#  Tobacco, America’s Master Plant 

 





October 21, 2025

 

 

 [ Paola Sanchez-Castaneda ](/people/paola-sanchez-castaneda) 

 Edited by Aaron Michael Ullrey.

*The following Research Reflection is part of an ongoing series spotlighting the academic study of religions.*

   ![Man in white cap holding greens smoking a pipe](/sites/g/files/omnuum4346/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/2025-10/2.jpg?itok=VqWS4Rk5) 

 

Ignacio Mususú Neuque is a *Zaita*, medicine man, and knowledge keeper among the Muysca peoples. For him, tobacco is “the grandfather,” the one who brings messages and summons the ancestors and other earthly and spiritual beings. Tobacco (*Nicotiana* genus) is often called a “master plant” by Indigenous peoples of the Americas, and for the Muysca of Suba, Colombia, who are my research collaborators, tobacco holds a central place in their spiritual and political life.

Tobacco has been used across nearly the entire American continent in diverse forms. In 2021, archaeological excavations at the Wishbone site in Utah uncovered evidence of human tobacco use dating back 12,300 years, 9,000 years earlier than previously known. These findings suggest that Pleistocene hunter-gatherers used tobacco, likely smoking it or chewing it, as part of their ceremonial or daily life.

Two of the earliest chronicles of Spanish colonization—*Historia general y natural de las Indias* by Oviedo y Valdés (1535) and *Historia de las Indias* (1527-1561) by Fray Bartolomé de las Casas—record how the Spanish encountered tobacco. They observed Indigenous peoples smoking cigars, a practice the Spaniards associated with losing consciousness or “going out of one’s senses.” The Spaniards themselves soon adopted tobacco use. Oviedo y Valdés noted its numbing effects for easing syphilitic pain, while de las Casas described Spanish scouts benumbed and fatigued yet strangely invigorated. Even critics were struck by how rapidly tobacco came to captivate the Spanish.

While some colonizers and European travelers valued tobacco’s effects, there is limited to no evidence of non-Indigenous use within a sacred medicinal system comparable to those practiced by Indigenous communities. In *Tobacco and Shamanism in South America* (1987), the anthropologist Johannes Wilbert surveys deep uses of tobacco among Indigenous peoples, including the Muisca of Colombia. “Muisca” was the name given by the Spanish and later adopted in official contexts, but as part of their language revitalization process, the community now prefers the name “Muysca,” a historically-grounded spelling that reflects a distinct ancestral vowel sound.

At the time of the Spanish conquest, tobacco was not just smoked but was transformed into a concentrated beverage, typically mixed with other medicinal and sacred plants. According to Wilber’s study of the colonial accounts, the Muisca “are alleged to have served strongly concentrated tobacco infusions mixed with *Brugmansia aurea* and alcoholic chicha to slaves and wives destined to be buried alive with their masters.” Less ominously, Wilbert notes that tobacco was also burned as a fumigant for crop protection, in funeral rites, and for spiritual cleansing and divination. According to colonial chronicler Friar Pedro Simón, Muisca shamans chewed and smoked tobacco to gain visions. These diviners were seen as prophets who gained information by interpreting smoke or ash from burned tobacco leaves, but also entered visionary states through the plant’s pharmacological effects.

   ![Ancient drawing of people in a circle smoking pipes, stars in the distance](/sites/g/files/omnuum4346/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/2025-10/1.jpeg?itok=XRe7WcT3) 

 

Some of these spiritual practices endure in the present. Among contemporary Muysca communities, particularly in Suba, tobacco

 remains a living medicine. Based on my ethnographic research, *Zaitas* and elders turn to tobacco as a guide in spiritual, ritual, and political life. Before important meetings with local or national authorities, the *Zaitas* gather to smoke tobacco cigars, observing tobacco burning to anticipate outcomes. During these gatherings, the *Zaita* “opens the word”—a ceremonial act of initiating dialogue in a sacred manner, creating a space of harmony and asking permission from the land, the ancestors, and the spirits to speak on behalf of the community.

Another example of tobacco’s role in community and political life appears in cases of *justicia propia*—the Indigenous justice system. Justice is not retributive but relational, restoring balance rather than punishing. When conflicts arise, *Zaitas* guide the person involved through a long process of harmonization and reintegration. Sacred plant medicines are used to help individuals heal and reconnect, and they are often asked to contribute to the community in specific ways, such as working in the gardens. In all of this, tobacco plays a central role.

Tobacco is an offering to the element of fire, *gata*, invoking presence, clarity, and transformation. It serves as a bridge to the ancestors, a way of making that “connection,” as Elder Ignacio calls it. As many *Zaitas* express, “Tobacco cannot be absent; it is the first doorway to ancestral medicine—this is why it is called the master plant.” It is only after tobacco is offered that other sacred plants enter the ceremony.

While some sacred plants categorized as “psychedelic” draw increasing attention in scholarly and therapeutic contexts, tobacco is too often overlooked. It is tobacco that continues to hold the most consistent ceremonial presence across Indigenous nations, from visioning and divination to healing and political governance. Tobacco is a living entity, a master plant that mediates relationships between Indigenous peoples and their territories. For the Muysca, tobacco speaks; it guides and teaches.



 

 

 



 

 See also:- [ Researcher Reflections ](/topic-tags/researcher-reflection)
- [ Transcendence and Transformation ](/programming-threads/transcendence-and-transformation)