Here ’ s where it gets good .
As a symbol of the European empire , Spaniards brought hemp to the Americas in 1530 . Pedro Quadadro , a Spanish conquistador from Seville , was given a labor grant and told to be the first person to grow cannabis in the Americas . To support his efforts , the Spanish Crown ( La Corona ) demanded all “ Indians ” work to sow the seeds . This was part of the cross-Atlantic trade , where new crops were sent back and forth to Europe .
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Hernán Cortés and his counselor , the Nahua woman La Malinche , meet Moctezuma in Tenochtitlan , November 8 , 1519 .)
Graphic courtesy Wikimedia commons .
Over time , Mexicans discovered that hemp could be cultivated into a psychoactive plant and replace the native plants now forbidden to them . They needed to develop a word to refer to the plant that aligned with the language of the colonizers . They couldn ’ t use telltale , pre-Hispanic terms such as Teonanácatl ( translated as “ God ’ s Flesh ” from Nahuatl , the language of the Aztecs ), which described a psilocybin mushroom native to Mesoamerica . They needed to subvert the meaning and pass under the radar of the Spaniards and began to use Christianized . At first , they referred to cannabis as Rosa Maria , a reference to the Mother Mary / Guadalupe Virgin . Eventually , this morphed into mariguana and , finally , by the 1850s , marijuana . The origins of the word are rooted in defiance and revolt against severe cultural genocide .
First records of Mexicans adopting hemp into a cannabis crop come from a farm at the base of Mexico City ’ s towering volcano Popocatépetl . From there , herb dealers would sell hempseeds ( known as pipiltzintzintli , or “ noble little princes ”) far and wide to help cure spiritual and physical ailments . By the 1760s , it was widely known that the indigenous people were cultivating and consuming marijuana to commune with God , a practice the Spaniards had aimed to destroy but couldn ’ t .
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The restrictive colonial era in Mexico meant to strip away all indigenous spiritual practices associated with psychoactive native plants and establish a submissive , Catholicized people . In part , however , it failed . The Spaniards provided the very ingredients needed to develop a bigger , deeper relationship with psychoactive plants : hemp and forced labor . They just happened to underestimate the rebellious ingenuity of those they aimed to colonize .
Oh , the irony .
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Karla Deel is the Flora Farms Marketing Director , a writer , poet , and researcher , with a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing and Media Arts from the University of Missouri-Kansas City . She ’ s published a book titled “ Storied & Scandalous Kansas City , a History of Corruption Mischief and a Whole Lot of Booze .” Deel also serves on the Jackson County Historical Society board , works in communications for the Friends of the Kansas City Public Library , and volunteers for several local nonprofits . Visit Karla at
www . KarlaDeel . com .
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