Though it is widely believed a kind of cannabis congee was consumed by the ancients, there has been a dearth of hard archeological evidence to back up the theory.
The tomb was unearthed in 2019 by laborers who were building an elementary school playground in Taiyuan, Shanxi’s provincial capital.
The plant is listed as one of the “wu gu” , or “five staple crops,” in historical texts, though most contemporary Chinese history textbooks describe its ancient cultivation as an “economic activity” for textile manufacturing.