Writing in German for Spektrum der Wissenschaft, Karin Schlott reports on a study in Antiquity by a Warsaw team led by Dagmara Socha. They analysed hair and nails of eight Inca child mummies found on Andean peaks in Peru and Argentina. Six showed cocaine, the Argentine children also cocaethylene, a sign of cocaine combined with alcohol, and one child harmine, an ingredient of ayahuasca. The drugs may have been meant to induce visionary states or to calm the children before the capacocha ritual.

The Inca held these rites in times of drought, famine or political crisis, believing powerful gods lived on the summits. The chemistry turns a belief system into measurable evidence, and it raises an old question for freethinkers: what happens when sincere faith in gods demands the lives of the most vulnerable?

Source: Karin Schlott, Spektrum der Wissenschaft (German) (2026-11-03)

Summarised by the FTI newsdesk.