Caapi

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Synonyms

Tetrapteris styloptera Jusseiu

This little-known, yellow-flowered climbing bush

was first described in 1954 by Richard E. Schultes.

The Maku, who live on the Rio Tikie (Amazonia),

call it caapi (cf. Banisteriopsis caapi) and use it for

ritual purposes (Schultes 1954, 204). They

manufacture from the bark a psychoactive drink

that apparently has effects like those of ayahuasca

and is used in a similar manner. The bark may

contain ~-carbolines (Schultes and Hofmann

1992,58*).

The Tanimukas call the closely related yellowflowered

Tetrapteris styloptera Jussieu-most

likely a synonym-wee-po-awk. They use the powdered

bark medicinally as a hemostatic (Schultes

1983, 137).

Tetrapteris mucronata Cav., known as caapipinima,

also appears to be used for psychoactive

purposes (Schultes and Hofmann 1992, 66f.*).
Literature

Schultes, Richard Evans. 1954. Plantae AustroAmericanae

IX: Plantarum Novarum vel

Notabilium Notae Diversae. Botanical Museum

Leaflets 16 (8): 179-228.

---.1983. De Plantis Toxicariis e Mundo Novo

Tropicale Commentationes XXXI: Further

ethnopharmacological notes on malpighiaceous

plants of the northwestern Amazon. Botanical

Museum Leaflets 29 (2): 133-37.