CANNABIS 



ORIGIN OF NAME SATIVA 



History 



(( \niti>r l.-!.,.li>ui-n. Si,,-. .\ ri.i. 1H95, 901) says the fibre of the male plant ia tougher 

 uinl licttiT than ih.it ..f tin- I'.-male. It is separated by retting, brt-.i 



utcliiiiK as in (lax. [Cf. also Dodge, Cult, of Hemp and Jute, U.S. Dept. 



fstig. Rept., 1896, No. 8.] In New Jersey experiment* were Soil and Climate, 

 ted to test the influence of environment on the relative production of 

 male and female plants. On rich soils twice as many female as male plant* 

 : I-M in the seeds. So also seed collected late in the season was found to give 



tillato than staminate plants. 



TUI-MUIL; now to the mistakes made by Gorarde and most of tlm curly writers wild Hemp. 

 rdiiitf plants supposed to be wild states of *<. natim, it may be 

 d that in tlm classic literature of this subject in Europe, India and China, 

 .inly parallel examples of error may be cited to those of the 13th to 18th 

 tury writers. In India from the time of the early Mughal Emperors, at Confusion with 

 .t two, if not three fibre-yielding plants have been recognised as forms of other 

 hemp, \i/.. bhangd or aana (rammbi* mittm), pataan (inhi*<-n ,,,,,,, i,,,,i<*<. * 



in (or sunn) (vo/iiii-ii .)((). The first two are mentioned, for example, Sanskrit 

 in tlm Ain-i-Akbari (1590, Blochmann, transl., i., 87) in such terms as to leave no Literature, 

 tloulit as to the palmate-leaved son having been recognised as distinct from the 

 sallow-flowered sonof another passage (Glad win, transl., i., 101). But while sana 

 a libra occurs in the Institutes of MaAu (probably of date 100 to 500 A.D.) 

 in some of the later Sanskrit works, it apparently denotes Crotainrla rather 

 <<! uiKffMs. It would thus seem as if the word aana to denote the true 

 mp had been a comparatively modern usage. 



History. The names schema and deschoma given to it, according to John Am- Hemp in 

 -us (Stirp. Rar. Imp. Ruth., 1739, 174), in Dahuria, are suggestive of the Chinese China. 

 a (great-mo), si-ma (male-ma), tsu- (sometimes written chu-) ma (female and 

 -bearing-ma). Bretschneider says " the character ma, which nowadays is 

 LC term for plants yielding textile fibres, was in ancient times applied 

 r to the common hemp plant ranwabla ***, Linn. It would, in 

 , seem fairly certain, if the plant be excluded by botanists from the position 

 >eing regarded as indigenous to China, it has been frequently mentioned in 

 e Rh-ya, and special characters are employed to denote the fibre plant as distinct 

 i the seed-bearing form. In fact it would seem that so very ancient is the 

 acter ma that it denotes conjointly fibre and oil (or food). Dr. Henry has 

 inted out to me that the character in question looks not unlike two plants 

 a partially protecting line. Whether or not the very character used to 

 mote ma was intended to convey the idea of the two forms, the double property 

 i certainly known from the most ancient times. [Cf. Kew Butt., 1891, 247-59.] 

 tschneider accordingly observes : " As hemp-seed was an article of food, 

 in ancient times was reckoned as one of the five, or nine, kinds of 

 The Lu Shi (Sung dynasty) relates a tradition according to which 

 Emperor Shen Nung (28th century B.C.) first taught the people to culti- 

 i the ma. 



Discussing the classic names associated with India, G. A. Grierson (Note 

 the References to the Hemp Plant occurring in Sanskrit and Hindi Literature, 

 H.D.C.R., iii., 246) mentions bhanga, indrdcdna and vijayd or jayd. " The 

 ie bhanga occurs in the Atharvaveda (say 1400 B.C.). The hemp plant is 

 iere mentioned simply as a sacred grass." It was one of the five herbs offered 

 oblations, viz. #oma, kuca, bhanga, barley and saha. " The first mention of 

 nga as a medicine which I have noted is in the work of Susruta (before the 

 century A.D.), where it is called an antiphlegmatic. During the next four 

 turies bhangd (feminine) frequently occurs in Native Sanskrit dictionaries 

 sense of hemp plant." " In the 10th century the intoxicating nature of 

 ng seems to have been known : and the name indrdqana, Indra's-food, first 

 pears, so far as I know, in literature. Its intoxicating power was certainly 

 own in the beginning of the 14th century." The synonym vijayd (the 



of success) often has the alternative meaning of haritaki (Tci-ntinnUa). known - 

 tt (Mat. Med. Hind., 1900, 235-41) a great authority on the Sanskrit names 

 plants says a mythological origin has been invented for this plant. It is 

 juted to have been produced in the shape of nectar while the gods were 

 churning the ocean. In part confirmation of that view it may be mentioned 

 that in the medical treatise that constitutes The Bower Manuscript (translated 

 and annotated by Dr. A. F. Rudolf Hoernle) no mention is made of Indian 

 hemp in any form. The MS. was found at Kucha, Khotan, which according to 

 Stein was engulfed by sand towards the close of the 8th century. Jt is thus 



251 



Indian Classic 

 .References. 



Intoxicating 

 Property 



