Oldest evidence of humans using tobacco discovered in Utah

[Judi Lynn]

2. New Archaeological Find in Utah Suggests Humans Have Been Using Tobacco Since the Ice Age

Prehistoric peoples may have chewed tobacco seeds around the campfire.

Sarah Cascone, October 12, 2021

Humankind’s addiction to tobacco runs deep: Archaeologists in Utah have discovered what appears to be the earliest known use of wild tobacco, stretching back 12,500 years—some 9,000 years earlier than the previously dated evidence.

A team from the Far Western Anthropological Research Group in Henderson, Nevada, and the Crow Canyon Archaeological Center in Cortez, Colorado, found Nicotiana attenuata, or coyote tobacco, seeds around a manmade hearth or firepit at the Wishbone site in Utah’s Great Salt Lake Desert, not far from Salt Lake City. The researchers published their findings in the journal Nature Human Behavior.

Wishbone got its name from the large number of waterfowl bones found at the site, where ducks were likely the mainstay of the prehistoric human diet. But tobacco wouldn’t have grown in what was then a marshy area, with its closest natural habitat some eight miles away.

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Also in the ashes were seeds from other plants that ancient humans are known to have consumed, suggesting that people intentionally brought tobacco seeds to the site—the population at Wishbone appears to have traveled widely each year. The seeds wouldn’t have burned well, so they were probably not being used to feed the fire. Most likely, the ancients liked to chew tobacco, releasing the addictive nicotine for a dopamine high.

More:
https://news.artnet.com/art-world/archaeologists-discover-12300-year-old-tobacco-use-2019581