Many quotes in this article are from persons who wish to remain anonymous. Others are from published reports on various newsgroups and forums. I have used no names accordingly.

It is not the intent of this article to discuss Salvia divinorum. That has been done elsewhere and at great length. Nor is it the purpose of this paper to discuss the fragrant and culinary sages that are known to contain thujone, the active principal in absinthe. Rather this article is meant to deal with the other tested and untested but potentially psychoactive species of Salvia plants. There has been much recent interest over claims of similar compounds to those in S. divinorum being found in other species of Salvias.

The earliest record is to be found in Pharmacotheon (Ott, 1996, pg. 380) “Similar diterpenes such as salviarin and splendidin have been isolated from Salvia splendens and other Salvia species (Savona et al 1978; Savona et al 1979), and these Salvia diterpenes represent a novel class of psychoactive compounds.”

Late in 1997 there began to appear references to Salvia splendens being sublingually active as an anxiolytic on various forums on the internet. When attempting to pursue these leads, contradictions were encountered that did not deter my quest, but gave me certain reservations. Through the good graces of a benefactor, I was able to obtain some S. splendens leaf in late 1997 about the same time I acquired some seeds. I posted at that time on two different forums (The Lycaeum and E.com trip reports forums) but did not save a copy of the posts and they have become irretrievable. The posts dealt with the smoking of Salvia splendens and how the effects were comparable to the last hour of a Ps. mushroom experience.

Others who tested Salvia splendens in various forms had varying degrees of success. While some thought that the experience was likeable to that of cannabis “less than a similar sized bowl of “Cannabis Cup Mix” but worth trying again” and “kind of being high (MJ) without the confusedness” others compared it to Benzodiazepine or anxiolytic substances “yes, definitely calming”. Most of the remarks concerning tranquilizing effects were from those who used the leaves sublingually “When I took S. splendens sublingually the effect was one of emotional numbing without intellectual dullness” and “I felt a relaxing effect in my head the muscles in my arms had relaxed as well”.

Other comparisons were to smoking wormwood “she thought that it was a gentle relaxant and found it quite pleasurable to read whilst under it's effects. When I mentioned that I noted a similarity with wormwood, she concurred”.

Wormwood is Artemesia absinthum and contains thujone.

The various reports of differing effects are not unusual when trying to describe a new and hitherto unknown experience. People tend to describe the unfamiliar with what is familiar to them, and so each person coming from their own frame of reference can only use those terms they know.

I have seen posts comparing S. splendens with GHB, beer and cannabis, valium and psychedelics in their last stages of intoxication. The only thing some of the posts have in common is that there is a definite effect from S. splendens.

Some have found combining it with cannabis helpful “When some cannabis is smoked one hour into the experience the latter's effect is considerably potentiated, but with the clarity of the splendens evident”, while others have found it to be the opposite, “after an hour and a half of completely no-show, I was persuaded to try a small pipe of good, strong, but known quality bud. Bad Idea! Whether the splendens affected the buzz off the bud or the bud in some way activated the splendens trip-I knew even before I put the pipe down it was going to be a bad one. I had a tendency to nod as if my body was in two parts split by a V running from shoulders to just above the navel and joined by a hinge like a joint. I probably could have had an out of body experience (it certainly looked like it would have gone that way) if I had let the trip take over, but the thing was a bit too freaky for that”.