August 6, 2012

Seeking That Caffeine Buzz for More Than a Thousand Years




Seeking That Caffeine Buzz for More Than a Thousand Years

It’s one of those iden­ti­fy­ing flashes that con­nect us instantly with the past. As early as 1050 A.D. inhab­i­tants of North Amer­ica, specif­i­cally east of St. Louis, MO. were seek­ing out, brew­ing and rit­u­ally drink­ing in copi­ous quan­ti­ties a sub­stance anthro­pol­o­gists are call­ing Black Drink. They prob­a­bly did this before con­duct­ing any impor­tant activ­i­ties.  The drinkers were prob­a­bly mostly men and the bev­er­age they were drink­ing was made from leaves and twigs of species of holly (Ilex vom­i­to­ria, Ilex cas­sine). They con­sumer it from rit­ual ves­sels like these beakers.

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