History of DMT

Naturally occurring substances (of both vegetable and animal origin) containing DMT have been used in South America since pre-Columbian times.

DMT was first synthesized in 1931 by chemist Richard Helmuth Fredrick Manske (born 1901 in Berlin, Germany – 1977).

In general, its discovery as a natural product is credited to Brazilian chemist and microbiologist Oswaldo Gonçalves de Lima (1908–1989) who, in 1946, isolated an alkaloid he named nigerina (nigerine) from the root bark of jurema preta, that is, Mimosa tenuiflora.

However, in a careful review of the case Jonathan Ott shows that the empirical formula for nigerine determined by Gonçalves de Lima, which notably contains an atom of oxygen, can match only a partial, "impure" or "contaminated" form of DMT.

It was only in 1959, when Gonçalves de Lima provided American chemists a sample of Mimosa tenuiflora roots, that DMT was unequivocally identified in this plant material.

Less ambiguous is the case of isolation and formal identification of DMT in 1955 in seeds and pods of Anadenanthera peregrina by a team of American chemists led by Evan Horning (1916–1993).

Since 1955, DMT has been found in a host of organisms: in at least fifty plant species belonging to ten families, and in at least four animal species, including one gorgonian and three mammalian species (including humans).

In terms of a scientific understanding, the hallucinogenic properties of DMT were not uncovered until 1956 by Hungarian chemist and psychiatrist Stephen Szara. In his paper “Dimethyltryptamin: Its Metabolism in Man; the Relation of its Psychotic Effect to the Serotonin Metabolism”, Szara employed synthetic DMT, synthesized by the method of Speeter and Anthony, which was then administered to 20 volunteers by intramuscular injection. Urine samples were collected from these volunteers for the identification of DMT metabolites.

This is considered to be the converging link between the chemical structure DMT to its cultural consumption as a psychoactive and religious sacrament.

Another historical milestone is the discovery of DMT in plants frequently used by Amazonian natives as additive to the vine Banisteriopsis caapi to make ayahuasca decoctions. In 1957, American chemists Francis Hochstein and Anita Paradies identified DMT in an "aqueous extract" of leaves of a plant they named Prestonia amazonicum and described as "commonly mixed" with B. caapi.

The lack of a proper botanical identification of Prestonia amazonica in this study led American ethnobotanist Richard Evans Schultes (1915–2001) and other scientists to raise serious doubts about the claimed plant identity.

The mistake likely led the writer William Burroughs to regard the DMT he experimented with in Tangier in 1961 as "Prestonia".

Better evidence was produced in 1965 by French pharmacologist Jacques Poisson, who isolated DMT as a sole alkaloid from leaves, provided and used by Agaruna Indians, identified as having come from the vine Diplopterys cabrerana (then known as Banisteriopsis rusbyana).

Published in 1970, the first identification of DMT in the plant Psychotria viridis, another common additive of ayahuasca, was made by a team of American researchers led by pharmacologist Ara der Marderosian.

Not only did they detect DMT in leaves of P. viridis obtained from Kaxinawá indigenous people, but they also were the first to identify it in a sample of an ayahuasca decoction, prepared by the same indigenous people.

Late 8th Century

Burial site in N. Chile includes bag with snuffing paraphernalia and snuff remnants containing DMT, 5-MeO-DMT, and bufotenin. Other sites include seeds of Anadenanthera spp.   

905–1170

Ritual bundle found in a funerary site in SW Bolivia contains remnants of DMT, Harmine, Bufotenine, Cocaine, and possibly Psilocin, along with snuff tablets, a snuff tube, llama bone scrapers, and a head band. The find is notable because of the presence of a number of psychoactive chemicals, as well as the combined presence of DMT and Harmine.

1496

Friar Ramon Pane documented the use of a psychoactive snuff called cohoba/yopo among the Taino who inhabited the island of Hispaniola Haiti/Dominican Republic. It is now agreed that cohoba/yopo was almost certainly made from Anadenanthera peregrina, which has been reported to contain N,N-DMT, 5-MeO-DMT, and bufotenin. 

1560 

Indians along the Rio Guaviare in Colombia take yopo along with tobacco.   

16th - 19th Century 

Cohoba snuff from the yopo tree used by natives of Columbia and surrounding areas.   

1571 

Incan medicine men make prophecies through inebriation brought about by drinking vilca, a DMT containing preparation of A. colubrina.   

1741 

A Jesuit writes about cohoba use by the native people between Colombia and Venezuela.   

1801 

Baron Alexander Humboldt identified the yopo tree as Anadenanthera peregrina   

1931 

DMT first synthesized by British chemist Richard Manske and named "nigerine".   

1939 

Virola genus identified as the source of a psychoactive snuff called epena used in Amazoniana Columbia, Venezuela and Western Brazil.   

1955 

N,N-DMT is identified as one of the ingredients of the A. peregrina seeds used to make cohoba snuff. This marked the first time that N,N-DMT was discovered naturally occuring in a plant or animal. Authors speculate that it is psychoactive. 

1956 

First scientific publication verifying the psychoactive properties of DMT by Stephen Szara.

Mar 1968 U.S.

The Bureau of Drug Abuse Control notes in Microgram that DMT is available on the street, both as a powder, and "impregnated on marihuana and tea". 

1971 

N,N-DMT becomes illegal in the U.S. with the passage of the 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances.