Discover Hemp’s hidden history and learn why hemp is finally making a comeback.
Imagine if just one renewable resource could produce food, fuel, fiber, medicine, construction materials, and batteries.
What if that one crop could also clean polluted soils, reduce deforestation, and lessen human dependence on petroleum-based plastics?
That resource exists and is called cannabis sativa ssp. sativa aka Hemp! This brief article takes you through Hemp’s historical timeline, and its ancestral uses, and goes over why hemp is returning to the mainstream world after nearly a century of political suppression.
History of Hemp
Hemp has been used throughout human antiquity. Even before the dawn of agriculture, archeological evidence shows us that humans gathered wild hemp and proliferated the plant throughout Asia and Europe.
As humanity progressed and began cultivating crops, the hemp plant was among the first plants humans chose to grow - and for good reason. As mankind advanced through the ages, hemp proved to be an incredibly versatile and diverse plant, one which provided ancient humans with valuable resources like food, fiber, medicine, and even ritual.
In the next sections, you will learn how ancient humans used hemp as a valuable renewable resource for centuries, discover the roots of modern hemp prohibition, and learn why hemp in the modern era is making a big comeback.
Ancient Uses of Hemp
Ancient humans cultivated hemp for a diverse array of purposes. Considered a superfood, hemp’s nutritious seeds provided a healthy source of protein, omega fatty acids, and minerals. The fibrous stalk provided pulp for different types of papers, canvas for sails, fabric for clothes, and rope for building.
Hemp cultivators soon discovered the difference between female and male plants, with male plants providing the nutritious seeds and stalks and female hemp plants producing resin-rich flowers containing the chemical compounds responsible for hemp’s powerful therapeutic effects. Furthermore, they discovered that some varieties of hemp possess potent psychoactive effects. Modern colloquialism refers to the psychoactive varieties of hemp as marijuana
Hemp’s resinous and oily buds have been used for therapeutic purposes as far back as 2,500 BC in Ancient China. Multiple uncovered archeological sites suggest that hemp’s primary initial use goes back to biblical times when its psychoactive properties (marijuana) were used by priesthood classes in parts of ancient Asia and Europe for spiritual and religious ceremonial rituals.
Not only did hemp’s resin-rich flowers provide potent oils for ceremonial purposes, but they were also used for their protective qualities. Purified hemp oil, made from the flowers, and hemp seed oil, which is made from the seed, are beneficial for the skin and used as lotions whereas the resin has anti-bacterial and anti-fungal properties and was used to craft protective resins for wood, rope, canvas, and other types of materials.
Hemp During Prohibition
For centuries hemp was a primary crop across Europe, Asia, and The Middle East. The Greeks, Romans, Turkish, Afghanis, Indians, French, German, British, and many other cultures were all using hemp for diverse purposes.
Hemp maintained a strong, prominent presence among the leading developing cultures and even into the modern era when U.S. Colonies were required to farm hemp. By 1762, hemp was used as a currency in the American colonies. In the early 1900s leading up to World War I, farmers could pay taxes for a portion of their hemp crop. By 1937, the United States government began taxing hemp with the passage of the Marihuana Tax Stamp Act.
At this point, the U.S. incrementally began to outlaw and criminalize marijuana, and subsequently hemp along with it. By the late 1960s, hemp was federally criminalized, classified as a Schedule I controlled substance, and demonized as a gateway drug to harder substances such as meth, heroin, and cocaine.
Half a century later, the Western World is returning to its senses and remembering the valuable resource and beneficial properties hemp once offered our not-so-distant ancestors.
Hemp Is Back and Booming
Fast forward to today, hemp is making a complete comeback into mainstream society. From its valuable nutrient-dense superfood seeds and therapeutic oils to its impressive stronger-than-steel construction biomass applications, hemp is a renewable resource that has tremendous utility to offer.
Over the last decade, hemp-derived CBD oil has gained immense popularity due to its medicinal, non-psychoactive therapeutic effects and the increased availability of hemp due to the Hemp Pilot Program and recent versions of congressional Farm Bills. Due to public pressure, numerous US states, now a majority, have passed policies allowing strictly regulated use of CBD hemp oil for approved medical conditions such as pediatric epilepsy and cancer under their respective medical marijuana programs.
Then, in 2018, the Farm Bill included the Hemp Farming Act, which removed hemp from DEA’s Schedule I and legalized hemp at the federal level paving the way for the hemp boom we saw in recent years. Now, hemp is widely grown in certain areas of the country and used for a variety of things not the least of which is CBD and hemp-extract consumer products.
Other countries such as France have been cultivating hemp for centuries and have refined longstanding ancestral strains to produce high-quality paper and other textile products. This is why we craft our luxury pre-roll paper cones from hemp sourced from France.
Buddha Bhaang™ Hemp Pre-Roll Cones
We only use hemp for smoking papers because it provides the cleanest smoke, free from chlorines and chemical residues, the smoothest, natural taste, and offers an even, slow burn that is infinitely more enjoyable than cellophane or rice smoking papers.
Not only that but using hemp helps replenish the soil, saves water, promotes sustainability, and reduces the impact of deforestation (using wood for paper), which negatively impacts climate change and environmental health.
Buddha Bhaang™ hemp papers are more than just fine paper cones. They’re a lifestyle choice that says, “I care about myself and the environment.”
Don’t forget to follow Buddha Bhaang™ on social media and sign up for our newsletter to get updates and exclusive offers on our hemp pre-roll cone collections.
Sources:
- Journal: Science Advances, The origins of cannabis smoking: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6561734/
- Journal: Economic Botany, An Archeological and Historical Account of Cannabis in Ancient China: https://www.jstor.org/stable/4253540
- Smithsonian Magazine Online: Archaeologists Identify Traces of Burnt Cannabis in Ancient Jewish Shrine: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/cannabis-found-altar-ancient-israeli-shrine-180975016/