There’s a high possibility that William Shakespeare was “high” when he penned his iconic plays, or so suggest the new discovery.
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William Shakespeare may have been stoned when writing his famous plays.
During the study, researchers used gas chromatography mass spectrometry, which is a technique sensitive to residues of different substances – even if smoked more than 400 years ago.
According to findings, the pipes have been excavated from Shakespeare’s backyard in Stratford-upon-Avon in central England and the residues can nonetheless be detected…
Twenty-four fragments were founded in the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.
It is thought that cannabis was smoked in Europe at that time as were coca leaves (cocaine), though no traces of the latter were found in Shakespeare’s pipes.
24 pipe fragments showed cannabis in eight of the samples, with four of them coming from the playwright’s property.
Professor Frances Thackery, of the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa, who led the research, believes that Sir Francis Drake brought back cocaine leaves from Peru during his explorations with Sir Walter Raleigh.
“Why write I still all one, ever the same / And keep invention in a noted weed”, Shakespeare wrote in his work Sonnet 76.
“This can be interpreted to mean that Shakespeare was willing to use “weed” (cannabis as a kind of tobacco) for creative writing (“invention”)”, the authors wrote.
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A few literary indications suggest Shakespeare might have been aware of the deleterious effects of cocaine and preferred cannabis, the South African Journal of Science reported.
