Earliest evidence of cannabis use found in ancient Siberian tomb | Hacker News Reader

Earliest evidence of cannabis use found in ancient Siberian tomb

cnn.com

41 pointsmooreds31 comments

> Caspari added that the team are now sequencing the ancient DNA of the seeds they found at the site.

This would sell

It would probably be extremely weak in comparison to the modern varieties. Not necessarily a bad thing (a more balanced, less THC-heavy strain might lead to a more pleasant high) but hard to sell many people on a much, much milder strain than what they're used to.

They would just consume more or concentrate it. Im sure the interest derives more from the profile of the various psychoactive compounds than their potency or farm viability.

Considering all the former smokers, now in their 40s/50s, buying CBD, I think there’s a market for weaker weed.

I spent a lot of time in Georgia, where rudica hybrids are very common. Makes for a nice smoke, not as heavy as big name strains, and hardy and easy to grow.

I think if marketed properly it could still do well. But more as a niche 'artisanal' strain than the mass produced ones like we have today.

Just in the last 50 years, thanks to modern science, cannabis production has evolved heavily. This resulted in far more (ie 3-5x as much) THC concentration per kg of weed than in the 1970s. This is important if you are doing mass production because of transportation costs that go into the economics of any business at scale. But it also means that the cannabis plants of today have been heavily selected throughout the years. So having access to an 'OG' seed would certainly be valuable both for research and marketing purposes.

> I think if marketed properly it could still do well. But more as a niche 'artisanal' strain than the mass produced ones like we have today.

absolutely. crush your enemies, see them driven before you, hear the lamentations of the women, then get high AF with the Golden Horde strain

> I think if marketed properly it could still do well.

It works for the Mother Vine in Manteo, NC.

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mother-vine-oldest-north...

I prefer a milder strain for this and other reasons. My local dispensary stocks a couple of options that are near or below 10% THC. The first few times I bought it they would always confirm whether I knew I was buying CBD. I think that says a lot about expectations around potency.

There’s not quite enough info but it could certainly add interesting qualities to hybridization. Like is it ruderalis, sativa, indica, something else? Ruderalis for example is not that exciting as a stand alone but it gave us autoflowers

A few iterations of intentional growth/cull would let a grower market it as derived/based on "oldest weed ever found!"

Dogfish Head brewery sold a lot of beer developed in a similar way.

Midas Touch was inspired by remnants found in ancient drinking vessels associated with King Midas and brought to life with the help of biomolecular archaeologist Dr. Patrick McGovern.

https://www.dogfish.com/drink/beer/midas-touch

This could have been used for medical purposes. I don't see what evidence they present for their claims of people using it to het high specifically.

> This could have been used for medical purposes

Yes, and the researchers/scientists are quoted saying as much in the article

“ Now they have hemp growing in their land, which is very like flax except in thickness and in height, for in these respects the hemp is much superior. This grows both of itself and with cultivation; and of it the Thracians even make garments, which are very like those made of flaxen thread, so that he who was not specially conversant with it would not be able to decide whether the garments were of flax or of hemp; and he who had not before seen stuff woven of hemp would suppose that the garment was made of flax.

75The Scythians then take the seed of this hemp and creep under the felt coverings, and then they throw the seed upon the stones which have been heated red-hot: and it burns like incense and produces a vapour so thick that no vapour-bath in Hellas would surpass it: and the Scythians being delighted with the vapour-bath howl like wolves.[72] This is to them instead of washing, for in fact they do not wash their bodies at all in water.”

Herodotus.

— Now Herodotus is not exactly a reliable historian, but I don’t think there is any reason for him to have just invented this.

Also, “medicinal” use wasn’t really a category that they would have recognized, nor was there a taboo on intoxication that would make them invent such a category. There might have been ritual element to it, or some other instrumental reason behind it, but I think a contemporaneous description of them seeming to enjoy it is pretty good reason to believe that part of it was that it was just a good time.

Not sure which reporting was submitted to HN, but it was recently posted that they'd confirmed Herodotus' report: https://www.reuters.com/science/siberian-burial-site-reveals...

"Chemical analysis of braids of hair from the bodies of several people found in the central burial chamber identified chemical signatures consistent with THC"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recreational_drug_use_in_anima...

It's not unreasonable to think it possible.

https://wallhop.io/https://www.cnn.com/2026/11/05/science/an...

I was really surprised how the article danced around the use of cannabis. The article framed it as possibly related to ritualistic and or funerary purposes. I see no reason that it wasn’t simply a lifestyle choice. Although even modern use may seem ritualistic. I just think it would be more honest to just say it was used.

Yeah, I think it’s just an anachronism to even try to impose those categories. There is often a religious or spiritual element to getting high.

I think if historians in the far future looked at the rave scene in the mid to late 90s they would call it a religious movement. There are ritualistic elements, religious hymns, ceremony, etc. People often described it in religious terms. There was even a moral/ethical element (PLUR) And I think it wouldn’t be entirely wrong. But it also obviously doesn’t mean that getting fucked up and having fun wasn’t the primary motivation for most people.

Wallhop is great by the way. Thanks for introducing me to it by way of a post on another article I think.

nice

Cannabis traces have also been found in ancient Egyptian mummies, many millennia before Columbus, despite being an American plant.

> Cannabis traces have also been found in ancient Egyptian mummies, many millennia before Columbus, despite being an American plant

The genus Cannabis originated in Central Asia (specifically the northeastern Tibetan Plateau region) and shares a family (Cannabaceae) with its closest related sister genus, Humulus (hops) (McPartland, 2018; Kovalchuk et al., 2020).

References Kovalchuk, I., Pellino, M., Rigault, P., van Velzen, R., Ebersbach, J., Ashnest, J. R., Mau, M., Schranz, M. E., Alcorn, J., Laprairie, R. B., McKay, J. K., Burbridge, C., Schneider, D., Vergara, D., Kane, N. C., & Sharbel, T. F. (2020). The genomics of Cannabis and its close relatives. Annual Review of Plant Biology, 71, 713–739. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-arplant-081519-040203 Cited by: 225

McPartland, J. M. (2018). Cannabis systematics at the levels of family, genus, and species. Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research, 3(1), 203–212. https://doi.org/10.1089/can.2018.0039 Cited by: 513

This era shall now be known as the stoned age...

Smoking causes cancer.

Life kills.

You can consume cannabis in a wide variety of manners that are not smoking it.

The most popular alternative is putting it into a vaporizer, but eh, still bad for the lungs. But you can also make tea out of it, you can make edibles (most popular: cannabutter and brownies), you can make extractions like hash, you can make tinctures for your skin, and there's even suppositories for rectal and vaginal use.

"a grateful dead poster and incense found on the eastern edge of the tomb"

DUDE

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