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The Dacians, the bravest and most just of the Thracian peoples, as the ancient authors said, were tribes considered barbaric by Romans or Greeks, writes adevraul.ro. The warrior tribes that occupied a large area of Central and Eastern Europe and that in a certain period managed to subdue most of their enemies. However, the history of the Dacians was romanticized both in the 19th century, and especially in the years of communism. Many of the ancient Dacian traditions and original customs remained poorly understood by the general public, precisely because they did not fit in with the party’s ideology regarding the image of the Dacian, the noble ancestor.
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At the same time, archaeological discoveries are poor as information, for the reconstruction of certain social, traditional and historical aspects of mentalities in the case of the Dacians. Little information comes from the Greco-Roman area, through Latin and Greek historians and geographers. An original aspect timidly advanced during the communist period by historians, but developed by specialists such as Mircea Eliade or Andrei Oişteanu, is the use of narcotics among the Dacian population. In short, the hallucinogenic substances that the Dacians used to achieve ecstasy.
Mushrooms were the warriors’ favorites. Mircea Eliade, the well-known historian of religions, tried to rebuild the geo-dacian society, differently from what we know in most history textbooks. Thus, Eliade presents the young worshipers of the wolf, as a totemic animal, and warrior confreres, with initiation rituals and animal exploits. “The essence of military initiation was the ritual transformation of the young warrior into a beast. It was not just bravery, physical strength, or endurance, but a magical-religious experience that changed the way the young warrior was.
He had to transmit his humanity through an attack of aggressive and terrifying anger, which assimilated him to rabid carnivores, “Eliade wrote in” From Zalmoxis to Genghis Khan. “Dressed in animal skin, the Dacian warrior of these warrior brotherhoods of The initiates, a kind of “berserkir” (not rabid animal), who became famous in the Germanic world, was an unstoppable beast on the battlefield. “As long as the warrior was dressed in animal skins, he was no longer a man , was the carnivore itself. “Not only was he a fierce and invincible warrior ruled by furor heoricus, but he had nothing human left; in short, he no longer felt compelled by the laws and customs of the people,” added Eliade. Ovidios, the exiled Roman poet on the shores of the Black Sea, also remembers these warriors and has an opportunity to see them.
“They have a harsh voice, a wild face and are the most authentic incarnation of Mars. They never had their hair and beards cut,” he comments in Tristele. Some scholars say, even as Eliade suggests, that the Dacian warriors of these brotherhoods would have attained the animal state and that “heroic fury” without fear of death and with the help of narcotics. It is mainly a type of hallucinogenic mushroom, popularly called “fly”, famous for its colorful hat. In the poisonous base, consumed in small amounts, it would have had strong hallucinogenic effects.
“Specialists generally agree that the ‘fly’ fungus was used as a very powerful drug by young warriors in the male initiation brotherhoods to provoke states of rage heroicus and appetitus mortis, conditions that classical authors mention when they speak of Warrior habits of Indo-European populations, including Scythians, Iranians, getodacians and Germans “, wrote the specialist Andrei Oişteanu in” Narcotics in Romanian culture “. This idea is also presented by university professor Ostin Mungiu, a renowned specialist, in the article “Dacian anesthetized with nightshade syrup combined with wine”, from the “Lumina” newspaper. “The fact that the getodacians sacrificed themselves with a serenity and joy that can hardly be understood is due not only to fanaticism, but also to the administration of psychoactive substances from plants, which induced a hallucinating state, which prepared them to meet the gods. ” “, writes.
Cannabis brought the gods closer
Specialists show that not only the warriors consumed narcotics, but also the priests, or more precisely the shamans, those Zalmoxian ascetics who went into a trance to communicate with the gods. They allegedly used cannabis to “contact the gods”. These are ascetics called kapnobatai, those who walked through the smoke. Vasile Pârvan translates them as “travelers through the clouds”, and I, Coman, “walkers through the smoke”. Mircea Eliade believes that “walkers through the smoke” refers to an ecstasy caused by the smoke resulting from the burning of hemp seeds, which Herodotus speaks of, “Ion Horaţiu Crişan specified in” The spirituality of the geto-dacians. In fact, Herodotus refers to the cannabis fumigations practiced by the Scythians in the Carpathian-Danube-Pontic area. The Greek historian says that the Scythians, an Iranian people, lived in closed shops and smoked cannabis on several occasions. Vasile Pârvan proposed the idea that the Getae also participated in these rituals.
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Cannabis fun
Ancient authors and scholars attest to the use of cannabis in the Thracian tribes on several occasions. Especially at parties, where the hallucinogenic effect was strong. For example, Pomponio Mela, a 1st century AD Latin historian, spoke of a Thracian custom of partying. “They throw away the fires around which the seeds sit, the smell of which causes customers a joy of intoxication,” wrote the Latino author. And he is not the only one. Solinus, a 3rd century Roman geographer, also mentions a similar custom. “During lunch, the spouses surround the homes, throw seeds of the weeds that they have in the fire and, after being hit by their smell, with their numb senses, they feel drunken joy.” Andrei Oişteanu, in “Narcotics in Romanian Culture”, says that the Dacians cultivated hemp or that it was wild hemp used in rituals, especially at weddings. “In the late 19th century, Erwin Rohde was of the opinion that the plant whose narcotic smoke was inhaled by the Thracians, Scythians and masseurs was Cannabis indica, from which hashish was extracted,” Oişteanu said in the newspaper.
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