The earliest decipherable grounds of people smoking ganja for its psychotropic properties has been chance on in what is now Western China . They were using the drug to get high at least 2,500 years ago , agree to a new subject in the journalScience promote . While cannabis has been cultivated in East Asia for thousands of years as a roughage and oil - seed crop , the authors describe the discovery of 10 incense burner in ancient tomb that contain the early known grounds of smoking hemp for consciousness alteration anywhere in the humanity .
The wooden braziers were found in the Jirzankal Cemetery , 3,000 meters ( 9,850 substructure ) up in the Pamir mountains , which is believed to date back to the middle of the first millennium BCE . investigator used a technique call gun chromatography - mass spectroscopic analysis to analyse burnt organic material retrieve from the pots , and receive that it match the chemical touch ofcannabis .
While the cannabis industrial plant is make out to haveoriginated in the region , most ancient air contained very low amounts of the psychoactive compoundtetrahydrocannabinol ( THC ) , and were therefore used mainly for textiles or intellectual nourishment . However , the material receive from the Jirzankal tombs contained a much higher tightness of THC than is typically find in wild marihuana plant , advise it had been select for its psychotropic effects .
This discovery raises interesting questions about the timeline of cannabis cultivation , indicating that masses in this part of China may have been actively breed high - THC strains for smoking as betimes as 2,500 years ago .
However , it is also possible that high stage of ultra - purple light and other environmental factors associated with high-pitched elevation caused the wild cannabis plants in the Pamir mountains to course produce increase THC .
Regardless of how these strong sens nisus came to exist , written report author Nicole Boivinclaimsthat “ [ these ] findings support the mind that cannabis flora were first used for their psychoactive compounds in the mountainous regions of easterly Central Asia , thereafter spreading to other regions of the world . ”
According to the researchers , smoking was likely to have occurred during burial rituals , perhaps as a mean of access other realms for communicate with the all in or the divine . Over time , these psychotropic cannabis strains made their way to other parts of Asia and Europe via trading links such as the legendary Silk Route .
