ET TU, BARD?: SHAKESPEARE'S PIPES REVEAL SURPRISING RESIDUES OF DRUGS

Shakespeare might have written on drugs, according to new research.

The poet, a married father of three children, was linked to drug use by
forensic analysis of pipes found in his home at Stratford-upon-Avon.

Although the evidence was circumstantial, scientists from South Africa's
Transvaal Museum in Pretoria said the results were a revelation about drug
use in 17th-century England.

Two of the 24 pipes they tested bore traces of cocaine, the first time the
drug has been found in Europe before the 19th century. Others had traces of
a chemical called myristic acid, a hallucinogenic derived from plants, and
traces of cannabis and tobacco.

``The cocaine found is really quite remarkable,'' said Francis Thackeray, a
paleontologist who co-wrote an article on the discovery in the South
African Journal of Science.

``Cocaine was recorded in Europe about 200 years ago, but to our knowledge
never this early,'' he said.

``The Spanish had access to it at that time in the Americas, but the fact
that it was smoked in England at that time is a first.''

Thackeray is excited about the discovery of cannabis. Although hemp was
widely used for ropes and in printing Shakespeare's early works, there was
little evidence that it was smoked.

Thackeray looks to Shakespeare's work to support the theory that he was a
dopehead as well as a genius.

He said Shakespeare uses complex imagery of darkness, poison and, as in
Sonnet 27, ``a journey in his head,'' with even the dark lady of the
sonnets a possible reference to the creative but dangerous forces of drugs.

``In Sonnet 76,'' Thackeray said, ``he refers to the `invention of a noted
weed,' which may have been a reference to cannabis. In the same sonnet, he
refers to `compounds strange,' and the word compounds is a known reference
to drugs.''

The pipe fragments were examined using gas chromatography with the help of
Thackeray's co-author, Inspector Tommie van der Merwe of the South African
police service's forensic-science laboratory.

They were lent by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, which took issue with
the argument.

``People love to come up with reasons for saying Shakespeare was not a
genius,'' said Ann Donnelly, the curator.

She said the specimens were not of sufficient quality to prove the point
either way.