Carl Linnaeus – the cultivated name

  HEBRARIUM   Before it was an accusation, it was a cultivated plant. In 1753, Carl Linnaeus placed the plant inside modern botanical language. Cannabis sativa. A binomial name, almost dry in its precision. Yet the second word matters: sativa — cultivated, sown, raised by human hands. The name does not romanticise the plant. It […]

Mile 419.99 – the sign they still wanted to steal

HEBRARIUM Some numbers become heavier than metal On Interstate 70 in Colorado, the Mile 420 marker was stolen so often that transportation officials replaced it with a new sign: Mile 419.99. It was a practical fix, almost bureaucratically elegant — move the joke by one hundredth of a mile and hope the thieves lose interest. […]

When a word becomes a gate

HEBRARIUM Notes on canna, cannabis, and shared language Editor’s note: MOICANNA has contributed visual and editorial material to this Herbarium entry. This conversation focuses on publishing, language and cultural context. It is not a legal commentary on any pending trade mark proceeding. MOICANNA was an earlier publishing and visual project around Cannabis Education and Culture. […]

The herb without grief

  HEBRARIUM Nepenthés, pharmakon, and the forgotten language of therapeutic cannabis Nepenthés Cannabis (Κάνναβις η νηπενθής) The herb before the sorrow Before it became fibre, it was a bond. Before it became smoke, it was a whisper. Before it became forbidden, it was nepenthes: an herb without grief. The Greek word nepenthés is one of […]