Hippos made it to Columbia because Pabli Escobar brought them. I am sure if he was selling cocaine from Madagascar and he wanted monkeys they would be there.
-
Happy Birthday ICMag! Been 20 years since Gypsy Nirvana created the forum! We are celebrating with a 4/20 Giveaway and by launching a new Patreon tier called "420club". You can read more here.
-
Important notice: ICMag's T.O.U. has been updated. Please review it here. For your convenience, it is also available in the main forum menu, under 'Quick Links"!
The Origin Of Cannabis
- Thread starter englishrick
- Start date
ramse
Active member
I mean the first direct evidence... in fact, Herodotus speaks only of the cannabis seeds that were burned to produce the purifying exhalations, and the archaeological remains have confirmed it, since only hemp seeds have been found... and the ritual described by Herodotus and confirmed by archaeological excavations could have had purifying purposes only and not intoxicating.
Furthermore, it would appear that the practice of burning hemp seeds on the braziers turns out to be much older than the Scythian culture.
Charred hemp seeds were found in a burial of the Kurgan Neolithic culture, at a site near Gurbanesti in Romania, dated around 2000 BC
Other hemp seeds were found in a Bronze Age burial in the northern Caucasus region.
ROSETTI D.V., 1959, Movilele funerare de la Gurbăneşti. (Lehliu, reg. Bucureşti), Materiale şi Cercetari Arheologice, vol. 6: 791-816.
ECSEDY ISTVÁN, 1979, The people of the pit-grave kurgans in eastern Hungary, Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest.
ramse
Active member
some photos from the Afghan Media Resource Center
Afghanistan Khost Province 1990 A Muj Smoking Hashish
it was for people aware that poplars are very common in Xinjiang and other parts of Central Asia
whereas Yunnan becomes subtropical, but you do find poplars there
point is, the photo is from Yunnan, whereas someone was claiming it was evidence for broad-leaflet plants in Xinjiang
Wait what? Who made that claim? The only one making a claim here is you, saying it's from Yunnan. With zero proof. I seem to remember seeing the picture in a magazine, probably Nat Geo, and I think it was Manchuria not Yunnan. But I could be wrong. And you've got me repeating myself and wasting space because you didn't read my earlier post. This is exactly the sort of pissing match you love to start.
I'd like to see pictures of narrow leaf drug cannabis grown in Xinjiang. I've seen pictures of ditchweed, seed hemp, fiber hemp, (all with varying degrees of leaf width) in Eastern China but I've never seen drug strains. The Uyghurs are known for growing and smoking cannabis and hashish and there's a trade in China's biggest cities. Good old Vavilov says they were growing narrow leaf strains and he didn't see any Afghan varieties but that was 100 years ago. And Vavilov didn't see everything. Lots of reports of hashish from Chinese Turkestan, it's made it to Amsterdam, but never any seeds. I've seen pictures of purported Cannabis Indica grown in Manchuria in the 1930s, I'm assuming for hashish. The warlords who controlled much of China from the 1910s to 1940s grew quite a bit of cannabis for hashish, but no idea what they were growing. I'd guess in most cases whatever local strains they could find but the Muslims of China must have had the good stuff.
Well sheeeeet boys and girls turns out it was Xinjiang after all.
https://www.weedforum.eu/wietforum/gallery/image/1696-xinjiang-early-80s/
https://www.weedforum.eu/wietforum/gallery/image/1697-xinjiang-cannabis-close-up/
https://www.weedforum.eu/wietforum/gallery/album/13-medicinale-kruiden/
Surprised my memory is that good, must have seen the article 20 some odd years ago. Shoulda' stuck to my guns, I thought it was Xinjiang but I wasn't sure at all, something was telling me it was Manchuria. And I don't like making spurious claims without references. Posted it just because it's a cool picture and I felt like trolling. I think it's likely the field is hemp but it could be drug cannabis, I'll do some more digging and see if I can find the article. Most likely High Times although I still think it's Nat Geo.
The 'poplars' aka cottonwoods are planted in rows in dry windy places to keep the soil from eroding. They also act as windbreaks to protect fields and roads, in this case the cannabis field. There is a 'Yunnan Poplar' but it looks different.
Not sure why it was so important to get sidetracked from the Origins of Cannabis into poplar cottonwood biology and Xinjiang cannabis varieties but now I'm glad we did because any info on Xinjiang cannabis is gold. This isn't the picture I recalled seeing, the one I was thinking of was of a wide leaved plant growing next to a mud building in Kashgar. Probably ditchweed and considering the main trade route from Pakistan and Afghanistan goes over the pass to Kashgar it shouldn't be surprising.
There's also wide leaved varieties in Tuva, Russia, Mongolia, Jilin, Manchuria, Korea, Japan, etc. Most of them aren't drug varieties but when ruderalis, narrow, and wide leaf varieties mix you get all sorts of funky combinations of leaf shape and size. A reason why leaf shape isn't the best way to classify strains, it's so plastic and can develop in a generation or two or disappear just as quickly.
Ngpka is right about Yunnan having all sorts of wide leaf strains, being the hot spot of cannabis diversity it is. I've seen pics of plants that you'd swear were Afghani, big plants with huge wide leaves.
https://www.weedforum.eu/wietforum/gallery/image/1696-xinjiang-early-80s/
https://www.weedforum.eu/wietforum/gallery/image/1697-xinjiang-cannabis-close-up/
https://www.weedforum.eu/wietforum/gallery/album/13-medicinale-kruiden/
Surprised my memory is that good, must have seen the article 20 some odd years ago. Shoulda' stuck to my guns, I thought it was Xinjiang but I wasn't sure at all, something was telling me it was Manchuria. And I don't like making spurious claims without references. Posted it just because it's a cool picture and I felt like trolling. I think it's likely the field is hemp but it could be drug cannabis, I'll do some more digging and see if I can find the article. Most likely High Times although I still think it's Nat Geo.
The 'poplars' aka cottonwoods are planted in rows in dry windy places to keep the soil from eroding. They also act as windbreaks to protect fields and roads, in this case the cannabis field. There is a 'Yunnan Poplar' but it looks different.
Not sure why it was so important to get sidetracked from the Origins of Cannabis into poplar cottonwood biology and Xinjiang cannabis varieties but now I'm glad we did because any info on Xinjiang cannabis is gold. This isn't the picture I recalled seeing, the one I was thinking of was of a wide leaved plant growing next to a mud building in Kashgar. Probably ditchweed and considering the main trade route from Pakistan and Afghanistan goes over the pass to Kashgar it shouldn't be surprising.
There's also wide leaved varieties in Tuva, Russia, Mongolia, Jilin, Manchuria, Korea, Japan, etc. Most of them aren't drug varieties but when ruderalis, narrow, and wide leaf varieties mix you get all sorts of funky combinations of leaf shape and size. A reason why leaf shape isn't the best way to classify strains, it's so plastic and can develop in a generation or two or disappear just as quickly.
Ngpka is right about Yunnan having all sorts of wide leaf strains, being the hot spot of cannabis diversity it is. I've seen pics of plants that you'd swear were Afghani, big plants with huge wide leaves.
hi, I don't have time to respond in detail, but two things to note:
Chris Bennett's books and other writing is confused and confusing, and it seems you might have been reading that or stuff derived from it
there is no "Kurgan Neolithic culture" or, as Bennett puts it, a Neolithic people called "the Kurgans"
a kurgan is a burial mound - it's a Turkic word for them
for Herodotus, you need to read the account(s) of cannabis in the Histories in context:
the circumstantial evidence that the Scythians and other Iranic steppe cultures were smoking and drinking cannabis to get high is overwhelming...
there are a lot of other related finds, plenty of other historic material, and new ones appearing regularly, eg this in Xinjiang and a while back in Stavropol
Xinjiang has a long connection border to kazakhstan , i.e. afganica , WLD , china must have all Afghanica , WLD , NLD , hybrids galore
ramse
Active member
hi nagkpa,
I have a couple of Bennet books, but I have yet to find the time to read them... I gathered this information mainly from the studios of Giorgio Samorini an Italian ethnobotanist...
I know what a kurgan is... and they are an essentially cultural phenomenon
not that Wikipedia is the most authoritative source... but
Wikipedia Italy:
Kurgan Culture
The term kurgan culture indicates the set of prehistoric and protohistoric cultures of Eurasia (Eastern Europe, Central Asia and Siberia, up to the Altai Mountains and western Mongolia), which used to bury the high-ranking dead in burial mounds, built starting from from 4000 BC about and particularly in the Bronze Age.
or maybe I don't understand what you want to tell me...
Last edited:
the entire concept of WLD is dubious, and especially dubious in the context of landraces
as said, there's zero evidence I'm aware of for for broad-leafleted plants in Xinjiang, and likewise in Kazakhstan
if anyone has any serious evidence for them, I would genuinely like to see it
fair enough, it does seem this idea has been resurrected by a few academics, ie that there is a single people/culture responsible for those finds
it's a very dodgy idea though...
Found a great site with all sorts of historic cannabis photos. Here's a shot of 'Manchurian Indicas'. It's got to be hemp but the picture dates from the 1930s, a time when hashish and opium were produced in the region.
https://www.thecannachronicles.com/chinese-indica-field-1931/
And a link to the site.
https://www.thecannachronicles.com/
Right off the bat I found this great picture.
https://www.thecannachronicles.com/italian-pow-cannabis-garden-1915/
https://www.thecannachronicles.com/chinese-indica-field-1931/
And a link to the site.
https://www.thecannachronicles.com/
Right off the bat I found this great picture.
https://www.thecannachronicles.com/italian-pow-cannabis-garden-1915/
funkyhorse
Well-known member
Hi Therevverend
I had the chance/opportunity/luck during my life to be in a lot of different places of the globe and one of them was Manchuria.
While I was there I sampled flowers and hash made from manchurian strain by other people and also I cut myself some feral plants first week of october before the freezing cold arrives, dried and smoked them 13 years ago. They grow in the wild anywhere in Manchuria and you can get as much as you want if you are there at harvest time end september/beginning october
Out of the three chinese landrace varieties(Dali, Xinjiang and Manchurian), the only one with a mild psychoactivity is Manchurian. Dali is hemp. And landrace Xinjiang would be very close to Dali but the hybridization that took place before the chinese curfew of Xinjiang improved the quality of the xinjiangese plants and up to 18 months ago it got much better than the manchurian I tried back then.
I doubt manchurian would get hybridized and change much because it is a very difficult temperature and land and I dont think many strains will adapt and survive there
I had the chance/opportunity/luck during my life to be in a lot of different places of the globe and one of them was Manchuria.
While I was there I sampled flowers and hash made from manchurian strain by other people and also I cut myself some feral plants first week of october before the freezing cold arrives, dried and smoked them 13 years ago. They grow in the wild anywhere in Manchuria and you can get as much as you want if you are there at harvest time end september/beginning october
Out of the three chinese landrace varieties(Dali, Xinjiang and Manchurian), the only one with a mild psychoactivity is Manchurian. Dali is hemp. And landrace Xinjiang would be very close to Dali but the hybridization that took place before the chinese curfew of Xinjiang improved the quality of the xinjiangese plants and up to 18 months ago it got much better than the manchurian I tried back then.
I doubt manchurian would get hybridized and change much because it is a very difficult temperature and land and I dont think many strains will adapt and survive there
Hempy McNoodle
Well-known member
We may never no for sure, but I can't help but think that Cannabis originated closer to the equator. Perhaps sub-saharan africa or southern asia. I find it likely that Cannabis pre-dates the end of the last ice age and was able to spread north as the ice sheets moved north. It makes less sense, to me, that it was some sort of tundra plant that just appeared out of nowhere and started adapting to warmer climates.
Yeah that's how it worked but not quite so far south, not all the way to Africa. During the Ice Ages cannabis grew in refuges, along with the other northern plants and animals. Interbred and mixed, then as the ice sheets expanded and retreated it expanded and constricted it's range. There were a few hot spots, China to the east, and Iran and the Caucasus in the West, that cannabis retreated to. These are the spots with the most genetic diversity.
One other thing I should say, for instance about the range of cannabis expanding and contracting across Europe during the ice ages, it's the 'scientific consensus'. What the majority of scientists think they know. Some of this stuff is more contested then others, maybe 99% of scientists or 60% of scientists. Evolution for instance, is the scientific consensus and it's very very unlikely it's wrong. Global warming is supported by most of the data. Other stuff is in more of a grey area, the data points one way but it's not completely one sided.
If you want to disagree with the scientific consensus, for instance that cannabis grew in North America pre-Columbus, that's cool we all have our own theories about stuff. But you should know the evidence is very very weak. And the more often you disagree with the scientific consensus the harder it is to have a discussion because the less credible sources you'll find.
Of course the scientific consensus is wrong from time to time but you aren't going to get rich betting against it. And it pays to know the odds, whether something is controversial or not. We're talking about archaeology in this thread mostly, but stuff like physics and biology and how to grow cannabis work in a similar way. Does Round Up cause cancer? How much nitrogen does a flowering cannabis plant need? You get different answers but it's helpful to know what the consensus is and what the opposing arguments are, if it's a subject that interests you. Of course sometimes there's no consensus..
Hempy McNoodle
Well-known member
Thank you threvverend that gives me something to consider.
I also consider that much of what is desert today in north africa and the middle east, was likely a lusher 'mediteraenian' type of climate, in the era before the end of the pleistocene.
It's fine to go against consensus. I do it routinely. But I do still learn. I like respectful exchanges of ideas. That said, I don't think it makes sense (to me) that the plant would make an entrance onto the earth as a relictual species clinging to life in warm canyons in central asia, which even today is a somewhat harsh biome for cannabis. I think it's much more likely that it evolved to eventually fit the niche of the central asian steppes and was beaten back for a few thousand years by the ice sheets. Probably evolved from some vibrant jungli plant out of the warm regions of the world. There are many great reasons why the fossil record would be very obscure in the era when the fossil evidence becomes lacking. I still definitely will keep an open mind about alternative theories, but this theory, sort of makes more sense to me personally. Is the oldest record for hemp still the Taiwan discovery from aproximately 12,000bc? If so, this supports my point because we are talking about a cultivated crop. I would think the species may be older than humans or be derived from an ancester from more plant friendly warmer regions of the ancient pleistocene world.
I also consider that much of what is desert today in north africa and the middle east, was likely a lusher 'mediteraenian' type of climate, in the era before the end of the pleistocene.
It's fine to go against consensus. I do it routinely. But I do still learn. I like respectful exchanges of ideas. That said, I don't think it makes sense (to me) that the plant would make an entrance onto the earth as a relictual species clinging to life in warm canyons in central asia, which even today is a somewhat harsh biome for cannabis. I think it's much more likely that it evolved to eventually fit the niche of the central asian steppes and was beaten back for a few thousand years by the ice sheets. Probably evolved from some vibrant jungli plant out of the warm regions of the world. There are many great reasons why the fossil record would be very obscure in the era when the fossil evidence becomes lacking. I still definitely will keep an open mind about alternative theories, but this theory, sort of makes more sense to me personally. Is the oldest record for hemp still the Taiwan discovery from aproximately 12,000bc? If so, this supports my point because we are talking about a cultivated crop. I would think the species may be older than humans or be derived from an ancester from more plant friendly warmer regions of the ancient pleistocene world.
funkyhorse
Well-known member
Hi Revverend
Certainly very interesting:..."We're getting off topic here, there's a bunch of other info on Chinese cannabis, Xinjiang, Manchuria, shamanism, traditional Chinese culture I want to post..." I am looking forwards to your posts on these topics.
About the Romulan which is trending topic lately, this link was posted:
https://www.thegrowthop.com/cannabi...ent-their-captivity-stoned-out-of-their-gourd
After I read this link and saw the pictures, it is obvious to me that the POW have been smoking manchurian and if this is the "korean" in the romulan hybrid formula, then it should be corrected and called for what it really is, Manchurian. In South Korea I didnt see any wild ganja, in the north korean border is feral like everywhere else in Manchuria. Look at the map, it includes part of south eastern Mongolia, part of far east Russia, north east China and the north of North Korea:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchuria
I agree with you manchurian must be of value for northern growers, I would not be surprised if it has autoflowering traits
I have never been in such a cold place before in my life. Winter temperatures are -30C to -40C. It was very interesting to see at the end of may beginning of june the trees were flowering and only after they have flowered, they start forming leaves. I have never seen this before in the tropical/subtropical climates.
Certainly very interesting:..."We're getting off topic here, there's a bunch of other info on Chinese cannabis, Xinjiang, Manchuria, shamanism, traditional Chinese culture I want to post..." I am looking forwards to your posts on these topics.
About the Romulan which is trending topic lately, this link was posted:
https://www.thegrowthop.com/cannabi...ent-their-captivity-stoned-out-of-their-gourd
After I read this link and saw the pictures, it is obvious to me that the POW have been smoking manchurian and if this is the "korean" in the romulan hybrid formula, then it should be corrected and called for what it really is, Manchurian. In South Korea I didnt see any wild ganja, in the north korean border is feral like everywhere else in Manchuria. Look at the map, it includes part of south eastern Mongolia, part of far east Russia, north east China and the north of North Korea:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchuria
I agree with you manchurian must be of value for northern growers, I would not be surprised if it has autoflowering traits
I have never been in such a cold place before in my life. Winter temperatures are -30C to -40C. It was very interesting to see at the end of may beginning of june the trees were flowering and only after they have flowered, they start forming leaves. I have never seen this before in the tropical/subtropical climates.
Man, I actually wrote this and deleted it because it was going off topic.
I also some deleted stuff I wrote covering this. I guess I should write it again. At the end of the last ice age Europe was very different. A dry cold steppe, like Central Asia is today. Cannabis, probably Sativa Spontanea, grew across it. The range actually shrunk back to the Ukraine as the climate changed and the grass land shrank. A bunch of animals who depended on the 'mammoth steppe' went extinct, including mammoths.
And remember when we're talking about 'ice age refugia' we aren't talking about a few icy little valleys in Afghanistan. We're talking about China, Iran, the Southern Ukraine and Turkey, vast countries. Along with the plants and trees that survived south of the ice the people and animals survived in the refuges as well. Horses, wolves, deer, bear, boar, goats, sheep, all our common Eurasian animals (and the same thing happened in North America-except it was Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, etc.) migrated south to get away from the cold.
Got a bit to say about the Kurgan Hypothesis. Ngpka said:
It's fair to say that the Kurgans but it's a mis-representation of what the Kurgan idea is. What Ramses wrote was:
Ramse is saying the Kurgan culture is not one people one culture but a set of cultures and peoples ranging thousands of years across the Eurasian steppe. The problem with the Kurgan idea is that we know 'who they became' but we don't know enough about 'who they were.'
This is why it's called the 'Kurgan hypothesis' or 'steppe hypothesis' and not the 'Kurgan theory'. (although people who REALLY believe in it call it the Kurgan theory) A theory, the theory of evolution or theory of gravity, is basically true. The scientific consensus is that it's not debatable. It's part of how the world works. A hypothesis is thought to be true, it may be extremely likely, but the evidence is far weaker and it doesn't have a 100% scientific consensus about it. This is important because future finds could radically change what we know about the 'Kurgans'.
This collection of people and cultures were the 'Indo-Europeans' you hear so much about. The ancestors of the Germanic people that invaded the Roman Empire, the Vedic people who invaded India and Iran. Here's a map of their expansion out of the Ukraine and across Eurasia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurgan_hypothesis#/media/File:IE_expansion.png
This is from the wiki article which is worth reading.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurgan_hypothesis
These peoples buried their dead in mounds, and some of them buried them with lots of cannabis. The finds we keep rambling about were 'Kurgan'. This is so important to the history of cannabis because we can see them in the process of discovering cannabis and getting high.
Early on they're burning seeds and leaves for funeral ceremonies, along with a witches' brew of other aromatic herbs. This stuff was originally Sativa spontanea, but as they expand into regions with psychedelic type plants, Western China, Afghanistan, India, Iran, they stop with the seed mixes and leaves, and start burning the female plant parts in their incense burners and braziers. They migrate to areas where farming is possible and start growing stuff including lots of ganja. In the process selecting cannabis strains for more potency.
At least this is my 'Stoners hypothesis'. Could be totally wrong but it sounds good. I don't want to get into too much into the debate about the 'Kurgan hypothesis' because it's off topic and a waste of my time. I'd think it's more of an 'idea' then a people. Another note is that these were the groups that domesticated the horse, you can see how powerful their ideas and cultures would have been. Along with the horse comes more trade, better booze and drugs, Gods, and language and it spreads rapidly to various other peoples across the steppes and Eurasia. All the way to France and Mongolia.
Sorry I confused you, the POWs are in Europe, they're eastern European. Not related to the pictures in Manchuria which were 20 years later. Didn't mean to mislead you.
Let's not get too hasty, we don't know for sure Romulan really has Korean in it, let alone which Korean it is. Lots of US and Canadian soldiers stationed there over the years. Korea has an ancient history of hemp cultivation and wild and feral plants have been found going back thousands of years. Hemp plays an important role in Korean funerary rituals, as it does across Eurasia. In North Korea there's been articles about how the people there are smoking cannabis instead of tobacco but it doesn't seem to be potent. Wild hemp. There's also the Russian far east bordering on Korea and China, Siberian tiger country along the Amur River. It really isn't Siberia but historically is more connected to Manchuria and Korea. We know they grow ganja there, check out this craziness:
https://www.thefix.com/content/addicts-slaves-marijuana-plantation9814
Wouldn't that be fun, the cossacks find you with a joint so they make you their trim slave. Sit you down with 880 lbs to trim! What a nightmare!
Kalishnakov seeds has a hybrid of a giant Amur autoflower from the region.
https://en.**********.eu/strain-info/Amur_Giant_Auto/Kalashnikov_Seeds/
I've found quite a few references to huge cannabis fields in the Amur region. Popular with organized crime and paramilitary groups, it seems like much of the seed would be brought in from Europe. Either hybridized with the local strains or kept separate.
I'm guessing there's a feral/wild strain that grows across the Far East, very similar whether you're in Manchuria, Russia, Korea, or Japan. Growing at that latitude. Then there'd be the cultivated hemp and seed strains, some going back hundreds or thousands of years. Then you'd have the secret shaman stuff that no one has written the history of. If it exists, that's always the ?
