A Brief History of Drugs

Very short history till modern (18th-20th century) times. The author has a very modernist, wrong knowledge about medieval Times, resulting in an again and again refuted story about the “Dark Middle Ages”. E.g. he spans out a large storyline of the Catholic Church hunting rational people and condemning the sciences, or dates early modern events like the wide persecution of witches back to the 12th century.

(He also retells the myth about crusader orders imitating a supposedly established use of narcotics by the Assassins)

His best part is the 19th century, with its rediscovery of narcotics and “les paradis artificiels”. The book ends with an anthology of stories about the involvement of executive and legislative agencies in drug trade and distribution and became very annoying. An entertaining still annoying mixture of historical narrative, conspiracy stories and anecdotes.

My first history of drugs, and I hope there are better one on the market