Curt's Flying Ointment Page line9.gif (3614 bytes)
Birds fly over the rainbow - why then oh why can't I?
ALL of the substances mentioned on this page are DEADLY POISONS. This page is intended only to facilitate learning about the history, psychology, chemistry and biology of so called "witches' flying ointment", and, more generally, "entheogens".
I have never personally ingested ANY of these substances - and I do not in any way encourage anyone else to do so.
all links working as of 6-8-2001

Hey - as long as you're here, why not check out my Shamanism page?

Background material on flying ointments
Alexander Kuklin has written a nice little book called How Do Witches Fly. You can purchase the book from Amazon.com
Here's a page mostly focussing on Belladonna but also dealing with some historical stuff on flying ointment.
And here's a nice little site devoted to Drugs and Witchcraft.
Here is a nice page on Witching Plants.
And here's another historically oriented Belladonna page.
Michael Harner's book Hallucinogens and Shamanism has a good essay on the subject of drugs and european witchcraft. His essay is a little unkind to modern day "Wiccans" - but perhaps not unfairly so.
This is a little piece on the History of Substance Control.
Nowadays, anyone foolish enough to actually use some combination of belladonna, wolfsbane, henbane, etc, only has to worry about death by poisoning or permanent neurological damage and liver damage. Not so long ago there was an added danger - being burned at the stake. Also check out the Hall of Remembrance

Flying ointment recipes
(see above links as well)
This link is definitely not for the faint of heart. And it is also pretty slow to load - but it has a very interesting looking (and certainly toxic!) recipe.
Natural Magic, a medieval manuscript by John Baptist Porta, supposedly contains a recipe in it somewhere - happy hunting!
Here is a whole page of recipes. Some of these recipes contain ingredients that are not only toxic, but illegal as well.
This page describes how to make beer spiked with henbane.
Here's another link with a little bit of information on psychoactive beer (man, I could go for one right now!).

Individual ingredients
Aconite (Wolfsbane, Monkshood)
Wolfsbane FAQ (monkshood).
Another Monkshood page, including a link to an antidote for accidental poisoning.
Yet another aconite (wolfsbane, monkshood) page.
Datura (especially deadly!)
A whole page of Datura links.
The Datura FAQ.
Another Datura page.
And here's one more Datura page - this one has lots of nice pictures!
Belladonna
An extensive Deadly Nightshade page - complete with antidotes!
Another apparently well researched Belladonna page.
The herbweb.com Belladonna page is brief, but has some useful looking links.
Henbane
An extensive Henbane page.
A collection of internet posts concerning Medieval Poisons including Henbane, and many others.
Another nice Henbane page - this one has some information on growing Henbane.
And a whole page of Henbane recipes.

Other Toxic Things
Amanita Muscaria
Here's an article on the influence of mushrooms on Christianity.
And here's another article on the theory that Amanita Muscaria is none other than the sacred Soma of the Rig Veda.
Here's what the little buggers look like - aint they pretty?
And here's another beautiful photo
Pure Land Ethnobotanicals - mushrooms for sale.
Ayahuasca
The Erowid Ayahuasca Vault contains a wealth of information about the "vine of the soul".
The same goes for the Ayahuasca Home Page.
An article on Ayhuasca Tourism (what will they think of next??)
Ayahuasca Books (read all about it).
Ayahuasca Chemistry (specifically DMT extraction)
DMT: The Spirit Molecule - a new book by Rick Strassman. Looks really interesting!
Dissociatives
A bunch of DXM links.
Ketamine is possibly the deadliest substance of all those mentioned on this page - and that's saying something! For more information on ketamine - check out the Erowid Ketamine Vault.

Other Entheogenic Links
The Vaults of Erowid
Shamanic Dimensions
The Entheogen Project
The Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies
Island Web
The Basement Shaman (purveyors of shamanic wares)


The cool rotating witches are from Aisha Qadisha's excellent collection of animated gifs. This is yet another example of the cool things that those wacky folks at the Scarlet Woman Lodge are up to.

back to Curt's More Interesting Page