Shaun Smillie
A new study of residue left in age-old “tobacco” pipes could soon dispel the myth that it was only black tribesmen who used dagga in the early years of South African history.
Palaeontologist Dr Francis Thackeray of the Transvaal Museum will be examining the blackened residues found in the bowls and stems of smoking pipes from across South Africa that date from the pre-colonial and colonial periods. “We want to find out what people were smoking over the last millennia,” he says.
Thackeray is hoping that the study will help bring to light the hazy history of dagga use in South Africa. For a start it is not even known how cannabis found its way to the southern tip of Africa.
“One theory suggests that dagga was indigenous to South Africa, while another suggests the idea that the drug was introduced by Indian traders into East Africa and from there it made its way into Southern Africa,” says anthropologist Johnny van Schalkwyk of the National Cultural Museum, who will also be involved in the project.
Cannabis has been used by black communities in Southern Africa for at least 600 years; it was even grown by Khoi pastoralists.
But what has remained a mystery is the extent to which white colonists used the drug. Indications are that some were getting goofed on a little weed.
“In documents there have been references to wild or Indian tobacco that is believed to have been dagga,” says Thackeray.
Cannabis was also a well-known Dutch cure. Even in England, Queen Victoria is believed to have indulged in dagga tea to help ease menstrual cramps.
The pipes will come from museum collections throughout the country, including exhibits from the National Cultural History museum, which has a variety of pipes that date from both pre-colonial and colonial periods. Also to be tested are several clay pipes that were discovered in old rubbish heaps in the Cape Castle.
“We will also be examining stone pipes that have been found particularly in the interior of the country. We are not sure of the age of these pipes, but it has long been suspected, due to geometric engravings, that they were dagga pipes. Geometric designs have been associated with hallucinogenic drugs,” explains Thackeray.
The residue analysis, which will be conducted in a laboratory, is believed to be accurate enough to analyse samples that are more than 700 years old. While the study will determine who was smoking what in the days before and after Jan van Riebeeck, it is also hoped that more information will be obtained on the cultural uses of dagga.
Thackeray usually spends his time studying hominids, but recently became interested in pipe residue while trying to ascertain whether Shakespeare smoked pot. He was struck by the idea that the Bard might have had a drug habit when he came across a reference to “invention in a noted weed” in Shakespeare’s Sonnet 76. Thackeray got hold of several pipes that were found in the vicinity of Shakespeare’s home in Stratford-upon-Avon. “We don’t know if Shakespeare smoked these pipes, but it will show what his contemporaries were smoking,” says Thackeray.
Forensic tests were conducted on the pipes and pipe stems at the police forensic laboratory in Pretoria. The findings of the study are to be officially released this month and Thackeray says they will make interesting reading.
The South African pipe project is still in its preliminary stages but as it grows Thackeray believes he might find more than he bargained for. “While we expect to find the use of dagga, there might have been other substances smoked that we don’t know of.”