[HN Gopher] The transformation of tobacco and cannabis into earl...
___________________________________________________________________
The transformation of tobacco and cannabis into early modern global
obsessions
Author : benbreen
Score : 65 points
Date : 2021-03-15 21:42 UTC (3 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.laphamsquarterly.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.laphamsquarterly.org)
| feralimal wrote:
| "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 wrote:
| 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 wrote:
| 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/qC...
|
| Incidentally, that source is linked in the article more than
| once, along with others.
| Woberto wrote:
| 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 wrote:
| 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-
| eigh...
| feralimal wrote:
| 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/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 wrote:
| 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_in
| fo_ta...
| feralimal wrote:
| That's a refreshingly honest reply! Thanks!
|
| This is why I said that history is an interpretative act.
| I don't have an issue with the making the best of a past
| that is hard (impossible?) to discern. And that while our
| subject matter might be the past, we ourselves are in the
| present and express our understanding from our own biases
| and understandings - we talk ourselves into the past, in
| a way.
|
| What I object to is the indisputable tone - this
| happened, these are the reasons, etc. It gives the reader
| the impression of knowledge, but this is an illusion,
| possibly a dangerous one. It conveys none of the
| reasoning, jumps and ambiguity that, I think, are the
| main part of these sorts of investigation.
|
| Personally I would rather have the ambiguity, referring
| to source material, and try to develop a theory given the
| evidence - evidence-driven theories. I don't mind if
| there is no overarching narrative to explain it all. But
| it seems to me that professional historians feel
| empowered to present exactly that sort of a narrative,
| sometimes whether or not it is really supported by the
| evidence.
| h2odragon wrote:
| > 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 wrote:
| And it would make you just as content as a smokable, because
| like tobacco smoke, sawdust smoke contains MAO inhibitors.
| mod wrote:
| Hey, can you elaborate on this? Sincere request.
|
| Cheers!
| tartoran wrote:
| Nicotine is a nootropic but had no idea it about this
| https://www.biopsychiatry.com/nicotine-mao.htm
| eurasiantiger wrote:
| It's not nicotine. https://gwern.net/Nicotine
| TheAdamAndChe wrote:
| I made a relevant comment about this a while back[1].
| Thinking it was a nootropic got me addicted for years and
| brought no benefits. I still get the urge to smoke and
| it's been years now.
|
| Just don't smoke, there are better nootropics.
|
| [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26181713
| eurasiantiger wrote:
| Nicotine is not the main cause of tobacco addiction: it
| is attributable to MAO inhibitors created pyrolytically
| during the roasting and burning of plant material.
|
| The same goes for coffee and coffee substitutes with
| respect to caffeine.
| TheAdamAndChe wrote:
| This is wrong. Nicotine alone is less addictive than the
| nicotine-MAOI combination, but it is still extremely
| addictive. I started with vaping.
| eurasiantiger wrote:
| Anecdotal experiences are not evidence of anything else
| than someone having experienced something in a certain
| way.
|
| It is completely feasible that you simply are more
| susceptible to the effects of plain nicotine, e.g. due to
| differences in nAChR genes, or maybe you already had a
| MAOI source in your daily diet, e.g. medications,
| cannabis smoke, coffee, soy sauce, beer, wine, sake,
| roasted/grilled foods...
| TheAdamAndChe wrote:
| The same could have been said of tobacco in the 50's.
| Turns out it was bad for you.
|
| You're spreading misinformation and could get other
| people addicted. You're making assumptions on my diet
| just to dismiss the well-known fact that nicotine is
| addictive[1]. Most sites that say otherwise are either
| social media sites like reddit where echo chambers form,
| or they're obviously pro-ecig and extremely biased.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine
| eurasiantiger wrote:
| In all honesty, it seems your personal experience is
| clouding your objective judgment.
|
| There are plenty of academic studies regarding the matter
| of MAOIs in tobacco smoke, and their addictiveness.
|
| Also, most studies on smoking do not make a difference
| between smoking and pure nicotine. It would be great if
| you could check the sources of the Wikipedia article to
| see if this is the case there.
| TheAdamAndChe wrote:
| My judgement isn't clouded, but I've been directly harmed
| by such misinformation before. I want other people
| reading to know that nicotine isn't some wonder nootropic
| that brings no side effects or addiction, because it's
| just not the case.
| tartoran wrote:
| I was a smoker for 20 years, I know about the addictive
| properties but I think I did get some benefits but the
| damage is not worth it.
| thinkingemote wrote:
| Could this be why people feel calm and comfortable smelling
| woodsmoke on a campfire?
| eloisius wrote:
| It might also explain why I loved being in a wood shop so
| much as a kid. Something about the warm, sweet smell of
| wood smoke when the friction from a saw caused it to heat
| up was so relaxing.
| text70 wrote:
| Several woody aromatic compounds also have partial
| molecular similarity with neurotransmitters. Could it
| have been activating neural pathways directly in your
| brain through your olfactory?
| coldtea wrote:
| Part of it. It's also because they're camping as opposed to
| some hellish office.
| eurasiantiger wrote:
| Definitely. Since the same compounds are formed in meat
| during cooking, so there is a curious evolutionary
| correlation: did the first humans harnessing fire and
| cooking meat do so for the psychoactive effects?
|
| The implications also touch demographics, since humans have
| great variance in the activity of their MAO-A and MAO-B
| genes. People who get easily addicted to smoke flavoured
| food, coffee and/or tobacco may simply have inherited a
| high-activity MAO gene that they are trying to compensate
| for.
| mlang23 wrote:
| Interesting. I must have missed that smoked tobacco is a
| MAOI. But it is significant, i.e., noticeable?
| eurasiantiger wrote:
| Definitely. PET studies have yielded something like 1/5 to
| 1/4 of brain MAO enzymes being inhibited in smokers.
| temp0826 wrote:
| It does to me. Vaping nicotine always felt like more of a
| stimulant- whereas cigarettes were more relaxing.
| fnordian_slip wrote:
| 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 wrote:
| 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.
| naravara wrote:
| 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!
| BrianOnHN wrote:
| > accidentally inhaled way too much of a cigar
|
| While that's possible, I think your resulting illness was more
| likely a result of swallowing your spit, a common mistake.
| DebtDeflation wrote:
| 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
|
| Search YouTube for Thuoc lao 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 wrote:
| 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 wrote:
| 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.
| naravara wrote:
| Cool. I'm a novice piper myself but I suppose it's
| probably too nicotinic for me. I have some Orlick golden
| sliced and even that gets me uncomfortably light headed.
| DebtDeflation wrote:
| Highly recommend Latakia. Smells like a campfire before
| you even light it, but is delicious. And it's one of
| those things that soon will no longer exist in this world
| (the Syrian version is already gone) so experience it
| while you can.
| schoen wrote:
| Hey, I have your book _Age of Intoxication_!
|
| When I was in Lisbon I'd visited the Museu da Farmacia (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 wrote:
| > 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
| xyzelement wrote:
| Hence the phrase "blow it out your ass" :)
| maccard wrote:
| 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..
| EGreg wrote:
| Filthiest river, you say?
|
| https://benjaminleslie.wordpress.com/2011/01/09/river-of-
| shi...
| xxpor wrote:
| I have to presume this is the source of the phrase to blow
| smoke up one's ass?
| runawaybottle wrote:
| Make sure you smoke AND drink for maximum fun:
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_enema
| viewtransform wrote:
| with coffee to perk you up
| https://www.healthline.com/health/coffee-enema
| candu wrote:
| Actually, yes - you can find this and many other excellent
| historical medicine tidbits in Quackery [1] (and then be
| really, really grateful that both science and medicine have
| advanced significantly since we thought it was a good idea
| to, er, blow said smoke up said ass).
|
| [1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/33572516-quackery
| pablovidal85 wrote:
| Did this practice result in accidental fecal transplants?
| pjc50 wrote:
| An ancestor of the public defibrilator! Just without the, you
| know, actually proven to work aspect.
| peteradio wrote:
| I'd be pretty perky if someone poked a bellows in me bum.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-03-18 23:01 UTC)