Velada is the name of the healing vigils carried out by Mazatec curanderos (such as María Sabina). The rituals involved the use of psilocybin (magic mushrooms) or Salvia divinorumDanilo Parra, Salvia Velada: Experiencing a Traditional Mazatec Shaman Ceremony, Vice.com, 8 November 2016 to commune with God and experience enlightenment.
History In May 1957, the banker and ethnomycologist R. Gordon Wasson published an article in Life magazine, Seeking the Magic Mushroom, describing his first experience consuming the mushroom and following the Velada of a shaman back in 1955. He claimed to be among the two first modern Western men to follow a traditional Velada ritual on psilocybin.LIFE Magazine article (May 13, 1957) His tale inspired a generation of “mycotourists” seeking to experience the authentic Mazatec Veladas.Paja Faudree, Singing for the Dead: The Politics of Indigenous Revival in Mexico, Duke University Press, 29 May 2013Wesley Thoricatha, History of Psychedelics: How the Mazatec Tribe Brought Entheogens to the World, Psychedelictims.com, 28 October 2015
Wasson's curandero was Maria Sabina. She was seen as a traitor by her community and rejected. She had received rock stars such as John Lennon, Mick Jagger, and Bob Dylan to follow the Mazatec Velada, which had led to an international exposition of the Mazatec's entheogenic secrets.
See also Seeking the Magic Mushroom Mazatec people Curandero María Sabina
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