Mescaline notes
| Other Names
Mescalin, meskalin, mezcalin, mezkalin, 3,4,5-trimethoxy- benzolmethanamine, 3,4,S-trimethoxyf3- phenethylamine, 3,4,5-trimethoxyethyl- phenylamine, TMPFA, 2-(3,4,S-trimethoxy-phenyl)ethylamine Empirical formula: CllH17N03 Substance type: lophophora alkaloid, f3-phenethylamine Mescaline was first isolated in 1886 from "mescal buttons;' the aboveground parts of the peyote cactus (Lophophora williamsii), and was named after them. Mescaline is the most thoroughly studied of all psychoactive plant constituents. In the period between 1886 and 1950, more than one hundred mescaline research studies were published in the German language alone (Passie 1994). This alkaloid was found to be a component of numerous cacti (see the table on page 847). And it is possible that mescaline is produced from dopamine in vitro (Paul et al. 1969; Rosenberg et al. 1969). Arthur Heffter was the first person to initially test an isolated plant constituent on himself (Heffter 1894). The classic Heffter dosage consisted of 150 mg mescaline hydrochloride (HCL). A psychedelic dosage is now considered to be 178 to 256 mg of mescaline HCL or 200 to 400 mg of mescaline sulfate. The highest measured dosage reported in the literature was 1,500 mg. Taken orally,S mg/kg of pure mescaline is regarded as a hallucinogenic dosage. In the toxicological literature, there is no known lethal dosage of mescaline when it is ingested orally (Brown and Malone 1978, 14). Western psychiatry has been aware of consciousness-altering drugs since the nineteenth century. Mescaline was the first substance to be tested and applied in psychiatry. At the time, researchers regarded the effects of mescaline on a healthy subject as inducing a state that was otherwise known only in psychopathic patients. This led to the idea of pharmacologically induced "model psychoses" (Leuner 1962*). The effects of mescaline (and also of psilocybin) were described as "intoxication, toxic ecstasy, clouding of consciousness, hallucinosis, model psychosis, drug intoxication, emphasis, daydream;' et cetera (Passie 1994). Only in recent years has there been a shift in thinking away from the model psychosis concept and a recognition that psychedelic states and psychoses do not have a common origin (HermIe et al. 1988*, 1992*, 1993*). The predominant effects of mescaline are a "reveling of the individual senses and primarily visual orgies" (Ellis 1971, 21). The mescaline inebriation was first systematically described by Kurt Beringer in 1927. To date, there have been many encounters with the substance, and the most commonly reported experiences are ecstatic and visionary in nature: My awareness of subject and object disappeared, and I felt dissolved, rising in an orchestra of sounds. This ecstatic state was accompanied by an indescribable sensation of happiness. (Ammon and Gotte 1971,32) It has often been suggested that pure mescaline can be taken in place of Lophophora williamsii. "However, most peyote users are of the opinion that synthetic mescaline cannot be compared with the effects of peyote" (Harp 1996, 16). On the Cultural History of Mescaline Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) made the psychedelic effects of mescaline famous in his two essays "The Doors of Perception" and "Heaven and Hell:' Usually the person taking mescaline will discover an inner world that is so obviously something given, so enlighteningly eternal and sacred, as the transformed outer world that I had perceived with my eyes open. (Huxley 1970,32*) It is very likely that Hermann Hesse also had contact with mescaline, and that it may have inspired his novel SteppenwolJ, one of the cult books of the hippie generation. The psychedelic rock band Steppenwolf took its name from the book, and the novel also became a motion picture starring Max von Sydow (USA 1974). Nationalgalerie, a German New Wave band, sings on its album Mescaline, "To be transformed by a trickster fairy. My lawyer advised me to take some mescaline" (Sony Records, 1995). The French novelist and artist Henri Michaux (1899-1984) studied mescaline during the 1960s and ingested it to see what effects it might have upon his creativity. Like many other FrenchJmen, however, he summarized his experience as an "accursed miracle" and scribbled his experiences of inner turmoil on paper (Michaux 1986). Today, these "drawings" are still reproduced in publications as an example of the "psychosis-like" effects of mescaline. |
Cacti Containing Mescaline
(from Doetsch et al. 1980; La Barre 1979; Mata and McLaughlin 1982*; Shulgin 1995*; Lundstrom 1971; Pardanini et al. 1978; Ott 1993*; Turner and Heyman 1960)
Commercial Forms and Regulations Mescaline is available primarily as a hydrochloride or sulfate. In Germany, it is considered a "narcotic in which trafficking is prohibited." In the United States, the Controlled Substances Act lists mescaline as a Schedule I substance (Korner 1994,38*).
Literature See also the entries for Lophophora williamsii, Trichocereus pachanoi, Trichocereus spp., and ~phenethylamines. Ammon, Gunter, and Jurgen Gotte. 1971. Ergebnisse fruher Meskalin-Forschung. In BewuBtseinserweiternde Drogen aus psychoanalytischer Sicht, special issue, Dynamische Psychiatrie, 23-45. Beringer, Kurt. 1927. Der Meskalinrausch. Berlin: Springer. Repr. 1969. Blofeld, John. 1966. A high yogic experience achieved with meskalin. Psychedelic Review 7:27-32. Doetsch, P. W., J. M. Cassidy, and J. L. McLaughlin. 1980. Cactus alkaloids. XL: Identification of mescaline and other phenethylamines in Pereskia, Pereskiopsis and Islaya by use of fluorescamine conjugates. Journal ofChromotography 189:79. Ellis, Havelock. 1971. Zum Phanomen der MeskalinIntoxikation, Bemerkungen zum Problem der Meskalin-Intoxikation. In BewuBtseinserweiternde Drogen aus psychoanalytischer Sicht, special issue, Dynamische Psychiatrie, 17-22. Frederking, W. 1954. Meskalin in der Psychotherapie. Medizinischer Monatsspiegel, 3:5-7. Harf, Jurgen C. 1996. Meskalin und Peyote. Grow! 6/96: 15-16. Heffter, Arthur. 1894. aber zwei Kakteenalkaloide. Berichte der deutschen Chemischen Gesellschaft 27:2975. Kluver) Heinrich. 1926. Mescal vision and eidetic vision. American Journal ofPsych0 logy 37:502-15. ---. 1969. Mescal and mechanisms of hallucinations. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. La Barre, Weston. 1979. Peyotl and mescaline. Journal ofPsychedelic Drugs 11 (1-2): 33-39. Lundstrom, Jan. 1971. Biosynthetic studies on mescaline and related cactus alkaloids. Acta Pharm. Suecica 8:275-302. Michaux, Henri. 1986. Unseliges Wunder: Das Meskalin. Munich and Vienna: Carl Hanser. Pardanani, J. H., B. N. Meyer, and J. L. McLaughlin. 1978. Cactus alkaloids. XXXVII. Mescaline and related compounds from Opuntia spinosior. Lloydia 41 (3): 286-88. Passie, Torsten. 1994. Ausrichtungen, Methoden und Ergebnisse fruher Meskalinforschungen im deutschsprachigen Raum (bis 1950). In Jahrbuch des Europiiischen Collegiums fur Bewufltseinsstudien (1993/1994), 103-11. Berlin: VWB. Paul., A.G., H. Rosenberg, and K. L. Khanna. 1969. The roles of 3,4,5-trihydroxy-~-phenethylamine and 3,4-dimethoxy-~-phenethylaminein their biosynthesis of mescaline. Lloydia 32 (1): 36-39. Rosenberg, H., K. L. Khanna, M. Takido, and A. G. Paul. 1969. The biosynthesis of mescaline in Lophophora williamsii. Lloydia 32 (3): 334-38. Turner, W. J., and J. J. Heyman. 1960. The presence of mescaline in Opuntia cylindrica. Journal of Organic Chemistry 25:2250. Wallraff, Gunter. 1968. Meskalin-Ein Selbstversuch. Berlin: Verlag Peter-Paul Zahl. |