Ancient Shamans Tripped on Hallucinogens in a Spanish Cave

Humans have used modern technology to invent many new ways to find comfort and push our life experiences into new directions. But there is one method that has stood the test of time for thousands of years: drugs. Indeed, there is widespread archeological evidence for human use of mind-altering substances, including an 1,000-year-old plant bundle with chemical traces of cocaine and 14th-century ceramic jugs containing opium. Unearthed ancient drug paraphernalia build out the well-accepted story that people have been doing drugs, religiously or recreationally, since the dawn of civilization (and likely even earlier.)

Imagine, though, that you are in a completely thought experiment-based drug court representing an ancient defendant accused of doing ancient drugs. The evidence, you might say to the fictitious judge, is completely circumstantial! The prosecution has nothing to prove that my client actually did those drugs, your honor.

Your defense would have been valid until now: A new study analyzed human hair from the early first millennium BCE collected in caves in Es Càrritx on the island of Menorca east of Spain, and found multiple psychoactive compounds derived from plants. To the Spanish and Chilean researchers who conducted the investigation, these findings indicated that the heads attached to the hair had engaged in drug use for almost a year. The new study was published on April 6 in the journal Scientific Reports.

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