A study published Monday detailed the discovery of a 1,000-year-old set of vessels used to transport drugs and tobacco around ancient Mesoamerica.
Chemical analysis of pre-Hispanic vases found in Guatemala revealed the presence of nicotine, confirming the use of tobacco in Mesoamerica in the Late Classic Period, which stretched from 650 to 950 A.D., according to the study published in the journal Antiquity. Colonial accounts of the socio-demographic characteristics of Mesoamerica included the use of tobacco products, but there has been limited physical evidence of the practice until these data.
“We knew that tobacco was a very important substance employed for a variety of ritual and therapeutic purposes in ancient Mesoamerica and across the New World,” the study’s co-author Oswaldo Chinchilla Mazariegos said, according to Live Science. “However, archaeological evidence is scarce because the remains of tobacco rarely preserve well.”
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It’s unclear how individuals used tobacco, as the vases suggest it could have been dried and used as a powder or liquid for smoking, drinking or snorting for a number of different physiological and psychological reasons. (RELATED: I Stepped Outside For A Smoke Late Last Night And Ended Up Filming A High-Speed Police Chase)
High levels of nicotine can be deadly, but it was also used as a narcotic “to induce deep sleep, visions and divinatory trances,” the researchers noted. There’s also some question over the location of the find: A sweat bath in Cotzumalhuapa, where authors suggest the substances could have been used in a purification ritual.
