Ancient cannabis stash found in China

As reported by CNN:

An ancient race that lived 2,700 years ago in the Gobi Desert may have been among the first to use cannabis for medical or religious purposes.

Nearly two pounds of the plant was found stashed in the tomb of a Gushi shaman. It was high in the chemical compounds that provide its psychoactive properties.

"It had evidence of the chemical attributes of cannabis used as a drug," said Dr. Ethan Russo, an author of a study published in the Journal of Experimental Botany. "It could have been for pain control. It could have been for other medicinal properties. It could have been used as an aid to divination."

The Gushi people were a Caucasian race with light hair and blue eyes who likely migrated thousands of years ago from the steppes of Russia to what is now China.

Photo credit to the slideshow at Discovery Channel, which adds the following notes: The sample in the photo had retained its green color, but lost its potency over the millennia. The size of the seeds mixed with the leaves indicates that it came from a cultivated strain. Before storage, all of the less psychoactive male parts of the plants had been removed, confirming the notion that the leaves were used for medicinal or spiritual purposes, not for weaving (their rope was made out of reed fibers, not hemp).