writch's wramblings

W. B. O'Shaughnessy, M.D.

I came across a reference today in the most sideways manner, but found it so curious that I had to point it out. W. B. O'Shaughnessy, M.D. is the man who discovered that people didn't have to die from cholera if you gave them intravenous electrolytes.

He is also the doctor who brought medical marijuana to the west (from India).

In looking over his seminal work, ON THE PREPARATIONS OF THE INDIAN HEMP, OR GUNJAH, I found that he would purchase a seer weight of gunjah for between twelve annas and a rupee, while bhang went for a pice.

A rupee was what is now about $4 in silver. There are a sixty-four pice in a rupee, and four pice in an anna.

A seer is a measure of weight just shy of a kilo.

Gunjah is dried flowers. Bhang is trimmings (for making bhang, the drink, and things).

So, there you have it, the approximate real value of marijuana (all things being equal).

It's really worth about a dollar and a half to two dollars a pound for dried bud, with trimmings being under a dime a pound.

All the excess inflated value is merely the product of prohibition.

Notes:

WB O'Shaughnessy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Brooke_O%27Shaughnessy
http://antiquecannabisbook.com/chap1/Shaughnessy.htm

On the Preparations of the Indian Hemp, or Gunjah

http://users.lycaeum.org/~sputnik/Ludlow/Texts/gunjah.html
http://ccrmg.org/wbos/pdf/11_paper.pdf

Weights and Money

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seer_%28unit%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupee

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