Native terms for peyote differ somewhat in denotation and connotation.
For clarity sake we shall list only those terms referring specifically
to _Lophophora williamsii_. Native classifications of cacti, as well as
extensions of the term “peyotl,” will be discussed in an appendix, as
involving special problems.
The Huichol of Jalisco call peyote hícuri, hicori, xicori or hicouri (in
the notation of speakers of different European languages); sometimes
they refer to it metaphorically as foutouri, “flower.” The Cora of the
Tepic mountains term peyote huatari, houtari or watara; the Tepehuane
of Durango, kamaba. The Tarahumari of Chihuahua call it hikuli or
hikori, sometimes adding, according to Lumholtz, the epithet wanamé (or
houanamé), “superior,” to designate the peyote par excellence; the same
meaning appears to be indicated in the reduplication híkurí-íkuríwa.[21]
The Opata[22] call it pejori, the Otomi beyo. The Pima of the Gila River
region use the name peyori. The Comecrudo or Carrizo of Tamaulipas
call peyote kóp, and Gatschet recorded the term kúampamát for “bailar
el peyote” (“many are dancing [the peyote dance]”). The Lipan name
is xʷucdjiyahi, “pricker one eats.” The Tonkawa of southern Texas
call peyote nonč-gáⁱɛn; the Taos name is walena, the generic term for
“medicine.” Mescalero Apache call it ho or hos; the Wichita nesac’. The
Comanche wokwi or wokowi is said by Mooney to be the generic name for
cacti.[23] The Arapaho call peyote hahaayāⁿx. Most of the Oklahoma tribes
have their own version of the term peyotl, such as the Kickapoo pi·yot,
or, like them, they may use some older native term for “medicine” such
as natáⁱnoni. John Wilson (Caddo-Delaware), curiously, called peyote
“sugar” or “bee-sugar”; and some Anadarko Delaware call peyote-eating
“ear-eating.”
Whites have used numerous confusing and erroneous non-botanical terms for
_Lophophora williamsii_. Of these usages the commonest, “mescal,” “mescal
beans” or “mescal buttons” are the most confusing. Mescal (from the
Nahuatl mexcalli, “metl [maguey] liquor”) in northern Mexico, properly
refers to the _Agave americana_ or _Agave_ spp. baked in earth ovens
and widely eaten in the Southwest, and from which the Mescalero Apache
take their name. By extension the term is applied to the intoxicant
distilled from the native beer, pulque, also made from _Agave_ spp. A
more precise designation of this native brandy (as opposed to the native
beer) is tesvino and its variants, from the Nahuatl tehuinti or teyuinti,
“intoxicating.”[24]
“Mescal bean” as used to designate _Lophophora williamsii_ is quite
indefensible, being wrong on two counts: the “mescal” bean proper is
_Sophora secundiflora_ (= _Broussonetia secundiflora_) or, incorrectly,
_Erythrina flabelliformis_. The former is a red bean which was used
in a pre-peyote narcotic cult of the southern Plains, to be discussed
later. The adjectival use of “mescal” in the designations “mescal
beans” or “mescal buttons” no doubt comes from the known intoxicating
properties of the distilled liquor mescal, as extended in meaning to
other unfamiliar new intoxicants, _Sophora secundiflora_ (bean), and
_Lophophora williamsii_ (cactus); the term “dry whisky” bears this out.
Lumholtz,[25] indeed, wrote that the Texas Rangers, during the Civil War,
when taken prisoner and deprived of all other stimulating drinks, soaked
peyote (which they called “white mule”) in water and became intoxicated
on the liquid. Further confusion of peyote with mescal has arisen from
the north Mexican habit of mixing the two in a drink. Dealers call peyote
the “turnip cactus” or “dumpling cactus” from its shape, to which also
refers the local Mexican term biznagas, “carrot.” A local name in Starr
County, Texas, where the plant grows abundantly, is challote, but the
usual dealers’ name is “peyote buttons,” from their flat shape when dried.