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Jeremy Narby - The Turkano - Discovering Curare
Identifier
008370
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
A description of the experience
Jeremy Narby
Curare is a substance that kills tree borne animals without poisoning the meat, causing them to relax their grip and fall to the ground. Monkeys, when hit with an untreated arrow tend to wrap their tails around branches and die out of the archer's reach.
There are 40 types of curares in the Amazon, made from 70 plant species. To produce it, it is necessary to combine several plants and boil them for 72 hours, while avoiding the fragrant but mortal vapours. The final product is a paste that is inactive unless injected under the skin. If swallowed it has no effect. It is difficult to see how anybody could have stumbled on this recipe by chance experimentation............ The Turkano of the Columbian Amazon say that the creator of the universe invented curare and gave it to them.