1. Name

Ayahuasca is a brew made from a blend of different plants: the Banisteriopsis caapi vine, which contains harmala alkaloids. (Naranjo 1967). Harmaline inhibits production of moniamine oxidase (MAO), and the Psychotria viridis (chacruna in Quecha language) shrub, whose leaves which contains Dimethyltriptamine  (DMT), a psychedelic principle. Yajé is also a recipe with Banisteriopsis caapi, but it uses the leaves of Diplopterys cabrerana which also are a source of DMT.

Unlike synthesized DMT that is most commonly smoked, ayahuasca and yagé are liquid preparation consumed orally as a “tea.” Ayahuasca brew contains harmaline alkaloids known as MAOIs, monoamine oxidase inhibitors, that prevent the stomach from breaking down DMT and thereby diminishing its effects but MAOIs also prolong the effects of the DMT. This is why ayahuasca never contains only the DMT-bearing Psychotria viridis (chacruna), and Yagé brew always contains Diplopterys cabrerana. Both sources of DMT are part of a pharmacological complex, which reflects a synergy with harmala alkaloids.

While ayahuasca and yagé, as described above, are the recipes and names most commonly used today, these recipes and names are not necessarily the most ancient or the only ones.  According to Gerardo Reichel Dolmatoff, the brew has many Indigenous names: “Among the Eastern Tukano people of the Vaupes this brew is called caapi, or gahpi or kahpi […]  among the Cubeo, it is called mihi. […] Also in the lowlands of Panama and Colombia, it is called ddpa among the Noanama  and among the Embera of Northwest Colombia and Southeastern Panama, it is called pilde. […] Among residents of the Montaña regions of Peru and Ecuador, in the Quechua-language […] it is known by the term ayahuasca”. (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1972, 85)                            

Introduction and Artwork

Tukano cosmogony describe the first inhabitants of the Earth descending from the Milky Way, bringing yagéwith them, making yagé, thereby, an essential part of their cosmogony. Shaped like the sacred serpent, a large anaconda canoe shaped descended from the River of Stars and transported a man and a woman with three plants: the foodstuff manioc or yuca, the psychoactive coca, and the psychedelic caapi or yagé . Other Tukano stories tell of a yagé-woman who gave birth to a luminous child born in a blinding flash of light.

The yagé-woman walked to the House of Waters, her place of origin; it was the Daughter of the Sun who brought mankind this sacred brew. “She had looked at the brilliance of the sun and had become impregnated through the eye . . . And when she gave birth there was another flash of light because the infant, being the Son of the Sun, shone brightly in the darkness of those primeval times. The child was made of light; it was human but it was light, it was Yagé”. (Reichel-Dolmatoff, 1978, 1-6). Therefore, yagé is  a divine gift from the Father Sun to humans.

Source: (Reichel  -Dolmatoff, 1978)

The Master of Animals is called: vahí-mansé, usually is depicted as a small man or red dwarf, he is the master of the hunt and fertility and the owner and guardian of magical herbs that provides luck to the hunter. A daughter of the Master of the Anumals is the owner of caapi, the sacred plant with psychedelic properties Banisteriopsis caapi (Reichel Dolmatoff 1971, 80-86).

Geography and Context

Ayahuasca is generally brewed in Brazil and Peru, and yagé is generally brewed in Colombia and Ecuador. The ayahuasca brew includes chunks of the Banisteriopsis caapi vine and leaves of Psychotria viridis(chacruna). (Torres, 2018) For yagé brew, the basic mixture consists of Banisteriopsis caapi vine and Diplopterys cabrerana leaves (chagropanga, ocoyagé). Both the Psychotria viridis (chacruna) and the Diplopterys cabrerana (chagropanga) are sources of DMT as described above, and while the chemical compounds in the two brews are essentially the same, scholars emphasize that there are significant nuances within indigenous taxonomy and knowledge that are not recognized in Western science.

Approximately one hundred species from forty plant families are reported as ayahuasca and yagé admixtures, part of their combined ingredients; many of these admixtures are themselves psychoactive plants in addition to psychedelic effects of the brewed Banisteriopsis caapi and either Psychotria viridis  or Diplopterys cabreranaleaves. There is no one specific blend considered to be the quintessential or original brew, just as there is no single quintessential or original name for the brew.

Primary Sources

The earliest historical source of ayahuasca appear to be reports by José Chantre y Herrera, who compiled a history of Jesuit activity from 1637 to 1767 in the Marañon River area, a source in Peru and Ecuador for the Amazon River. This compiled history includes a brief description of an ayahuasca ritual and a clear reference to the mixing of a liana or vine with other plants. “The diviner hangs his bed in the middle or sets up his stage on platform and places a hellish concoction next to it, called ayahuasca, which singularly effective in rendering one unconscious. A decoction is made from vines or bitter herbs, which must be boiled until it becomes very thick. As it is so strong then even a small amount can cloud the judgment, the amount needed is not much, and fits into small two cups.” (Chantre y Herrera, 1901:80). The colonial gaze is well displayed in expressions such as “hellish concoction” or “rendering one unconsciousness.”

Interpretation

Tukanos’ visual representations of caapi (ayahuasca/yagé) consist mainly in two different categories that align with the effects of the brew upon those who drink it; both categories are not naturalistic visual depictions of the Tukanos’ environment.

(1)  Tukano people compose geometrical patterns in paintings that adorn artifacts, appearing throughout material culture, and display them in communal houses called malocas. Some researchers associate these geometrical patterns to the entheogenic or psychedelic experience: phosphenes, visual sensations of light when no actual light is present, and wide-spread experiences of luminosity.

(2)   Tukano people also draw designs in a figurative style to depict their worldview, includes representations of sacred and mythological characters, usually in anthropomorphic or zoomorphic forms. Geometrical patterns acquired a practical function in Tukano culture; they are graphic symbols or signs that express major tenets of behavior. (Reichel-Dolmatoff, 1978).

 Tukano graphic symbols are a system of communication making up a collective knowledge embedded in iconography and a sort of “grammar” in geometrical patterns. These graphic messages remind those who view them to practice moderation in hunting and fishing, in eating, in needlessly destroying the environment, in fighting, and in population increase. The Master of the Animals send illness due to ritual transgressions and lack of reverence. On the other hand, the Sun father is a medicine men (payé), and he is the ancestor and the orign of power of contemporary payés. Within sacred narratives he also brrlough in his navel a psychoactive snuff (vihó), which contains the bark-resin of trees of the myristicaceous genus Virola. (Reichel Dolmatoff 1971, 80-86)

Implications

Due to rising interest in their therapeutic potential, ayahuasca and yagé brews are now globally well-known. These brews have been re-interpretation by a number of contemporary churches and religious movements in the West :as Santo Daime and Uniao do Vegetal churches . But the traditions from which these brews originate these brews are ignored or obscured. The ancient traditions around using these psychedelic brews continue to be practiced by indigenous cosmogonies, but their sacred narratives and rituals are frequently overlooked or misunderstood.

The sacred narrative presented above from the Tukano people shows the symbolism embedded within indigenous cosmologies, a wisdom focused on moral teachings and preserving of natural environment, such as myths about the Sun Father and the origin of yagé and the Master of Animal’s moral teachings against the overhunting and exploitation of nature. (Reichel Dolmatoff 1971, 80-86). Above all, the Tukano´s cosmogony highlights the significance of three sacred plants which were a divine gift: foodstuff yuca, a psychoactive stimulant as coca leaves, and yagé with psychedelic properties.

References:

Chantre y Herrera, José. Historia de las misiones de la Compañía de Jesús en el Marañón español. Madrid: Imprenta de A. Avrial. 1901

 Naranjo Claudio. “Psychotropic Properties of the Harmala Alkaloids”. In Efron, Daniel (Ed) Ethopharmacological Research for Psychoactive Drugs. Proceedings of a Symposium held in San Francisco California. January 28-30. (Sponsored by Pharmacology Section, Psychopharmacology Research Branch. National Institute of Mental Health, 1967), 385-391.

 Reichel-Dolmatoff, Gerardo..Amazonian cosmos. The Sexual and Religious Symbolism of the Tukano Indians.(The University of Chicago Press, 1971), 80-86.

 Reichel-Dolmatoff, Gerardo. (1972). “The cultural context of an aboriginal hallucinogen: banisteriopsis caapi” in Furst, Peter ed.Flesh of the gods : the ritual use of hallucinogens. (Wave Land Press, 1972), 85-86.

 Reichel-Dolmatoff, Gerardo. (1978). Beyond the Milky Way: Hallucinatory Imagery of the Tukano Indians. (UCLA Latin American Center, 1978), 1-6.

https://archive.org/details/beyondmilkywayha0000reic/page/4/mode/2up?view=theater

 Torres, Constantino Manuel. (2018). “The Origins of the Ayahuasca/Yagé Concept: An Inquiry into the Synergy between Dimethyltryptamine and Beta-Carbolines.” In Ancient Psychoactive Substances, ed. Scott. M Fitzpatrick (University Press of Florida, 2018), 234-264.