420: how and when did marijuana arrive in Mexico

This April 20 commemorates World Marijuana Day. Around the origin of this celebration, there are several theories, although the most accepted one is that a group of young people who called themselves Los Waldos, in the 70s, in California, United States, got together to smoke marijuana after school. To do so, they decided that the meeting time would be 4:20, and in fact, they used code 420 as a key.

Another well-known version tells that in 1995, in Vancouver, Canada, 200 cannabis users came together, with the intention of demanding the decriminalization of this product, and as a way of protest, smoked that herb in public.

Whatever the reason, consumers around the world adopted this date to celebrate World Marijuana Day.

In Mexico, marijuana is the most widely used illegal drug among the population. It is estimated that some seven million Mexicans, 8.6% of adults between the ages of 18 and 65, have tried it at least once.

And the fact is that the history of the plant in Mexico has a long history, which begins in the time of the Colony and continues to this day. According to the text Historical Breviary on Cannabis, from the Virtual Law Library of the Institute of Legal Research of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), cannabis was present on exploration trips and reached America in the 16th century, when it was introduced as a source of fiber in Chile in 1545, and in Peru, nine years later. The English colonists also understood its importance, since it was introduced to Canada in 1606 and to Virginia in 1611.

He arrived in Mexico during the Conquest, brought by Pedro Cuadrado, one of the conquistadors who were part of the Panfilo de Narváez expedition. According to his own words, Cuadrado was the one who started the cultivation of this plant in these territories.

The same text notes that the historian Silvio Zavala states that Hernán Cortés recommended the planting and cultivation of hemp, since he said that the indigenous people, in order to live well, had, mainly, before the arrival of the Spaniards, lacking fine wool, hemp, flax, plants and four peas.

F ray Juan de Zumarraga was enthusiastic about cannabis, apparently, because according to Fray Juan de Torquemada, Zumarraga, in approximately 1531, put diligence in planting fruits of Castile, hemp and flax, as one of the measures aimed at achieving a prosperous economy that would allow Spaniards to settle in Mexico, adapt happily.

The Inquisition was the first instance in Mexico to sanction the non-industrial use of hemp. The ban focused on certain plants, including peyote, ololiuqui, and so-called pipilzinzintles or pipilzinzintlis, also known as “venerable children. The latter is the name that the indigenous people used to designate hemp and other plants in the rituals in which it was ingested for its psychoactive effects. The ban was given in February 1769.

In spite of this, at the beginning of 1777 one of the largest economic campaigns in the history of New Spain began: it was sought to introduce hemp cultivation with the full force of the Crown. The latter expressed such interest in this that it even sent a group of Spanish farmers to disseminate cultivation techniques, and even changed its political line, by granting permission for a Royal Factory of Canvas and Canvas to be installed in the viceroyalty.

The distribution of idle land, whether private or Crown, among indigenous peoples, was also ordered to facilitate cultivation.

After Mexico's Independence, the use that began to be given to hemp was no longer textile, but ritual and medicinal. Healing and practices with plants ceased to be persecuted for religious reasons, however, instead, the medical practice that occurs in this contemporary consciousness will assume that persecution, although throughout the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century it does not substantiate the need for punishment, and they only concretize the beliefs or ritualities of their practice.

The first regulations in the field of health that began in the late 30s and early 40s of the 19th century were the precedent of the Penal Code of 1871, in which crimes against health are first punished. By this time, the plant was already known by the name marijuana, which would make it famous all over the world.

For the Mexican Revolution, the use of marijuana was very common. However, in 1908, shortly before, a tighter control of the consumption of enervantes began. Finally, in 1920, its use was banned.

KEEP READING: