ABSTRACT

Unlike von Martius and von Spix, who spent 3 years in Peru, Johan Jakob von Tschudi’s (1818-1889) primary interest was in animal classification. However, he also recorded detailed observations of many plants, including sasparilla, cinchona, balsam, and coca. von Tschudi did not much like the natives, finding them “unsocial and gloomy.” He was, however, fascinated by some aspects of their lifestyle, especially their use of coca. Von Tschudi swore that chewing coca leaves could prevent “the difficulty of respiration felt in the rapid ascents of the Cordilleras,” a disorder known today as high-altitude pulmonary edema. However, it was an account of his employee, Hatan Humang’s, remarkable endurance that fascinated him, and his readers. According to von Tschudi:

A cholo of Huarai, named Hatan Huamang, was employed by me in very laborious digging. During the five days and nights he was

in my service he never tasted any food, and took only two hours sleep each night. But at intervals of two and a half or three hours he regularly chewed about half an ounce of coca leaves, and he kept an acullio (a wad of leaves) continually in his mouth. I was constantly beside him, and therefore I had the opportunity of closely observing him. The work for which I engaged him being finished, he accompanied me on a two days’ journey of twentythree leagues across the level heights. Though on foot, he kept up with the pace of my mule, and halted only for the chacchar (more coca leaves). On leaving me, he declared he would willingly engage himself again for the same amount of work, and that he would go through it without food, if I would but allow him a sufficient supply of coca. The village priest assured me that this man was sixty-two years of age, and that he had never known him to be ill, a day in his life.