D & D.E.A.? i.e. Hardby Vice

[Prince of Happiness]

Looking over the recent issue of Dungeon, I noticed a theme of adventures and the setting material that seems to make the assumption that governments in the Flanaess, amongst other settings, has a drug policy akin to what you see in place in most countries nowadays. It seems to be the most incongruous anachronism that I've seen in a long time that would assume that a) ancient governments/municipalities would even formulate a drug policy or b) even bother to enforce it.

A cursory glance of narcotic/stimulant/intoxicant (herein "drugs") use in medieval/ancient societies seems to fall along two schools of policy:

1. You take what you can handle, though extensive use can bring one social ostracism or censure such as alcohol, coffee, coca leaves, tobacco, and snuff. There might even be a cultural embrace of the taking of these substances that is enshrined in social ritual.

2. Prohibition brought about by religion: Islam & alcohol (though use of hashish, marijuana, opiates, caffine and qaf are common and not necessarily prohibited at all) or the Calvinists and coffee (or even the LDS).

3. Religious use: Such as alcohol, opiates, and hallucinogens.

Now, outside of the obvious reluctance for any sane gaming company to not want to promote drug-use, why would the use of drugs really come up that much when clearly most ancient societies tended to produce their foreign substances either locally and small-scale, or imported them and created a thriving trade? Where would the Tony Montana-esque drug lords of Scuttlecove even manage to acquire the wealth that they do and why would they have to live in some (literally) gods-forsaken, humid s***-hole, when logically there wouldn't be that much of a demand, ostracism, or government enforcement of any potential legislation (who cares about someone getting stoned when you have IUZ next door?).

Also, how do you approach drugs in your campaigns? This includes substances such as alcohol, caffine, and tobacco.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I almost never see references to "medieval" societies mentioning drug use, but I do have two examples. Neither is actually from the Middle Ages.

It was wrong to use drugs in Ancient Rome, although they didn't have punishment other than the social kind (eg people mock a drug user for being a drug user, thirty years down the road they mock the drug user for their memory problems brought about by drug use).

China fought two Opium Wars with Britain over the issue of drug use, the first one around 1840 (definitely post-medieval era). There were people using opium in China before the British arrive, but the problem became many times worse when the British started selling opium to Chinese criminals, marked with the Queen's own symbol!

I just don't think medieval societies could have had such a big drug problem... a lack of chemical knowledge and a lack of rapid mass transport meant that continuously supplying users with drugs would have been very difficult (and the drug costs would be very expensive). Drug users would probably use local drugs that came from plants that hadn't been specifically bred for drug production. I couldn't really tell you what punishment, if any, there were for drug use. While the problem would not have been as severe as it is today, it could still have been pretty bad.

 

[Prince of Happiness]

I almost never see references to "medieval" societies mentioning drug use, but I do have two examples. Neither is actually from the Middle Ages.

It was wrong to use drugs in Ancient Rome, although they didn't have punishment other than the social kind (eg people mock a drug user for being a drug user, thirty years down the road they mock the drug user for their memory problems brought about by drug use).

China fought two Opium Wars with Britain over the issue of drug use, the first one around 1840 (definitely post-medieval era). There were people using opium in China before the British arrive, but the problem became many times worse when the British started selling opium to Chinese criminals, marked with the Queen's own symbol!

I just don't think medieval societies could have had such a big drug problem... a lack of chemical knowledge and a lack of rapid mass transport meant that continuously supplying users with drugs would have been very difficult (and the drug costs would be very expensive). Drug users would probably use local drugs that came from plants that hadn't been specifically bred for drug production. I couldn't really tell you what punishment, if any, there were for drug use. While the problem would not have been as severe as it is today, it could still have been pretty bad.

That pretty much echoes my thoughts. I don't think there was much mention of a "drug problem" in medieval European society namely because it was either not worth mentioning, and that alcohol was much more prevalent than narcotics.

Funny you mention the Opium Wars. When I was thinking this thread up, I thought about them. I think that might be the last time you'll see a Western society fighting a war for the right to deal narcotics! But I did note that the Manchu Dynasty only finally moved forward with anti-drug legislation when availability became massive which brought me to your third point, that production just wasn't up to snuff, and hard narcotics like cocaine and heroin were centuries away, while marijuana...why pay for that when you could just grow it? Other stimulants such as coca, qaf, and coffee where regarded as either beneficial, or culturally entrenched and therefore not really viewed as a "problem."

 

[Nyaricus]

I almost never see references to "medieval" societies mentioning drug use, but I do have two examples. Neither is actually from the Middle Ages.

Well, there is the fact that assassins derive their titles from hashish (marijuana product or some such) users/religious zealots. This is Crusades-era, mind you

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Well, there is the fact that assassins derive their titles from hashish (marijuana product or some such) users/religious zealots. This is Crusades-era, mind you

The sad thing is that I knew that, and just forgot about it *Sigh*

I'd think the fact that they kill people for money is worse than harming themselves with drugs. (They're not selling the drugs to other people.)

Some societies occasionally used mind-influencing drugs for religious or "magical" ceremonies. I don't know how addictive or harmful those drugs were. There was a funny episode of Spin City that mentioned that, but of course that's a fictional source.

 

[jefgorbach]

Without research, Im guessing the medieval drug problem was pretty much self-containing.
Considering what we know as leisure time is pretty much a side-effect of the mass-production industry which freed the majority of individuals from raising crops/etc to survive, it is fairly reasonable/likely the full-blown drug dependency we are familar with simply wouldnt have existed during the Middle Ages because such users/victims would have starved long before reaching that level of dependency.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I read somewhere that peasant revolts were kept in check with holidays; one third of the year (including Sundays) you could not work due to one religious holiday or another. There were "Feast Day of Saint Random" all over the place, holidays that most of us would not have heard of.

Peasants actually had a fair amount of free time, but they did have to work extremely hard the rest of the time. Working on a holiday was not an option either in most cases. (A British king managed to circumvent the rule when he ordered all peasants to practice archery on Sundays. This was before the Anglican church existed, but then again Britain was pretty far from Rome/Vatican City.)

... Or I could have used a bad source. Anyone want to check on that?

 

[Baron Opal]

I seem to remember something about there being a papal encyclical about some wretched bean from the New World distracting the nuns. Xochotl, hochol, kochlot... Hrm. I forget what it was called...

 

[Nyaricus]

The sad thing is that I knew that, and just forgot about it *Sigh*

lol, tis all good. I just always get a little inner laugh that assassins are so euonymously named

cheers,
--N