Origins and Lineage of Cannabis

Behind every strain lies a lineage that often reaches further back than its name. The articles start with the division into sativa and indica and then move to the landraces of the Americas and the Hindu Kush. They end with individual strains and lines and their family history.

  • Landraces

  • Americas and the Caribbean

  • Latin American Landraces

    Where the Latin American and Caribbean cannabis landraces really come from: domestication in East Asia, the four transatlantic introduction routes, and why Acapulco Gold, Santa Marta Gold, Punto Rojo and others are 20th-century regional selections on introduced stock.

  • Arrival in the New World

    Cannabis is not native to the Americas. Iberian fibre hemp, the African slave trade and Indian indentured labour carried the plant across the Atlantic; Colombia joined via a fourth, later route. The four routes in detail, sourced.

  • Mexican Landraces

    Mexican landraces root in Spanish fibre hemp from 1530 and internal selection along the Pacific axis. Origin, character and the well-known lines from Acapulco Gold to Oaxaca Highland, sourced.

  • Colombian Landraces

    Colombia's sativas reached the country via the Caribbean through Panama in the early 20th century and became world-famous only in the US boom of the 1970s. Origin, character and the lines from Colombian Gold to Corinto, sourced.

  • Brazilian Landraces

    Brazil's cannabis came in via the African slave trade as fumo de Angola; the vocabulary is Kimbundu. Origin, character and the lines from Manga Rosa to Santa Maria, sourced.

  • Maconha and Diamba

    The Brazilian cannabis vocabulary is Kimbundu. Where maconha, diamba and riamba come from, why smoking itself is an African innovation, and what the derivation of the word marijuana involves – sourced.

  • Strains and Lines

  • Original Haze

    The documented history of Original Haze: its Californian origin, the disputed four-country recipe, its rescue from near-extinction, and the living preservation lines today – fact-based and sourced.

  • Jamaican Lambsbread

    What Lambsbread really is: a Rastafari sacrament term, not a documented strain pedigree. The origin of Jamaican ganja, the Skunk#1 claim and the modern preservation line – fact-based and evidence-classed.

  • Caribbean Dream

    Caribbean Dream is a documented sativa-x-sativa preservation cross by Roms (ATAO Genetics) from a St. Vincent sativa and Jamaican Lambsbread. Breeding history, background and a strain description covering growth, aroma and effect.

  • US Genetics Hype

    Trace the US exotic hype to its root and the documented genetics turn out small and old: one cross from the 1970s, one real landrace - and two genetic black boxes.

  • Fern-Leaf Mutation

    The commercially stabilised fern-leaf strains on the market trace back to the Freakshow/Berryfreak cross (central California, ~2017). Origin, the open dispute over its parents, and every market line – fact-based and sourced.