coca, there were several who seemed to like chamairo (Elick, 
pers. comm.). 
HISTORICAL RECORDS OF CHAMAIRO 
While researching the literature on coca and its uses, two early 
references to chamairo were discovered. The historical record of 
chamairo dates from the year 1790, when the Franciscan 
missionary Agustin Sobreviela encountered the plant during his 
travels on the Rio Apurimac in Peru. He wrote of meeting two 
Indians who were traveling downstream to collect chamairo, a 
“tree bark” which they said they chewed along with coca 
(Izaguirre, 1923: 325). 
The second report appeared about 100 years later. Olivier 
Ordinaire, a French explorer who traveled among the Campas 
of eastern Peru, described the following encounter (Ordinaire, 
1892: 131): 
“Seeing my breathlessness and exhaustion, the Campa chief 
pressed me to chew with my coca a dry bark which he gave me. I 
did what he said and almost immediately felt a real sensation of 
well-being and tranquility. The Campas make use of this bark, 
which comes from a liana called chumayro, whenever they have 
to fight against fatigue. They always have a provision of it in the 
bag which they carry on their shoulder. When they have run a 
long distance or made violent exercise, as in the tapir hunt, or 
when they are caught in a thunderstorm, they do not fail to chew 
a certain quantity of this bark mixed with coca leaves which they 
also consume in quantity. But all those whom I was able to ask 
told me that they can do without coca more easily than without 
chumayro.... 
“The liana which bears this name and which the same [chief] 
Puchana showed me later in the forest, grows in the thick jungles 
where it attains the thickness of a man’s arm. The Indians cut it 
when it becomes as thick as a finger. They immediately strip the 
bark, the only part which they use, divide it into pieces about a 
foot long, dry it and store it in small bundles. To consume the 
bark, it only remains to remove, with a knife or a finger nail, the 
rugosities of a calcareous appearance which more or less cover 
it.” 
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