Datura in the context of "Brugmansia"

Cohoba is a Taíno transliteration for a ceremony in which the ground seeds of the cojóbana tree (Anadenanthera spp.) were used as a snuff via a Y-shaped snuff tube. Use of this substance produced a visionary or entheogenic effect. The cojóbana tree is believed by some to be Anadenanthera peregrina although it may have been a generalized term for psychotropics, including the quite toxic Datura and related genera (Solanaceae). The corresponding ceremony using cohoba-laced tobacco is transliterated as cojibá. This was said to have produced the sense of a visionary journey of the kind associated with the practice of shamanism.

The practice of snuffing cohoba was popular with the Taínos with whom Christopher Columbus made contact. However, the use of Anadenanthera powder was widespread in South America, being used in ancient times by the Wari culture and Tiwanaku of Peru and Bolivia, and also by the Piaroa of Venezuela and Colombia, and the Yanomami of Brazil and Venezuela. Other names for cohoba include vilca, cebíl, ñuá and yopó. In Tiwanaku culture, a snuff tray was used along with an inhalation tube.

Deliriants are a subclass of hallucinogen. The term was coined in the early 1980s to distinguish these drugs from psychedelics such as LSD and dissociatives such as ketamine, due to their primary effect of causing delirium, as opposed to the more lucid and less disturbed states produced by other types of hallucinogens, where rational thought is better preserved (including the ability to distinguish hallucinations from reality). The term generally refers to anticholinergic drugs, which are substances that inhibit the function of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine.

Common examples of deliriants include plants of the genera Datura and Brugmansia, both containing scopolamine, as well as higher than recommended dosages of diphenhydramine (Benadryl). A number of plant deliriants such as that of the Solanaceae family, particularly in the Americas, have been used by some indigenous cultures to reach delirious and altered states of consciousness for traditions or rituals, such as rites of passage, divination or communicating with the ancestors. Despite their long history of use, deliriants are the least-studied class of hallucinogens in terms of their behavioral and neurological effects.

Daturae is a tribe of flowering plants in the subfamily Solanoideae of the family Solanaceae. It comprises three genera: Datura, the Devil's trumpets, Brugmansia, the Angel's trumpets, and the monotypic Trompettia.

These plants are all genetically related. Phylogenetic research shows that Datura species evolved out of an ancestor shared with Nicotiana Tabacum. Whether or not Datura and Brugmansia species evolved out of each other is disputed.