Ayahuasca

Did You Know?

• The first ayahuasca churches affiliated with the Brazilian Santo Daime were established in the Netherlands.
• People who have consumed ayahuasca report therapeutic effects, especially around depression and personal traumas.

Traditional use

In South America, ayahuasca is used in very different ways depending on the community. Some groups use it for shamanic rituals, while others drink it casually with friends to better understand the world around them. People outside these traditions who work with ayahuasca often adopt the beliefs and worldviews of Indigenous shamans, such as those of the Urarina in the Peruvian Amazon. Many dietary rules are linked to ayahuasca, but these seem to come mainly from the Iquitos area, a hub for ayahuasca tourism.

Similar preparation practices show up at retreats in Peru’s Sacred Valley, around Cusco and Urubamba, where staff often include members of the Shipibo-Konibo tribe. In the rainforest, these rules focus on purification: avoiding spicy food, heavy seasoning, too much fat, salt, caffeine, citrus, and sex before, during, or after a ceremony. Some recommend a low-tyramine diet because of a possible interaction with MAOIs, but evidence shows that harmala alkaloids only affect MAO-A in a reversible way, like the antidepressant moclobemide, which has no dietary restrictions.

The Brazilian church União do Vegetal, based in a city, does not follow these restrictions, suggesting the risk is far lower than people think, and likely nonexistent. Experienced users and shamans warn against taking ayahuasca without a skilled shaman present. In some places, brujos pretend to be real shamans to lure tourists, supposedly to steal their energy or power, which they believe each person has in limited supply.

Pharmacology

Ayahuasca's psychological effects are largely due to a surge in serotonin, triggered by the interaction of DMT with beta-carbolines. This serotonin activates 5-HT receptors, and specifically stimulating the 5-HT2A receptor is linked to hallucinations. DMT, a natural serotonergic hallucinogen found in plants and mammals, is a DEA Schedule I substance with no accepted medical use, though it is being studied for clinical potential. The brew's psychoactive power comes mainly from DMT, which the MAOIs in the B. caapi vine make orally active, with harmine and harmaline also playing a part.

Newer studies and traditional knowledge emphasize the B. caapi vine and its beta-carbolines, noting they may have psychotropic effects through serotonin and benzodiazepine receptor interactions. Harmala alkaloids like harmaline and harmine can cause hallucinations, vomiting, confusion, and loss of coordination by stimulating the central nervous system and binding to 5-HT receptors. Harmine, a natural harmala alkaloid with MAO-inhibiting properties, appears in plants like Peganum harmala and B. caapi; it is being researched for anti-HIV potential and has shown promise in modulating astrocyte function, reducing inflammation, influencing neural progenitor growth, and possibly treating addiction and depression through glutamate and BDNF pathways.

Harmaline, a beta-carboline from the harman skeleton found in Peganum seeds, acts as a oneirogen and has demonstrated a range of effects, including lowering body temperature, relaxing blood vessels, fighting microbes and tumors, and showing anxiolytic, antidepressant, and hallucinogenic properties at certain doses.

History

Ayahuasca is commonly described as an ancient Amazonian practice, but linguistic and anthropological research indicates the brew may have spread across the western Amazon only within the last few hundred years, possibly along missionary and rubber trade routes rather than being a millennia-old tradition. While pre-Columbian artifacts include tobacco, coca, and Anadenanthera species, no direct evidence of ayahuasca from that era has been confirmed.

A 2008 discovery in a Bolivian cave—a pouch with snuffing trays, bone spatulas, and traces of harmine and DMT—along with harmine found in hair from two mummies in northern Chile, both linked to the Tiwanaku culture around 900 CE, suggests Banisteriopsis caapi use. There are accounts of Anadenanthera species being used orally and nasally in rituals and for therapeutic purposes during childbirth and infancy. Researchers propose that the addition of Banisteriopsis to activate its psychoactive effects came later, through contact between Amazonian and Altiplano groups.

Despite claims by some anthropologists of ancient use, solid proof of pre-Columbian ayahuasca consumption remains lacking. The first Western mentions of the beverage appear in the 17th century, during European colonization. The earliest known reference is a letter from Vincente de Valverde to the Inquisition. Jose Chantre y Herrera later offered the first detailed description of a “devilish potion” called ayaguasca, brewed from bitter herbs and lianas, used in all-night divination rituals where a shaman would hang a bed in a large house and keep the potion nearby to alter the senses.

Society and culture

The term "ayahuasca" comes from the Quechuan languages, spoken across Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia, and is spelled "ayawaska" in modern Quechuan orthography. It names both the Banisteriopsis caapi liana and the drink made from it. In Quechuan, "aya" means "spirit, soul" or "corpse, dead body," while "waska" means "rope" or "woody vine, liana." Translations include "liana of the soul," "liana of the dead," and "spirit liana." Users believe this vine lets the spirit leave the body and enter the spiritual world, otherwise closed to the living.

While "ayahuasca" is common in Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Brazil, the brew has many other names across northern South America. In Brazil, it is called hoasca or oasca. The Cofán people use yagé, yajé, or oofa. Caapi, kahpi, or gahpi come from Tupi–Guarani and proto-Arawak, meaning "weed" or "thin leaf."

The Colorado people say pinde or pildé. Chicham languages give patem or nátema. Yaminawa speakers use shori, mii, or miiyagi, and uni. Shipibo people say nishi cobin.

Kashinawa terms include nixi pae, shuri, ondi, rambi, and rame. Tucano people use kaji, kadana, and kadanapira. Arawakan languages have kamarampi, kamalampi, and hananeroca. Bora-Muinane languages offer bakko.

Ese'Ejja people say jono pase. Guahibo language gives uipa. Tsáchila people use napa, nepe, or nepi. Kamëntšá language has biaxije.

In Portuguese, União do Vegetal members call it cipó or vegetal. Santo Daime members use daime or santo daime, coined by founder Mestre Irineu in the 1940s from a prayer, and also say luz or santa luz.