Evidence of Ancient Opium Trade

The New York Post reports that researchers found trace amounts of opium in a "22-centimeter alabaster vase was inscribed in four languages — Akkadian, Elamite, Persian, and Egyptian — and dedicated to Xerxes I, whose Achaemenid Empire encompassed Egypt, Mesopotamia, the Levant, Anatolia, and parts of Arabia and Central Asia." This dates the jar to roughly 450 B.C. "The findings reportedly mirror echo findings of opiate remnants in Egyptian alabaster vessels and Cypriot base-ring juglets discovered in an alleged’s merchant’s tomb in Sedment, Egypt," which "dated back between 16th-11th century BCE during Egypt’s New Kingdom."

    These two findings were more than a millennium apart and spanned multiple social strata, leading researchers to deduce that opium could reside in the many alabaster vessels found in Tut’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings.

    In fact, some of these ancient containers also contained dark, sticky material that eluded chemist Alfred Lucas in 1933. They had notably been harvested by ancient tomb raiders, further pointing to the contents’ potential value.

    “We think it’s possible, if not probable, that alabaster jars found in King Tut’s tomb contained opium as part of an ancient tradition of opiate use that we are only now beginning to understand,” said Koh. “It’s possible these vessels were easily recognizable cultural markers for opium use in ancient times, just as hookahs today are attached to shisha tobacco consumption.”