Drugs weren’t just used to reach the gods—sometimes, they were the gods. In this episode of Pills and Power, we explore deities whose identities were inseparable from intoxicating substances. From Shiva and the ritual use of bhang and the mysterious soma, to Xochipilli and the psilocybin mushrooms woven into Aztec cosmology, we trace how drugs shaped worship, authority, and everyday life. We’ll look at the rituals, the evidence, and the followers who kept these traditions alive—and how their influence still lingers in religion, culture, and modern drug debates today.Sources:

https://www.britannica.com/topic/soma-Hinduism

https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/news/2024/10/ritual-and-religious-uses-psilocybe-mushrooms-mesoamerica

https://scholar.google.ca/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=Pachamama+Virgin+Mary&btnG=#d=gs_qabs&t=1768365260290&u=%23p%3DD6bOd8LPTz0J

The Stoned Age is a quick trip back to prehistory to explore our oldest drugs and where they fit into the very fabric of being human. From “caveman meth” to mushroom-headed shamans, this episode looks at how we know prehistoric people used drugs—and why they mattered. Along the way, we dig into mummies, cave art, Neanderthals, and Mormonism.

Sources: 

• The oldest archeological data evidencing the relationship of Homo sapiens with psychoactive plants: A worldwide overview

• Direct evidence of the use of multiple drugs in Bronze Age Menorca (Western Mediterranean) from human hair analysis

• Late pleistocene exploitation of Ephedra in a funerary context in Morocco

• The dangers of the herb ephedra

Season 2 of Pills and Power is coming—and it’s bigger, older and weirder than ever.

This season we dive into prehistoric drugs, religion, cults, power, and the rituals people swear by—from ancient human sacrifice to modern obsessions like Diet Coke.

New episodes drop 7th of January, and continue every Wednesday.

Welcome back to Pills and Power.

What happens when a hostage crisis collides with geopolitics, decades of oppression, and one of the most potent drugs on Earth? In October 2002, Chechen militants took over a packed Moscow theater—and the Russian government decided to end the standoff in a way that still stuns toxicologists today. We’ll unravel the tangled history of Chechnya’s fight for independence, the Kremlin’s heavy-handed responses, and why carfentanil—yes, the elephant tranquilizer—was ever on the table. This is a story of political theater, actual theater, and overdose used as a weapon.

Sources:

• International Negotiation Journal: The Moscow Theater Hostage Crisis: The Perpetrators, their Tactics, and the Russian Response

• Military Medicine: Nord-Ost: Russia’s Medical Failure in the 2002 Crisis

• GIS Reports: Chechnya: A litmus test of Russia’s power

• Britannica: Moscow theater hostage crisis of 2002

• MSNBC: Moscow Theater Hostage Crisis of 2002 (video)

What started with speakeasies and rum runners during U.S. Prohibition spiraled into a global criminal network. In this episode, we trace the underground booze routes of the 1920s, and how these early smuggling networks laid the groundwork for today’s powerful cartels. From the Gulf Cartel’s origins to the chilling violence of CJNG’s death camps, this is the dark evolution of an illicit economy born in the dry days of Prohibition.

Sources:

• Washington State University: Bootlegging During Prohibition

• Drug Enforcement Administration: National Drug Threat Assessment 2024

• Cato Institute: Making a Narco: Childhood Exposure to Illegal Labor Markets and Criminal Life Paths

• The New York Times: Canaries sing in Mexico, but Uncle Juan will not

• Ken Burns: Unintended Consequences of Prohibition

Step right up! In this episode, we dive into the raucous world of Wild West traveling medicine shows—part vaudeville, part medieval quackery, and all about the drugs. From narcotic-laced “cures” to the birth of the phrase “snake oil,” we trace how these spectacles peddled more than entertainment—and left their mark on drug history.

Sources:

• Ann Anderson: Snake Oil, Hustlers and Hambones 

• Smithsonian: Hamlin’s Wizard Oil Liniment

• The Henry Ford Collection: Dr. F.G. Johnson’s French Female Pills

• American Institute of the History of Pharmacy: Kickapoo Indian Medicine Company

• Sauk County History: Traveling Medicine Shows of Yesteryear
  

In Part 1, we sniffed around the medical labs. Now, in Part 2, we hit the streets. This episode dives into how real-life Victorians embraced the white stuff: from coca wine and the original cocaine-laced Coca-Cola to Sherlock Holmes' habit and Dr. Jekyll’s chemical curiosities.

Sources:

Mike Jay: Miracle or Menace?

The Atlantic: Why We Took Cocaine Out of Soda

The Guardian: The story of Dr Jekyll, Mr Hyde and Fanny, the angry wife who burned the first draft

United Nations: World Drug Report 2025

Smithsonian: Vin Mariani

This episode uncovers how a sacred South American leaf turned into Victorian society’s favorite “miracle” drug. Ray and Eliza explore coca’s ancient uses, its transformation into cocaine, and the irony of prudish Victorians throwing eye-drop parties and praising Freud’s favorite stimulant. From mummy girlfriends to botched surgeries—this is the strange trip from ritual leaf to pharmaceutical gold rush.

Sources:

National Geographic: How Coca Leaves Become Cocaine

Public Broadcasting Service: How ‘Miracle Drug’ Nearly Destroyed Sigmund Freud, William Halsted

Drug Enforcement Administration: Coca

Postgraduate Medical Journal: The Case of Emma Eckstein

British Broadcasting Corporation: Peruvian delivery man carried ancient mummy around in his bag

Beneath the brutal order of South African prisons lies the secret code of the Numbers gang — a sprawling brotherhood with its own legends, rules, and rituals. In this episode, Ray and Eliza trace the gang’s shadowy origin story, decode its mythos, and ask why these secret societies endure far beyond prison walls. From tattoos inked with melted plastic to contraband slipping past guards, we unpack how drugs — especially the infamous Mandrax — grease the gears of this underworld. 

Sources:

• Jonny Steinberg: The Number

• Heinrich Veloen: The Numbers Gang in South African Correctional Facilities

• VICE: Portraits of South Africa’s Bloodiest Prison Gang: The Number

• UN Institute for Disarmament Research: Project Coast: apartheid’s chemical and biological warfare programme

• Britannica: Methaqualone

When the troops came home from World War II, they didn’t just bring back stories—they brought back a taste for amphetamines. In this episode, we trace how wartime “pep pills” flooded postwar America—this time marketed at women. In this episode, we explore how “pep pills” promised energy, slim figures, and a cure for the quiet desperation of domestic life. From the pharmacy counter to pop culture, discover how a generation of housewives was sold a chemical solution for an impossible ideal.

Sources:

• University of Wisconsin-Madison advertisement catalog

• Nicholas Rassmussen: America’s First Amphetamine Epidemic

• PBS: Mrs. America: Women’s Roles in the 1950s

• Smithsonian Magazine: A Speedy History of America’s Addiction to Amphetamine