ayahuasca

plural ayahuascas

1. uncountableusuallyA giant vine native to South America (especially Banisteriopsis caapi), noted for its psychotropic properties.
2. uncountableusuallyAny of various psychoactive infusions or decoctions prepared from this vine.

   They make use of a narcotic drink called Ayahuasca, which produces effects similar to those of opium.

   1870, James Orton, The Andes and the Amazon, Or, Across the Continent of South America, page 171

   3 more examples

   As the Amazon forest people would take ayahuasca and enter into that place of Group Mind where they would make decisions for the tribe, the psychedelic shamanic acts that McKenna was promulgating would involve the experience of ecstasy and the contemplation of wholeness.

   2004, Martin Torgoff, “Nouveau Psychedelia”, in Can’t Find My Way Home: America in the Great Stoned Age, 1945–2000, New York, N.Y.: Simon & Schuster, →ISBN, page 414

   Like many young women in that cultural era, she was excited to explain ayahuasca, and informed me that her appointment was scheduled for next week, when she would be leaving New York to visit family in Rio.

   2020, Emily Segal, Mercury Retrograde, New York: Deluge Books, →ISBN

   Police in eastern Spain have arrested three people and seized 11 litres of ayahuasca, 117 San Pedro cactus plants and several bottles of toad poison after raiding two rural properties that were used to host lucrative spiritual retreats promising “astral journeys”.

   2025 August 11, Sam Jones, “Ayahuasca and toad poison seized as police raid spiritual retreats in Spain”, in The Guardian, →ISSN

   Synonyms: yage, grandmother