Mercury

Getting high off toxic solvents and chemicals to induce mind-altering effects is a public health concern today. But dial back 5,000 years, in the Iberian Peninsula, and groups of women adorned in immaculate ceremonial attire would participate in a ritual dance before an audience, inhaling a vibrant red powder, or mixing it in an elixir. This powder, derived from the mineral cinnabar, induced a fevered trance accompanied by tremors and delirium, and its users visited different astral planes. The dark side of this tradition was it necessitated a lifetime of dangerous and lethal mercury abuse. What the users were unlikely to be aware of was that the ‘trip’ was a byproduct of the toxic metal mercury, today one of the