ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the arrival of tobacco on European shores and the emergence of the philosophical and cultural epoch known as the ‘Enlightenment’ may be more than just coincidental. Enlightenment is a word first recorded in the English language in 1621, about the same period that tobacco was making substantial inroads into European life. Unlike James I, some members of the European aristocracy, both male and female, developed more positive attitudes to the use of tobacco, with addiction probably a powerful motivating force. Two examples of changing attitudes, both of them linked to different aspects of Enlightenment philosophies, are demonstrated in the courts of Catherine, Duchess of Savoy and of Peter the Great of Russia. The creative imagination, argues John Engell, was the most important and powerful notion to develop in the 18th century. ‘Tobacco constitutes persons’ applies to bodies in lowland South America.
