Case file · Sacred site
Richard Spruce meets caapi on the Uaupés
In 1852 the English botanist Richard Spruce watched a ceremony using caapi, the drink now known as ayahuasca, among Tukanoan people on the Uaupés river, and collected the vine, later named Banisteriopsis caapi.
1852 CE · 0.25, -69.10 · status: official
The account
Spruce drank it himself and described its effects. His notes, published long after, are among the first scientific records of the brew that underlies many Amazonian healing and visionary traditions.
The sceptical view
Spruce's account is a careful botanical record; the visions themselves are pharmacological and cultural, not physical evidence of spirits.
Connections in the atlas
- Villavicencio describes ayahuasca visions
- Mestre Irineu founds Santo Daime
- Yacurunas and the underwater cities