History of Cocaine and use by the Incas to Sigmund Freud

                        

By Elizabeth H. Elys
Coca plants, which are the source for cocaine, are indigenous to Central and South America. The name of the plant is derived from the Inca word KUKA. The Coca plants in South America points early 7000 years ago. They were used for many centuries by the Incas as a part of their religious ceremonies.

Coca grows wild in much of South American Andes, growing to height of 12 to 18 feet. There are over 100 species of Coca shrubs. One called Bolivian leaf (ERYTROXYLON COCA) and other known as the Peruvian leaf (ERYTROXYLON NOVOGRANATENSE).                             

According to one legend, the plant was a gift from the sun God INTI, who instructed the Moon mother MOMA QUILLA to plant Coca. The other and more famous legend involves MANCO CAPAC, the son of God and his sister- wife MAMA OELLO the founder of The Inca Empire. Legend says that they brought the culture of agriculture and made the coca plant a present to the Incans for their hard labor. It was considered a divine plant which satiates the hungry, strengthens the weak.

Zikmund Freud cited a legend of the Aymaran tribe in which Khuno, the God of snow and storm burned the land of all vegetation but Coca plant.

 To help the dead in the afterworld, mounds of stored coca leaves were left burial sites in the area of modern Peru. These sites are estimated to be about 4.500 years old.

 The Incas may also have been using liquid coca leaf compounds to perform brain surgery. The magic plant of the Incas was chewed by priest to help induce trances that led them into the spirit world to determine the wishes of their gods.

Artifact dating back thousands of years to the earliest Incan periods show the cheeks of their high priests distended with what in all probability were the leaves of the coca plant.

 Even before the Spanish conquest, Indians working in silver mines of the Andes chewed the coca leaf to help overcome pain, fatigue and respiratory problems. After the Spanish conquest the Church sought to ban the practice of chewing the coca leaf, mainly because of its association with Incan religious ceremonies. When the ban failed, the Spanish allowed the Incan survivors to continue their ancient practice of coca leaf chewing in order to maintain mining production.

The Native Americans of the Andes used coca to treat many medical problems: muscle pains, rheumatism, asthma, stomach ulcer, and variety of other disorders. A paste made of coca leaves was used to treat skin sores, headaches, reduce the swelling of wounds, and treat gum disease.

The drug was not formally isolated from the coca leaves until mid- 1800 s. It was in 1859 when German chemist A. NIEMANN first extracted the cocaine, the actual drug from the Coca leaves. It was around 1884 when Sigmund Freud, the Austrian Psychoanalyst who developed the Freudian Thinking model actually used the drug himself and realized the ability for cocaine to cure depression and sexual impotence. As a medical researcher, Freud was an early user and proponent of cocaine as a stimulant as well as analgesic. He believed that cocaine was a cure for many mental and physical problems. Between 1883 and 1887 he wrote several articles recommending medical applications, including its use as antidepressant. Freud also recommended cocaine as a cure for morphine addiction. He had introduced cocaine to his friend, who had become addicted to morphine taken to relieve years of excruciating nerve pain. He developed an acute case of "Cocaine Psychosis” and soon returned to using morphine, dying a few years later after more suffering from intolerable pain. After the "COCAINE Episode" Freud ceased to publicly recommend use of drug, but continued to take it himself for depression, migraine and other problems during 1890s.

Some historians think that he wrote much of his original psychology theory while under the influence of cocaine. It is important to note that cocaine was not illegal when Sigmund Freud was using. 

Inventor Thomas A. Edison was one of many people who used legal cocaine- infused patent medicines during the late 1800s. It helped him work long hours. Writer Robert L. Stevenson, known for work The Strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, counted on cocaine, then legal, to help him work; He was sick with tuberculosis and relied on the stimulating effect of cocaine to help him write his novels.

In 1863 A. Mariani, a Corsican, developed the first popular drink using coca leaves, known as VIN MARIANI became a runaway success in America and Europe. Vin Mariani was advertised and used for treating a variety of illnesses and became the world’s most popular prescription. Mariani used Anatole France, Henric Ibsen, Jules Verne, Alexander Dumas, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Queen Victoria and King George. Pope Pius X.

In the end of this story about COCA we have to mention John S. PERBERTON of Atlanta, a chemist came up with the world famous COCA- Cola ! He based his original drink on Vin Mariani. When Atlanta introduced Prohibition in 1886, Perberton had to replace the wine in his recipe with sugar Syrup, and the wine became COCA COLA!