3 Answers
Read this, hope you have the time and patience >http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1079499/
12 years ago. Rating: 6 | |
In Native American cultures, Tobacco has been used for many generations as offerings to the spirits, for planting, for gathering food, for healings and for ceremonies. The sacred uses of tobacco are different for many tribes but a basic truth remains, tobacco should be used for prayer, protection, respect and healings. Tobacco is medicine. The meaning of medicine can be translated according to perceptions, i.e. power from the creator and/or knowledge of self.
Tobacco was used as medicine before first contact. After contact tobacco was used as "gold power" of the Americas supporting the establishment of the colonies, the clergy and the militia. In 1723 Maryland and Virginia exported thirty thousand kegs per year requiring 200 ships to transport it. Still to this very day one can walk through the nations capital building and see tobacco leaves sculpted to the columns.
The consequences of the dominate culture exploitation is evident today in the
commercialization which glamorizes cigarette abuse. This raises a confusing conflict between abuse and the necessary place of tobacco within the native cultural community. The Costanoan Indian Research at Indian Canyon Ranch recently hosted a lecture to 300 students from various colleges of the North Central Coast of California. The students were surveyed over a 3 month period and asked before and after the discussion to respond ' to what tobacco has meant to them'. Each Learning Circle was attended by 10 - 40 students. 80% of Native American Students said that they "...had seen tobacco prayer ties being made and prayed with but they did not know how or why it was used.
We hope our future will hold the understanding of what "sacred use" means to the native people. Tobacco is an integral part cultural traditions and the right to use it in a sacred this manner must be retained. Costanoan Indian Research motto is "Honor the Past...To shape the Future," we have selected some examples of how tobacco was used by Native California peoples.
READ MORE >>>>>http://academic.udayton.edu/health/syllabi/tobacco/native04.htm
>>>>>http://academic.udayton.edu/health/syllabi/tobacco/lesson03.htm
12 years ago. Rating: 6 | |
Tobacco was used historically to treat internal parasites in horses, when they fed it to the horses, the nicotine killed the stomach/intestine worms. Also, nicotine is used to treat plants for bugs, tobacco was put into water to make a tea, it was either sprayed, or poured over the foliage to kill the bugs on the plants.
12 years ago. Rating: 5 | |