiety. Thousands of delightsome ideas appeared, and a pleasant jollity which enabled them to be amused by simple jests. By taking the substance to excess, they lost consciousness and fell into a terrible delirium."

Since the narcotic use of these two species has not been observed directly, various botanists have suggested that the hallucinogenic kanna may actually have been cannabis or other intoxicating plants, such as several species of Sclerocarya of the cashew family. These two species of Mesembryanthemum do hove the common name kanna, however, and they also contain alkaloids that have sedative, cocaine-like properties capable of producing torpor in man.

In the drier parts of South Africa, there are altogether 1,000 species of Mesembryanthemum - many, like the ice plant, of bizarre form. About two dozen species, including the two described here, are considered by some botanists to represent a separate genus, Sceletium. All belong to the carpetweed family, Aizoaceae, mainly South African, and are believed to be related to the pokeweed, pink, and cactus families.

RAPE' DOS INDIOS
(Maquira sclerophylla; also known as Olmedioperebea sclerophylla) is an enormous tree of the fig family, Moraceae. In the Pariana region of the central Amazon in Brazil, the Indians formerly prepared an hallucinogenic snuff from the dried fruits. The snuff was taken in tribal ceremonies, but encroaching civilization has destroyed its use.

SWEET FLAG
(Acorus calamus), also called sweet calomel, grows in damp places in the north and south temperate regions. No longer a member of the arum family, Araceae, it is one of two species of Acorus. There is some indirect evidence that Indians of northern Canada, who employ the plant as a medicine and a stimulant, may chew the rootstock as an hallucinogen. In excessive doses, it is known to induce strong visual hallucinations. The intoxicating properties may be due to a-asorone and ß-asarone, but the chemistry and pharmacology of the plant are still poorly understood.

MASHA-HARI
(Justicia pectoralis var. stenophylla) is a small herb cultivated by the Waiká Indians of the Brazilian- Venezuelan frontier region. The aromatic leaves are occasionally dried, powdered, and mixed with the hallucinogenic snuff made from resin of the Virola tree. Other species of Justicia have been reported to be employed in that region as the sole source of a narcotic snuff. Hallucinogenic constituents have not yet been found in Justicia, but if any species of the genus is utilized as the only ingredient of an intoxicating snuff, then one or more active constituents must be present. The 300 species of Justicia, members of the acanthus family, Acanthaceae, grow in the tropics and subtropics of both hemispheres. GENISTA (Cytisus canariensis) is employed as an hallucinogen in the magic practices of Yaqui medicine men in northern Mexico. Native to the Canary Islands, the plant was introduced into Mexico. Rarely does any nonindigenous plant find its way into the religious and magic customs of a people. Known also by the scientific name Genista canariensis, this species is the "genista" of florists.

Plants of the genus Cytisus are rich in cytisine, an alkaloid of the lupine group. The alkaloid has never been pharmacologically demonstrated to have hallucinogenic activity, but it is known to be toxic and to cause nausea, convulsions, and death through failure of respiration.

About 80 species of Cytisus, belonging to the bean family, Leguminosae, are known in the Atlantic islands, Europe, and the Mediterranean area. Some species are highly ornamental; some are poisonous.

MESCAL BEAN
(Saphora secundiflora), also called red bean or coralillo, is a shrub or small tree with silvery pods containing up to six or seven red beans or seeds. Before the peyote religion spread north of the Rio Grande, at least 12 tribes of Indians in northern Mexico, New Mexico, and Texas practiced the vision-seeking Red Bean Dance centered around the ingestion of a drink prepared from these seeds. Known also as the Wichita, Deer, or Whistle Dance, the ceremony utilized the beans as an oracular, divinatory, and hollucinogenic medium.

Because the red bean drink was highly toxic, often resulting in death from overdoses, the arrival of a more spectacular and safer hallucinogen in the form of the peyote cactus (see p. 11 4) led the natives to abandon the Red Bean Dance. Sacred elements do not often disappear completely from a culture; today the seeds are used as an adornment on the uniform of the leader of the peyote ceremony.

An early Spanish explorer mentioned mescal beans as an article of trade in Texas in 1539. Mescal beans have been found at sites dating before A.D. 1000, with one site dating bock to 1500 B.C. Archaeological evidence thus points to the existence of a prehistoric cult or ceremony that used the red beans.

The alkaloid cytisine is present in the beans. It causes nausea, convulsions, and death from asphyxiation through its depressive action on the diaphragm.

The mescal bean is a member of the bean family, Leguminosae. Sophora comprises about 50 species that are native to tropical and warm parts of both hemispheres. One species, S. japonica, is medicinally important as a good source of rutin, used in modern medicine for treating capillary fragility.

COLORINES
(several species of Erythrina) moy be used as hallucinogens in some parts of Mexico. The bright red beans of these plants resemble mescal becans (see p. 94), long used as a narcotic in northern Mexico and in the American Southwest. Both beans are sometimes sold mixed together in herb markets, and the mescal bean plant is sometimes called by the same common name, colorin.

Some species of Erythrina contain alkaloids of the isoquinoline type, which elicit activity resembling that of curare or arrow poisons, but no alkaloids known to possess hallucinogenic properties have yet been found in these seeds.

Some 50 species of Erythrina, members of the bean family, Leguminasce, grow in the tropics and subtropics of both hemispheres.

SHANSHI
(Coriaria thymifolia) is a widespread Andean shrub long recognized as very poisonous to cattle. It has recently been reported as one of the plants used as an hallucinogen by peasants in Ecuador. Shanshi is their name for the plant. The fruits are eaten for their intoxicating effects, which include the sensation of flight. The weird effects are due possibly to an unidentified glycoside, but the chemistry of this species is still poorly understood. Shanshi is one of 15 species of Coriaria, most of which are shrubs. They are found in the mountains from Mexico to Chile, from the Mediterranean area eastward to Japan, and also in New Zealand. Corioria is the only known genus in the family, Corioriaceae.

SINICUICHI
(Heimia salicifolia) is a poorly understood but fascinating auditory hallucincogen of central Mexico. Its leaves, slightly wilted, are crushed and soaked in water. The resulting juice is put in the sun to ferment into a slightly intoxicating drink that causes giddiness, darkening of the surroundings, shrinkage of the world, and drowsiness or euphoria. Either deafness or auditory hallucinations may result, with voices or sounds distorted and seeming to come from a distance. Partakers claim that unpleasant after- effects are rare, but excessive drinking of the intoxicant can be quite harmful.

Sinicuichi is a name given also to other plants that are important both medically and as intoxicants in various parts of Mexico. Other intoxicating sinicuichis are Erythrina, Rhynchosia, and Piscidia, but Heimia salicifolia commands the greatest respect. With the closely related H. myrtifolia, it has interesting uses in folk medicine. Only in Mexico, however, is the hallucinogenic use important.

Heimia belongs to the loosestrife fomily, Lythroceae, and represents an American genus of three hardly distinguishable species that range in the highlands from southern United States to Argentina. Presence of hallucinogenic principles was unknown in this family, but chemists have recently found six alkaloids in Heimia salicifolia. They belong to the quinolizidine group. One, cryogenine or vertine, appears to be the most active, although the hallucinogenic effects following ingestion of the total plant have not yet been duplicated by any of the alkaloids isolated thus far. This provides us with another example of the often appreciable difference between the effects of drugs taken as natural products and the effects of their purified chemical constituents.

IERBA LOCA and TAGILI
(Pernettya furens and P. parvifolia) are two of about 25 species of Pernettya, mostly very small subshrubs that grow in the highlands from Mexico to Chile, the Galápagos and Falkland islands, Tasmania, and New Zealand. These plants belong to the heath family, Ericaceae, along with the cranberry, blueberry, Scotch heather, rhododendron, and trailing arbutus. Several species are known to be toxic to cattle and man, but only these two are known definitely to be employed as hallucinogens.

Pernettya furens, which in Chile is called hierba loca ("maddening plant") or huedhued, has fruits that, when eaten, can cause mental confusion, madness, and permanent insanity. The intoxication resembles that following the ingestion of Datura.

The fruit of tagili, of Ecuador, is well recognized as poisonous, capable of inducing hallucinations and other psychic alterations as well as affecting the motor nerves. Though the chemistry of these and other species of Pernettya needs further study, it seems that the toxicity may be due to andromedotoxin, a resinoid, or to arbutin, a glycoside. Both compounds are rather common in this plant family.

BORRACHERA
(lochroma fuchsioides) is one of about two dozen species of lochroma, all native to the highlands of South America. There are suspicions and unconfirmed reports that several species of lochromo are locally taken in hallucinatory drinks, either alone or mixed with other narcotic plants, by Indians in the Sibundoy Valley of southern Colombia. Although no chemical studies have been made of lochroma, it belongs to the nightshade family, Solanaceae, well recognized for its toxic and hallucinogenic principles.

ARBOL DE LOS BRUJOS
("sorcerers' tree") or latué (Latua pubiflora) is used by the Mapuche Indian medicine men of Valdivia, Chile, to cause delirium, hallucinations, and occasionally permanent insanity. There is no cult or ritual surrounding its use, but the tree is widely feared and respected. Dosages are a closely guarded secret, and it is widely believed that a madness of any desired duration may be induced by a medicine man who knows how to measure the doses properly. The natives employ the fresh fruits.

The alkaloids hyoscyamine and scopolamine have been isolated from the fruit and are responsible for its potent effects. The only species of Latua known, the tree is confined to coastal mountains of central Chile. It belongs to the nightshade family, Solanaceae.

CHIRIC-CASPI and CHIRIC SANANGO
(Brunfelsia) are the most common of the native names for several species of shrubs that appear to have been important hallucinogens among some South American Indian tribes. The use of the name borrachero, which means " intoxicator," indicates that the natives of Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru recognize the shrub's narcotic properties, and the special care taken in its cultivation seems to suggest a former religious or magic place in tribal life. Recently, real evidence has pointed to the use of several species of Brunfelsia either as the source of an hallucinogenic drink, as among the Kachinaua of Brazil, or as an additive to other hallucinogenic drinks, as among the Jívaro and Kofán Indians of Ecuador.

The species hallucinogenically employed are B. grandiflora and B. chiricaspi. All species, however, enter into folk medicine, being used especially to reduce fevers and as antirheumatic agents. B. uniflora (as B. hopeana) has been included in the Brazilian pharmacopoeia.

Chemical investigation of the active compounds in the various species of Brunfelsia is still in the initial stage, and what the active principles may be has not yet been determined. The genus comprises 40 species of shrubs native to tropical South America and the West Indies. It belongs to the nightshade family, Solonaceae.

TORNA-LOCO
(Datura ceratocaula) is a fleshy plant with thick, forking stems that grows in marshes and shallow waters. Its unusual habitat and its strong narcotic properties earned it a special place among the ancient Mexican hallucinogens. The Aztecs, who invoked its spirit in treating certain diseases, referred to it as "sister of ololiuqui," one of the morning glories (see p. 128). Its modern Mexican name, tornaloco ("maddening plant"), indicates its potency as a narcotic.

TOLOACHE
(Datura inoxia; known also as D. meteloides), a coarser climbing annual native to Mexico and southwestern United States, has a long history of use as an hallucinogen. It was extremely important to the Aztecs, who called it toloatzin. Hernández recorded many medical uses but warned that taken in excess it would drive a patient to madness.

The modern Tarahumares still add the roots, seeds, and leaves to their maize beer. Zunis value the plant as a narcotic, an anesthetic, and a poultice for treating wounds. Only the rain priests are permitted to gather it. The priests put the powdered root in their eyes; also they chew the root to commune with spirits of the dead, asking intercession for rain.

The Luiseños use an infusion of toloache in an initiation ceremony. The young participants who drink it dance, screaming like animals, until they drop and succumb to the drug's effects. Yumans take it to induce dreams, gain occult powers, and predict the future. Yokuts use the drug in a spring ceremony to assure good health and long life to the young. The related D. discolor and D. wrightii of the same region are similarly used.

CULEBRA BORRACHERO
(Methysticodendron amesianum), a tree reaching a height of 25 feet, is known only from cultivated trees in the Kamsá Indian town of Sibundoy, Colombia. The Indians also call it mitskway borrachera ("snake intoxicant").

This tree is the only species of its genus and may represent an extremely aberrant form of a tree species of Datura. Its 11 - inch white flowers differ from those of the tree daturas in having their bell-shaped corolla split nearly to the base.

An infusion of the leaves is said to be more potent and dangerous to use than similar preparations of Datura. The chemical composition explains its great potency: 80 percent of the several typical tropane alkaloids present is scopolamine. Even in small doses, this drug may cause excitement, hallucinations, and delirium. The trees are the special property of certain medicine men who employ the drug in difficult cases of disease diagnosis, divination, prophecy, or witchcraft.

SHANIN
(Petunia violacea) is one of the most recently reported hallucinogens. It is taken by the Indians in Ecuador to induce the sensation of flight. Although an alkaloid of unknown identity hos been reported from this species of petunia, phytochemical investigation of petunias is urgently needed.

Some 40 species of petunias grow in South America and in warmer parts of North America. Members of the nightshade family, Solanaceae, they are closely allied to the genus Nicotiana (tobacco). Petunia violacea as well as other species are horticulturally important. Cultivated varieties, with their attractive, funnel-shaped blooms, are popular garden flowers that bloom profusely throughout the summer months.

KEULE
(Gomortega keule) is a small tree restricted to about 100 square miles in central Chile. It is the only species in a rare family, Gomortegaceae, related to the nutmeg family. The Mapuche Indions of Chile are soid to eat the fruit of keule, or hualhual, for intoxication, but whether the effects are truly hallucinogenic is not yet known. So far, there have been no chemical studies made of this tree.

TAIQUE
(Desfontainia hookeri) is a shrub of Andean valleys. Its leaves, made probably into a tea, are employed in southern Chile as a folk medicine and as a narcotic. Whether their effects are truly hallucinogenic is not known, nor has their chemical composition been investigated. The genus Desfontainia contains one or two other Andean species and belongs to the family Desfontainiaceae. A related family, Loganiaceae, includes the plants from which certain South American arrow poisons are made.

UPA
(Lobelia tupa), a tall, variable plant of the high Andes, is also called tabaco del diablo ("devil's tobacco"). In Chile, the Mapuche Indians smoke the dried leaves of this beautiful red-flowered plant for their narcotic effects. Whether they are truly hallucinogenic has not yet been established. They contain the alkaloid lobeline and several derivatives of it. The same alkaloid occurs in some North American species of Lobelia, especially L. inflata, known locally as Indian tobacco. It has been used medicinally and as a smoking deterrent. There are 300 species of Lobelia, mostly tropical and subtropical, and they belong to the bluebell family, Campanuloceae. Some are highly prized as garden ornamentals.

ZACATECHICHI
(Calea zacatechichi), an inconspicuous shrub ranging from Mexico to Costa Rica, is a recently discovered hallucinogen that seems to be used only by the Chontals of Oaxaca. They take it to "clarify the senses" and to enable them to communicate verbally with the spirit world. From earliest times, the plant's intensely bitter taste ( zacatechichi is the Aztec word meaning "bitter grass") has made it a favorite folk medicine for fevers, nausea, and other complaints.

After drinking a tea made from the shrub's crushed dried leaves, an Indian lies down in a quiet place and smokes a cigarette made of the dried leaves. He knows that he has had enough when he feels drowsy and hears his own pulse and heartbeat. Recent studies indicate the presence of an unidentified alkaloid that may be responsible for the auditory hallucinations.

There are a hundred or more species of Calea. They belong to the daisy family, Compositae, and grow on open or scrubby hillsides in tropical America. Some species enter into folk medicine.