Roman henbane supply discovered

[guy]

 

Researchers have unexpectedly discovered a supply of the powerful black henbane seeds in a hollow animal bone in Roman Netherlands from the first century AD. A birch tar plug and the waterlogged microenvironment had preserved the contents.

Henbane has both an analgesic and sedative effect, as well as having psychoactive and hallucinogenic properties.
 

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Ancient Roman authors were clearly familiar with the plant. Pliny the Elder, Plutarch, and others wrote about black henbane, along with its closely related but less potent relatives, white and yellow henbane. These plants—in the form of ointments, potions, or burning smoke—were prescribed for everything from earaches and toothaches to flatulence and “pains of the womb.” Ancient scholars also warned against taking too much because of the potential for hallucinogenic effects; Pliny counseled physicians to avoid it entirely.

 

https://www.science.org/content/article/roman-era-bone-container-holds-potent-hallucinogenic-medicine

Edited February 8 by guy

[guidoLaMoto]

Henbane is a plant in the Solanaceae family-- nightshade-- which also includes tomato, potato and eggplant, among others....As they say- There are no poisons, only poisonous doses. The alkaloids made by plants in that family have medicinal uses and can also be used for hallucinogenic purposes in religious or magical activities.

Very interesting that this supply was stored in a bone with tar plug-- waterproof. 

[guy]

Below is an excellent academic article on the find.

The presence of henbane throughout the Empire along with other medicinal plants supports the use of henbane as a medicinal ingredient:

 

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A few other archaeological finds strongly suggest a medicinal or hallucinatory use of black henbane. Until the Roman period, we have little archaeological evidence for the cultivation or medicinal or hallucinatory use of this plant (see OSM2 Table S1a). In the hospital of the first-century AD Roman fortress in Neuss (Novaesium), 128 charred seeds of black henbane were found in association with a number of other medicinal plants: fenugreek, vervain, common centaury (Centaurium erythrae), common St John's wort, dill and coriander. This strongly suggests that black henbane was known and used as a medicinal plant in the Roman Rhineland.

 

Examination of archaeobotanical data shows that black henbane, the nine possible medicinal/useful wild plant species and the four cultivated kitchen herbs/medicinal species, are found at 83 Roman-period sites in the Netherlands (see OSM3). Black henbane is found at 65 of the 83 sites. The other species are found in combination with black henbane more often than they are found without it. Black henbane occurs with at least one of the other species at 42 sites. At 23 sites black henbane occurred without any of these other species.

The pattern revealed by these data suggests that black henbane and other wild species with possible medicinal uses did not always grow naturally in and around human settlements. Deliberate cultivation is strengthened when species are found outside their natural habitat, such as at the Roman site of Hoogeloon-Kerkakkers. Here, four plant species that prefer calcareous soils—black henbane, vervain, motherwort and black horehound—grew in the acidic to neutral sandy sediments. The latter species is not mentioned in Roman texts but later historical sources do mention its medicinal qualities.

 

 

 

 

 

The conclusion was very compelling:

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Instances where the intentional human use of black henbane can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt are rare. Only a handful of archaeological examples can be cited: one find in a grave and three finds from hospitals. The discovery at Houten-Castellum, in the Roman Netherlands, of a bone cylinder closed at one end with a birch-bark tar plug and filled with black henbane seeds therefore provides an important new case for the deliberate collection and use of seeds from this plant. Classical texts describe the use of henbane as a medicinal plant and it seems that its uses were also known on the northern edge of the Roman Empire.

 

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Black henbane presents problems for archaeobotanical interpretation as it could occur naturally at most of the archaeological sites where it has been found. For this reason, it is usually grouped with wild plants. Our analyses show that the plant was used by people but unequivocal cases of intentional use are very rare. Nevertheless, we suggest that black henbane should not be disregarded as a wild plant so quickly in the future; the contexts of finds and associations with other plant species and artefacts should first be carefully considered.

 

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/evidence-of-the-intentional-use-of-black-henbane-hyoscyamus-niger-in-the-roman-netherlands/A06E000B17E1642C878E469157D5131C

Edited February 12 by guy