Published on 2024-10-11

Category: History of psychedelic ceremonies in Mexico

By Konstantin T. (MSc) for Compassion Retreats

Part 2. Conquest, Suppression, and Syncretism

Important Disclaimer: This series explores the historical and cultural context of psychedelic substances. The information presented is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice or endorsement of any particular substance or practice. Always consult with qualified professionals for health-related concerns. Compassion Retreats encourages safe, legal, and intentional exploration within appropriate contexts.

The arrival of the Spanish in the early 16th century marked a violent rupture in the long history of psychoactive plant use in Mexico. Armed with Catholic doctrine and imperial ambition, the colonizers encountered practices deeply alien and threatening to their worldview.1

Almost immediately, Spanish missionaries and chroniclers began documenting the use of substances like peyote, teonanácatl, and ololiuqui.2 Figures like Fray Bernardino de Sahagún, whose Florentine Codex provides invaluable, detailed accounts of Aztec life, including mushroom ceremonies, paradoxically preserved knowledge of these practices while simultaneously condemning them.3 Sahagún described Indians eating mushrooms with honey, experiencing visions, dancing, weeping, and consulting them for divination and healing.3 Fray Toribio de Benavente Motolinia offered a more harrowing account, describing users seeing snakes, feeling worms eating them, and sometimes hanging themselves in despair, calling the mushrooms a "bitter food" for communion with the devil.4

This interpretation—framing indigenous psychoactive use as devil worship, idolatry, and witchcraft—became the dominant colonial perspective, drawing parallels with European witch-hunt narratives that linked drugs to demonolatry.3 The visions induced were seen not as spiritual insights but as demonic deceptions.3 This hostile framing served as justification for systematic suppression. The Spanish Inquisition established its presence in Mexico (New Spain) and actively persecuted those who continued traditional practices.5 Peyote was officially outlawed by the Inquisition in 1620, leading to numerous trials in the subsequent centuries.1 The use of teonanácatl and ololiuqui was similarly targeted.6 This persecution, coupled with the deliberate destruction of indigenous codices by priests seeking to eradicate "paganism," drove many traditional practices underground, obscuring parts of their history.7

However, the suppression was never complete. The sheer resilience of cultural traditions, sometimes aided by geographic isolation—such as the Wixárika retreating into the Sierra Madre Occidental or practices persisting in the remote mountains of Oaxaca—allowed knowledge and rituals to survive, passed down through generations of healers and community members.8

Furthermore, a fascinating process of syncretism unfolded, blending indigenous beliefs with elements of the imposed Catholic faith.9 This was partly a survival strategy, allowing indigenous people to maintain aspects of their cosmology "hidden in plain sight" by associating their deities with Catholic saints or incorporating Christian symbols and prayers into their rituals.10 For instance, Mazatec veladas often feature images of Catholic saints and the Virgin of Guadalupe alongside traditional elements like copal incense and tobacco.11 The veneration of the Virgin of Guadalupe at Tepeyac hill is thought by some to overlay pre-Hispanic worship of the Aztec mother goddess Tonantzin at the same site.12 Curanderismo, Mexican folk healing, explicitly blends indigenous plant knowledge and ritual with Catholic spirituality.13 This fusion wasn't just camouflage; it represented a dynamic cultural adaptation, creating new, unique spiritual expressions.13 The Spanish themselves were sometimes drawn in, with records of colonists using peyote or employing indigenous healers, further complicating the picture.1 Authorities viewed this syncretism with suspicion, often deeming it heresy, yet it persisted.8

Copal offerings

Interestingly, some colonial authorities made distinctions, tolerating or even incorporating certain "rational" non-psychoactive medicinal uses of plants like peyote (e.g., topical treatments for wounds, bites, or pain; low-dose preparations as heart tonics listed in official pharmacopeia as late as the 19th and early 20th centuries) while condemning their visionary applications.1 This nuanced view might have inadvertently created space for the plants, if not their full traditional use, to persist more openly. The collision of worlds thus resulted not in a simple erasure, but in a complex layering of suppression, hidden persistence, and creative cultural blending that shaped the landscape for centuries to come.

Next: Whispers from Oaxaca: The West 'Discovers' Sacred Mushrooms

Previous: Psychoactive plants in pre-Columbian Mexico

Sources

  1. Peyote | Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Latin American History, https://oxfordre.com/latinamericanhistory/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199366439.001.0001/acrefore-9780199366439-e-1139?d=%2F10.1093%2Facrefore%2F9780199366439.001.0001%2Facrefore-9780199366439-e-1139&p=emailA8zqTpvR9NOZs
  2. Hallucinogenic drugs in pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures - PubMed, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21893367/ *
  3. Teonanácatl and Ololiuqui, two ancient magic drugs of Mexico - unodc, https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/bulletin/bulletin_1971-01-01_1_page003.html
  4. THE TEONANACATL - Estudios de Cultura Náhuatl, https://nahuatl.historicas.unam.mx/index.php/ecn/article/download/78624/69566/231757
  5. Old Uses of Peyote in Traditional Mexican Medicine and its Inclusion in Official Pharmacopeia - Chacruna, https://chacruna.net/history-of-peyote-science-in-mexico/
  6. Indigenous psilocybin mushroom practices: An annotated bibliography in: Journal of Psychedelic Studies Volume 8 Issue 1 (2024) - AKJournals, https://akjournals.com/view/journals/2054/8/1/article-p3.xml
  7. Psychoactive and other ceremonial plants from a 2,000-year-old Maya ritual deposit at Yaxnohcah, Mexico - PMC - PubMed Central, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11051596/
  8. Peyote and Diabolism in New Spain - Early Modern History in 28 Objects, https://emh30.ace.fordham.edu/2018/12/09/peyote-and-diabolism-in-new-spain/
  9. Religious Syncretism in Colonial Mexico City - OER Project, https://www.oerproject.com/OER-Materials/OER-Media/HTML-Articles/Origins/Unit6/Religious-Syncretism-in-Colonial-Mexico-City
  10. Syncretism and the Tzeltal Rebellion - Esther M. Zimmer Lederberg, http://www.estherlederberg.com/Eugenics%20(Mayr)/Tzeltal%20Rebelion.html
  11. Mazatec Shamanic Knowledge and Psilocybin Mushrooms - Chacruna, https://chacruna.net/mazatec-shamanism-and-psilocybin-mushrooms/
  12. The syncretism Problem in Catholicism - Reddit, https://www.reddit.com/r/Catholicism/comments/1au7zm3/the_syncretism_problem_in_catholicism/
  13. El curandero actual: Preserving Indigenous Identity through Mexican Folk Healing's Chants - ShareOK, https://shareok.org/bitstreams/1b9e3544-91b6-4bc6-82c9-28b3e02c7c41/download

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