Molecular analysis of stone pipes from the interior Pacific Northwest reveals nicotine in specimens as old as 1,200 years, according to a study. Groups such as the Nez Perce smoked indigenous plants as part of ritual and cultural practices, long before the domestication of tobacco. In the Pacific Northwest, the bearberry plant was thought to be the main ritual smoke plant before the introduction of commercial tobacco by the Europeans in the 1790s. To determine which plants were included in such ritual smoking, Shannon Tushingham and colleagues extracted residue from 12 stone pipes and fragments representing five sites in the Columbia River Basin of southeastern Washington state. The authors used sensitive chromatography techniques to identify chemical residues of smoke plants. Though the authors expected to find primarily residues of bearberry in the oldest specimens, they found biomarkers of nicotine, a compound found in tobacco. The results show that tribes in the interior Pacific Northwest were smoking indigenous Nicotiana species prior to the introduction of commercial tobacco. According to the authors, the findings establish a history of ritual tobacco use, which can be used to inform education and smoking abatement programs.
###
Article #18-13796: "Biomolecular archaeology reveals ancient origins of indigenous tobacco smoking in North American Plateau," by Shannon Tushingham, Charles M. Snyder, Korey J. Brownstein, William J. Damitio, and David R. Gang.
MEDIA CONTACT: Shannon Tushingham, Washington State University, Pullman, WA; tel: 509-671-5918; e-mail: shannon.tushingham@wsu.edu
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences