ABSTRACT
Several years ago, the Africa Museum in Berg en Dal (the Nether lands) organized a special exhibition, “Herbs, Health, Healers” (De Smet, 1999), which was devoted to ethnopharmacology-the pro duction and use of substances with medicinal properties that are de rived from local flora and fauna-in Africa. In the catalog that ac companied the exhibition only incidental mention of mushrooms was made. Only one species was dealt with in detail: Coprinus africanus. The vernacular name of that species among the Yoruba in Nigeria is ajeimutin, which translates as “eat, without drinking alcohol.” The same fungal species also occurs in the Central African Republic, and the Lissongo (a group of Pygmies) call this mushroom itongomokolo: “the mushroom that spins your head and heart when simultaneously drinking palm wine” (Heim, 1963). From both vernacular names it is clear that several African cultures know that consuming this mush room in combination with alcohol can result in very disagreeable physical symptoms. In the northern hemisphere, it is medically known that consuming the related mushroom species Coprinus atramentarius in combination with alcohol gives rise to similar dis agreeable symptoms. It has been suggested that the substances re-
sponsible for this physical reaction could be used to treat alcoholism, but the fact that regular consumption of this species was found to de crease the fertility of male rats prevented its subsequent clinical trials and commercial use.
