Traces of Coca Plant Detected in 17th-Century Remains in Italy

MILAN, ITALY—According to a Gizmodo report, researchers led by Gaia Giordano of the University of Milan have detected traces of Erythroxylum coca, the plant used to produce cocaine, in brain matter scraped from skulls recovered from the Ca’Granada crypt, a burial site located near a hospital that treated the poor of Milan in the seventeenth century. No records of the medicinal use of the drug in the hospital have been found, however. The presence of the substance hygrine in the samples indicates that the individuals had chewed the plant’s leaves, perhaps to experience its euphoric effects, the researchers explained. It had been previously thought that cocaine had not been introduced to Europe until the nineteenth century, since most of the earlier attempts to transport the plant from South America had been unsuccessful. Read the original scholarly article about this research in Journal of Archaeological Science. To read about traces of coca and other psychoactive plants identified in the hair of mummies from southern Peru, go to "Earliest Ayahuasca Trip."