Cannabis Literature in East Asia During the 1940s

Context: What 'Cannabis Literature' Meant in 1940s East Asia

In 1940s East Asia, the word usually translated as 'cannabis'—大麻 (Japanese taima, Chinese dàmá, Korean daema)—almost always meant industrial and medicinal hemp, not a recreational drug Strong evidence^[1]. Japan was at war through 1945 and under Allied occupation afterward; China was fighting the Second Sino-Japanese War and then a civil war; Korea was a Japanese colony until 1945. Publishing was severely constrained by paper rationing, censorship, and military priorities ^[1].

The surviving literature is dominated by agricultural bulletins, prefectural extension materials, pharmacopoeia entries, and military supply documents rather than literary or cultural writing about cannabis as an intoxicant. This reflects both the actual uses of cannabis in the region and the material conditions of wartime publication.

Japan: Hemp as Strategic Crop and Postwar Prohibition

Japanese agricultural and military publications of the early 1940s treated taima (hemp) as a strategic fiber for ropes, uniforms, parachute cords, and Shinto ritual textiles Strong evidence. Tochigi Prefecture, a long-established hemp-producing region, continued to supply the military; prefectural agricultural extension materials from the period describe cultivation techniques in detail.

Medicinal uses appeared in pharmacy texts derived from the kanpō (traditional medicine) tradition, where cannabis seed (mashinin, 麻子仁) was listed as a mild laxative—a use inherited from classical Chinese medicine rather than a 1940s innovation ^[2].

The most consequential 'cannabis text' of the decade came after the war itself. Under the Allied occupation (SCAP), Japan enacted the Cannabis Control Act (Taima Torishimari Hō, 大麻取締法) in July 1948, which reframed cannabis from an ordinary fiber crop into a controlled substance, while carving out licenses for traditional hemp farmers Strong evidence^[3]. This law, not wartime publications, marks the turning point in Japanese cannabis policy.

Claims circulating online that 1940s Japan had a flourishing recreational cannabis literature are not supported by the surviving record No data. The pre-1948 absence of prohibition does not imply the presence of a drug culture; it simply reflects that hemp was treated as agriculture.

China: Pharmacopoeia, Continuity, and Wartime Silence

Chinese writing on cannabis in the 1940s was overwhelmingly continuous with the much older bencao (materia medica) tradition. Cannabis seed (huoma ren, 火麻仁) and, less commonly, the flowering tops (máhuā, 麻花) appeared in reprints and compendia of traditional medicine, citing classical sources like Li Shizhen's Bencao Gangmu (1596) ^[2][4].

Agricultural texts from the Republican period and from the Japanese-occupied northeast (Manchukuo) discussed hemp fiber production for textiles and military use Weak / limited^[5]. The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) and subsequent civil war (1946–1949) made sustained academic publishing and original research extremely difficult.

A common modern myth is that traditional Chinese medicine of this period prescribed cannabis flower for a wide range of ailments. In practice, by the 20th century huoma ren (seed) was by far the dominant cannabis preparation in bencao texts, used mainly for constipation, with flower and leaf preparations much rarer Strong evidence^[2].

Korea: Colonial Agriculture and Postwar Transition

Korea under Japanese rule (until August 1945) produced hemp (sam, 삼; or daema, 대마) primarily for textiles, especially the traditional sambe hemp cloth used in mourning garments and summer clothing Strong evidence. Japanese colonial agricultural reports document hemp cultivation in provinces such as Andong and Boseong.

After liberation in August 1945, Korea entered a period of political upheaval and factional conflict, culminating in the Korean War (1950–1953). There is little dedicated Korean-language cannabis literature from the late 1940s beyond agricultural and ethnographic references to hemp cultivation and use. Korea would not pass a dedicated cannabis control law until the Cannabis Control Act of 1976, well outside this period Strong evidence^[6].

Myths and Misreadings

Several claims circulate in English-language cannabis writing about this era that do not hold up to scrutiny:

• 'Japanese kamikaze pilots used cannabis.' No credible primary-source evidence supports this claim No data. Documented stimulants given to Japanese military aviators were synthetic compounds in the methamphetamine class (notably Philopon/amphetamine), not cannabis.

• 'Cannabis was a major recreational drug in 1940s East Asia.' The dominant illicit drugs of concern in wartime East Asia were opium and methamphetamine, not cannabis Strong evidence.

• 'Traditional East Asian medicine of the 1940s widely prescribed THC-rich cannabis flower.' The mainstream kanpō and bencao use was cannabis seed, which contains negligible THC; flower preparations were marginal to the textual record Strong evidence^[2].

The broader historical pattern is clear: 1940s East Asian cannabis literature is a story of fiber, ritual textile, pharmacopoeia continuity—interrupted by war and then reshaped, notably in Japan's case, by occupation-era prohibition.

Primary Sources and Further Research

Researchers interested in original materials can consult:

• The National Diet Library of Japan for prefectural agricultural bulletins and the original July 1948 Taima Torishimari Hō text ^[3]
• Reprints of the Bencao Gangmu and Republican-era Chinese materia medica compendia ^[4]
• Japanese colonial government statistical yearbooks for Korea (Chōsen Sōtokufu Tōkei Nenpō) for hemp acreage and production data

English-language secondary scholarship on East Asian cannabis history remains limited. The most reliable overviews appear in works on the broader history of drugs in modern Asia and in institutional histories of postwar Japanese law.

Sources

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