Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A hallucinogenic brew made from the bark and stems of a tropical South American vine of the genus Banisteriopsis, especially B. caapi, mixed with other psychotropic plants, used especially in shamanistic rituals by certain Amazonian Indian peoples.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A giant vine native to South America (especially Banisteriopsis caapi), noted for its psychotropic properties.
  • noun Any of various psychoactive infusions or decoctions prepared from this vine.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[American Spanish, from Quechua, rope of the dead, narcotic : aya, corpse + huasca, rope.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Spanish, from Quechua ayawasca, from aya ‘spirit, ancestor’ + wasca ‘vine’.

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Examples

  • For better or worse, there are ample byproducts of drug culture's intellect, including, according to Israeli researchers, the Old Testament, where the drug in a popular drink of the time called ayahuasca induced "the seeing of light and profound religious and spiritual feelings."

    Kimberly Brooks: Electric Kool-Aid Art Test: Mike Quinn 2010

  • For better or worse, there are ample byproducts of drug culture's intellect, including, according to Israeli researchers, the Old Testament, where the drug in a popular drink of the time called ayahuasca induced "the seeing of light and profound religious and spiritual feelings."

    Kimberly Brooks: Electric Kool-Aid Art Test: Mike Quinn 2008

  • At the conference many papers dealt with a visionary drug called ayahuasca, a harsh-tasting thick infusion often made by boiling Banisteriopsis caapi vine and Psychotria viridis leaves.

    Craig K. Comstock: Can Psychedelic Drugs Treat PTSD? Craig K. Comstock 2010

  • I have another one for you - In the Amazon Basin the people use an herbal concoction known as ayahuasca or yage to have visions.

    1491: excerpts part 2 2009

  • In contrast, as vividly described in his penultimate chapter, he samples a South American hallucinogenic mixture known as ayahuasca and is pretty much flattened by the experience.

    "Naturalism" as behavioral determinism and Zen Mumon 2005

  • The church, while nominally Christian, is the home of a syncretic religious group that uses as its core sacrament an ancient medicine derived from plant materials known as ayahuasca, and it is said to induce extraordinary and profound visions.

    Broken Music, A Memoir Sting 2003

  • In 1932, at the age of fourteen, Gomez was given the herbal hallucinogenic drink called ayahuasca by local shamans in order to recover his strength following a period of illness.

    Boing Boing Maggie Koerth-Baker 2011

  • At the conference many papers dealt with a visionary drug called ayahuasca, a harsh-tasting thick infusion often made by boiling

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed AlterNet Craig K Comstock 2010

  • At the conference many papers dealt with a visionary drug called ayahuasca, a harsh-tasting thick infusion often made by boiling

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed AlterNet Craig K Comstock 2010

  • At the conference many papers dealt with a visionary drug called ayahuasca, a harsh-tasting thick infusion often made by boiling

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed AlterNet Craig K Comstock 2010

Comments

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  • Ayahuasca (pronounced ajaˈwaska in the Quechua language) is any of various psychoactive infusions or decoctions prepared from the Banisteriopsis spp. vine, usually mixed with the leaves of the Psychotria bush. It was first described academically in the early 1950's by the late Harvard ethnobotanist Richard Evans Schultes who found it employed for divinatory and healing purposes by Amerindians of Amazonian Colombia.

    January 18, 2009

  • ~various names for "ayahuasca"

    * "caapi", "cipó," "hoasca" or "daime" in Brazil

    * "yagé" or "yajé" (both pronounced �?aˈhe) in Colombia; popularized in English by the beat generation writers William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg in The Yage Letters. The name yajé is also mentioned in an X-files episode.

    * "ayahuasca" or "ayawaska" ("vine of the dead" or "vine of souls": in Quechua, aya means "spirit," "ancestor," or "dead person," while waska means "vine" or "rope") in Ecuador, Bolivia and Peru, and to a lesser extent in Brazil. The spelling ayahuasca is the hispanicized version of the name; many Quechua or Aymara speakers would prefer the spelling ayawaska. The name is properly that of the plant B. caapi, one of the primary sources of beta-carbolines for the brew.

    * "natem" amongst the indigenous Shuar people of Peru.

    * "Grandmother"

    A

    January 18, 2009

  • Seen here.

    April 13, 2009