Cannabis, marijuana, hemp, ganja, pot, etc. with all its different names has been around since 8000 B.C. which means it has been around over 10,000 years. The cannabis plant is indigenous to central Asia and the Indian subcontinent, which is located in the modern day Taiwan. finding hemp use and cultivation in this data range puts it as one of the first and oldest known human agriculture crops. Cannabis, hemp preferably is one of the strongest fibers we have found to this day, for instance one acre of hemp will produce as much fiber as two to three acres of cotton and will last twice as long and won’t mildew. Hemp fibers have been used for thousands of years to create clothing, paper, foods, rope and much more.
Hemp is possibly the earliest plants to be cultivated, cannabis has been cultivated in japan since the Pre-Neolithic period. Cannabis fiber imprints were found on Yangshao Culture pottery dating from the 5th millennium B.C..
As explained by Carl Sagan in 1977 when he proposed the possibility that marijuana may have been the worlds first agricultural crop, leading to the development of civilization itself. In 6,000 BCE cannabis seeds and oils were used for foods in china and in 4,000 BCE textiles made of hemp were used in China and Turkestan. Next, in 2,737 BCE the first recorded use of cannabis as medicine was proposed by Emperor Shen Neng of China. Between 2,000 and 800 BCE Bhang, dried cannabis leaves, seeds and stems, is mentioned in the Hindu sacred text Atharvaveda (Science of Charms) as “sacred grass”. It is used by medicinally and ritually as an offering to Shiva.
In much more recent news the United States increased restrictions and labeling of cannabis as a poison began in many states from 1906 onward, and prohibitions began in the 1920’s. In the mid-1930’s cannabis was regulated as a drug in each and every state. The first national regulation was the Marihuana Tax of 1937. The Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 was a United States act that placed a tax on the sale of cannabis, this act was drafted by Harry Anslinger and introduced by Rep. Robert Doughton of North Carolina, on April 14th, 1937. Alsinger also referred to the International Opium Convention that from 1928 included cannabis as a drug not a medicine. Cannabis began to attract renewed interest as a medicine in the 1970’s and 1980’s, in particular due to its use by cancer and AIDS patients who reported relief from the effects chemotherapy and wasting syndrome.
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