The Club des Hashischins (sometimes also spelled Club des Hashishins or Club des Hachichins, "Club of the Hashish-Eaters") was a Parisian group dedicated to the exploration of drug-induced experiences, notably with

hashish Hashish ( ar, حشيش, ()), also known as hash, "dry herb, hay" is a drug made by compressing and processing parts of the cannabis plant, typically focusing on flowering buds (female flowers) containing the most trichomes. European Monitorin ...

.Levinthal, C. F. (2012). ''Drugs, behavior, and modern society''. (6th ed.). Boston: Pearson College Div. Members included

Victor Hugo Victor-Marie Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romantic writer and politician. During a literary career that spanned more than sixty years, he wrote in a variety of genres and forms. He is considered to be one of the great ...

Alexandre Dumas Alexandre Dumas (, ; ; born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie (), 24 July 1802 – 5 December 1870), also known as Alexandre Dumas père (where '' '' is French for 'father', to distinguish him from his son Alexandre Dumas fils), was a French writer ...

Charles Baudelaire Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poetry, French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist and art critic. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticis ...

, Gérard de Nerval, Honoré de Balzac, Paul Verlaine, and Arthur Rimbaud.

Club's origins

Several drugs like hashish and opium were increasingly well known in Europe by the beginning of the nineteenth century. At that time, recreational use of these drugs was widespread among scientific and literary circles. The Armée d'Orient, along with a contingent of 151 scientists and anthropologists from the Commission des Sciences et des Arts, brought quantities of hashish home with them from

Napoleon Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...

's expedition to Egypt. The

French conquest of Algeria The French invasion of Algeria (; ) took place between 1830 and 1903. In 1827, an argument between Hussein Dey, the ruler of the Deylik of Algiers, and the French consul escalated into a blockade, following which the July Monarchy of France inva ...

of 1830 to 1847 further increased the popular consumption of hashish.

History

The club was active from about 1844 to 1849 and counted the literary and intellectual elite of Paris among its members, including Dr. Jacques-Joseph Moreau, Théophile Gautier,

, Gérard de Nerval, Eugène Delacroix and

. Monthly "séances" were held at the

Hôtel de Lauzun The Hôtel de Lauzun is a 17th-century '' hôtel particulier'', or private mansion, located on the of the île Saint-Louis in the 4th arrondissement of Paris, France. It is among the few Parisian '' hôtels'' that retain their rich carved, pai ...

(at that time Hôtel Pimodan) on the Île Saint-Louis. Gautier wrote about the club in ''

Revue des Deux Mondes The ''Revue des deux Mondes'' (, ''Review of the Two Worlds'') is a monthly French-language literary, cultural and current affairs magazine that has been published in Paris since 1829. According to its website, "it is today the place for debates a ...

'' in February 1846, where he described his first visit: "One December evening, obeying a mysterious summons, drafted in enigmatic terms understood by affiliates but unintelligible for others, I arrived in a distant quarter, a sort of oasis of solitude in the middle of Paris that the river, surrounding it with its two arms, seems to defend against the encroachments of civilization. It was in an old house on the island of Saint-Louis, the Hotel Pimodan, built by Lauzun, that the bizarre club of which I was a member recently held its monthly sittings where I was to attend for the first time." While he is often cited as the founder of the club, in the article Gautier says he was attending their séances for the first time that evening and made clear that others were sharing a familiar experience with him. The club members often consumed ''

Dawamesc Dawamesc is a cannabis edible found in Algeria and some other Arab countries, made of cannabis tops combined with: "sugar, orange juice, cinnamon, cloves, cardamon, nutmeg, musk, pistachios, and pine nuts." The edible played a role in popularizing ...

'', a greenish paste made from cannabis resin mixed with fat, honey, and pistachios. During this period Jacques-Joseph Moreau, who specialized in the sociological concept of

social alienation Social alienation is a person's feeling of disconnection from a group whether friends, family, or wider society to which the individual has an affinity. Such alienation has been described as "a condition in social relationships reflected by (1) ...

, studied the effects of regularly consuming hashish. Moreau studied this product according to his travels between 1837 and 1840 in Egypt and

Syria Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...

, and Asia Minor. Back in France, he continued to experiment on himself and published an 1845 book entitled ''Hashish and mental alienation'' in which he establishes an equivalence between dream, hallucination, and hashish delirium. This book was the first written by a scientist about a drug. Gautier and Baudelaire eventually stopped attending the sessions. Gautier writes: "After a dozen experiments, we gave up forever this intoxicating drug, not that it hurt us physically, but the true writer needs only his natural dreams, and he does not like his thought to be influenced by any agent."

References

{{Coord, 48.8517, N, 2.3592, E, source:wikidata, display=title Cannabis culture French culture Cannabis in France