Books in Review 
til Wasson described his own extraor- 
dinary experience as a participant in 
a divinatory rite involving the con- 
sumption of the sacred mushroom in 
the village of Huautla de Jimenez in 
the May 13, 1957, issue of Life. The 
article, unfortunately, resulted in a 
veritable invasion of the Indian high- 
lands by seekers of instant nirvana 
through chemistry. Wasson has since 
written many times of the event, which 
he characterized as soul shattering and 
which totally reversed what he now 
recognized as culturally conditioned 
hostility to the fungal kingdom, es- 
pecially its psychoactive members. In 
1974 he published Maria Sabina and 
Her Mazatec Mushroom Velada (see 
review in Natural History , December 
1975), a tour de force of modern eth- 
nography. This book contained the 
complete text in Mazatec, Spanish, 
and English of Maria’s prayer chants, 
part Christian but mainly native in 
origin, and her consultation, bemush- 
roomed, with the sacred plant whose 
voice she, her patient, and the other 
Indian participants took to be that 
of Christ. Included with that remark- 
able book were four cassettes made 
from the original recording. Part of 
is Wasson’s new work is devoted to the 
1955 experience, but his retelling is 
enriched by a fresh interpretation of 
the role of sacred mushrooms in Meso- 
american cultural history before and 
til since the Spanish conquest. Along 
n . with Wasson I deplore the odd lack 
-c of response from anthropologists to his 
contribution, which to me seems cru- 
cial to understanding Native Middle 
I American religion and the shamanic 
it. phenomenon as it survives in Mexico. 
The book contains an analysis of 
the plant symbols carved on the fam- 
l{ . ous statue of the Aztec god of flowers 
and rapture, Xochipilli, in Mexico 
City’s National Museum of Anthro- 
pology. Schultes helped Wasson iden- 
e ,j tify these plants, every one of which 
turned out to be one of the ritual 
intoxicants used by Mexican Indians, 
including tobacco, morning glory, Hei- 
mia salicifolia, sacred mushrooms, 
and possibly poyomatli, the flowers 
of a tree native to Veracruz and Oa- 
xaca that were so highly esteemed by 
the Aztecs that they imported them 
over long distances. 
Wasson’s elucidation of the real 
meaning of the magnificent Aztec sta- 
tue breaks entirely new ground in Az- 
tec cultural history. Clearly the mush- 
room motif is central to the under- 
standing of the god and of important 
aspects of Aztec religion. The mush- 
room motif is repeated on the deity’s 
knees, the right forearm, the top of 
the head, and very prominently, on 
the base on which he is seated in a 
pose that suggests rapture, or ecstatic 
trance. Xochipilli, then, is more than 
the god of merriment and flowers — he 
is Lord of the “Flowery Dream,” as 
the Aztecs so aptly called the ecstatic 
trance experience with the sacred 
psychoactive plants. 
Some ten years ago, my own mono- 
graphic studies of hallucinogens in 
pre-Columbian art led me (also with 
the help of Schultes) to the identi- 
fication of the morning glory, Turbina 
corymbosa, in the mural art of Te- 
otihuacan, specifically at Tepantitla, 
but in the past I have been doubtful 
of Wasson’s insistence of the presence 
there of sacred mushrooms. Now I 
am no longer so dubious — his case 
in this book for the mushroom in the 
murals and on some painted poly- 
chrome Teotihuacan pottery is much 
stronger than I originally supposed. 
But — and this is an important point — 
if what Wasson believes to be mush- 
rooms really are mushrooms, they con- 
tain a significant message for the view- 
er. For they are all shown, not from 
above or in profile as they are else- 
where, but from below, featuring the 
juncture of the stem and the ribbed 
underside of the cap. Are we meant 
to see the mushrooms — as did the In- 
dians’ divine progenitors (or alter 
egos) — as the deities of earth and un- 
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