The Siberian cannabis princess: one of the first known users of medical cannabis

One of the most significant Russian archaeological discoveries of the late 20th century was that of the Siberian Ice Maiden. Discovered in 1993 in a tomb in the Altai Republic, the mummy—also known as the Ukok Princess or the Altai Princess—lived in the 5th^è century B.C.

An MRI revealed that the Ice Princess died of breast cancer. Archaeologists also discovered a container holding buried cannabis by her side and suggested that she was using it to relieve her pain.

The discovery was made on the Ukok Plateau, near the Chinese border, where archaeologists have finally identified one of the earliest known uses of medical cannabis.

We already knew that the’Emperor Shen Nung was prescribed cannabis to treat gout, rheumatism, malaria, and memory problems as early as 2737 B.C.

A Chinese physician named Hua Tuo (c. 140–208) is believed to be the first known person to have used cannabis as an anesthetic. According to reports, Tuo administered a mixture of powdered cannabis and wine to his patients before surgery, A Biographical Dictionary from the Later Han Dynasty to the Three Kingdoms Period.

The ancient Egyptians also used medical cannabis; the plant was mentioned in a medical papyrus on herbal medicine dating from 1550 B.C. According to a study published in Microbes in Food and Health, the papyrus contains a prescription for cannabis to treat inflammation.

And last year, archaeologists discovered what is believed to be the first evidence of cannabis being smoked in a 2,500-year-old cemetery in Central Asia.

Robert Spengler, co-author of the study and director of the paleoethnobotanical laboratories at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, has declared at National Geographic that people traveling across the Pamir Plateau—which connects Central Asia and China to Southwest Asia—may have led to the hybridization of cannabis cultivars throughout the region.

«This is a wonderful example of how humans are closely connected to the living world and exert evolutionary pressures on the plants around them,» Spengler said.