In A Nutshell
Absinthe, the famed Green Fairy, was once banned for causing hallucinations, convulsions, and tremors. This wasn’t actually because of some kind of psychoactive properties—the people experiencing these symptoms were just really, really wasted.
The Whole Bushel
The absinthe legend began in the 19th century, when it was touted as a means to expand one’s consciousness and induce mind-altering psychedelic experiences. This wasn’t vouched for by any run-of-the-mill whiskey hounds either; it was done by legendary artists such as Van Gogh and Picasso, who believed that a bottle of the green fairy would enhance their creativity.
The romanticism around absinthe only grew when it was banned in the early 1900s after causing episodes of “absinthism,” characterized by convulsions, tremors, and hallucinations. The ban had a lot of help, though. Absinthe was cheap and wildly popular, and France’s powerful wine producers happily backed the temperance crusade to knock out a rival drink. Only very recently was absinthe brought back into the fold, but somehow, the incredible psychedelic experiences were not brought back with it.
The active ingredient that was handed the blame for absinthism in the original Green Fairy was thujone, a compound in wormwood. Older estimates claimed bottles from before the ban held enormous amounts of it, with one widely cited figure putting the number near 260 milligrams per liter. When chemists finally tested surviving bottles from that era, though, they found an average of about 1.3 milligrams per liter, barely different from what modern bottles contain and nowhere near enough to make anyone trip. Thujone can trigger seizures in huge doses, but you would drink yourself to death long before you swallowed that much from a glass of absinthe.
So what are the reasons behind the famous tales of insane absinthe experiences? Well, reporters of such experiences were more than likely just extremely drunk. While popular drinks like vodka and whiskey contain about 40-50 percent alcohol content, absinthe is a gargantuan 70 percent alcohol by volume. Some of absinthe’s scarier reputation also came from cheap knockoffs, which unscrupulous makers doctored with poisons like copper salts and antimony to fake the right green color, and those really could sicken a drinker. So in the absence of any other possible source of absinthe madness, scientists have concluded that it is the super-potent alcohol in absinthe that led to its mythical psychedelic properties, not thujone or any other chemical.
Absinthe is legal again in much of the world. The United States lifted its long ban in 2007, as long as a bottle stays under 10 milligrams of thujone per liter. The European Union sets its cap a bit higher, at 35 milligrams per liter. Either way, a real bottle today carries roughly the same trace of thujone the old ones did, and the same complete lack of a hallucination to go with it.
Show Me The Proof
Absinthe: Common Misconceptions & Myths Debunked
Sorry, Absinthe Trippers: Scientists Say You’re Just Really Drunk
Absinthe Uncorked: The ‘Green Fairy’ Was Boozy — But Not Psychedelic
