he anthropological and popular liter-
 ature on Haiti is replete with refer-
 ences to zombies. According to
these accounts, zombies are the living
dead: innocent victims raised in a co-
matose trance from their graves by malev-
olent voudou priests (bocors), and forced
to toil indefinitely as slaves. Although one
author attempted to prove that zombies ex-
ist, most have rather uncritically assumed
the phenomenon to be folklore. Neverthe-
less, virtually all writers acknowledge that
the majority of the Haitian population be-
lieves in the physical reality of zombies.
 As long ago as 1938, Zora Hurston, a
student of Franz Boas at Columbia Univer-
sity, suggested that there could be a mate-
rial basis for the zombie phenomenon (cf.
Tell My Horse). Having visited what she
believed to be a zombie in a hospital near


Gonaive in North Central Haiti, she and the
attendant physician "discussed at great
length the theories of how zombies came to
be. It was concluded that it is not a case of
awakening the dead, but a matter of the
semblance of death induced by some drug
known to a few: some secret probably
brought from Africa and handed down gen-
eration to generation. The men know the
effect of the drug and the antidote. It is
evident that it destroys that part of the brain
which governs speech and willpower. The
victim can move and act but cannot formu-
late thought."
 Although Hurston alone gave credence
to this hypothesis, subsequent investigators
certainly knew of the poison. Leybum (in
The Haitian People, 1941) refers to "those
who believe that certain bocors know how
to administer a subtle poison to intended
victims which will cause suspended anima-
tion and give the appearance of death." Ac-
cording to M6traux (in Voodoo in Haiti,
1959), the houngan (voudou priests) know
the secret of certain drugs which induce a
lethargic state indistinguishable from
death. Courlander (in The Drum and the
Hoe, 1960) adds, "the victim is not really
dead but has succumbed to a virulent poi-
son which numbs all the senses and stops
bodily function but does not truly kill. Upon
disinterment, the victim is given an antidote
which restores most physical processes but
leaves the mind in an inert state, without will
or the power to resist"
 Though the anthropologists remained
equivocal, the Haitians themselves recog-
nize the existence of the poison with some
assurance. If it now seems remarkable that
the reports of the poison were not properly
investigated, there are, in fact, good histor-
ical reasons for the oversight. They ap-
peared during a period when Haitian social
scientists, trained in the tradition of cultural
relativism and objective analysis, were most

Botanist E. Wade Davis is a researcher with
the Botanical Museum of Harvard University,
presently doing research in the Brazilian Ama-
zon. This papers an edited version of a longer
article published in the Journal of Eth-
nophramacology. @ Copyright 1983 by E.
Wade Davis.


18/CARBBEAN MIEW