[1] Hernandez, in Safford, _Aztec Narcotic_, 295; _Peyotes, Datos para
Estudia_, 204.
[2] In simpler Mexican cultures, peyote was in the hands of shamans;
this other peyote appears to derive its name from the priests of
a certain class in the higher Aztec culture: “According to some
authorities, the highest grade of these native hierophants bore among
the Nahuas the symbolic name of ‘flower weavers,’ Xochimilca, probably
from the skill they had to deceive the senses by strange and pleasant
visions (Xochimilca, que asi llamavan á los mui sabios encantadores)”
(Torquemada, in Brinton, _Nagualism_, 298).
[3] A specimen in Mooney, Peyote Notebook, 56, was so identified.
Schultes viewed this and identified it as _C. cordifolia_ which in
addition has cocoon-shaped pods. Cf. the use of _Lophophora_ as an
aphrodisiac.
[4] Alfonso, in Rouhier, _Monographie_, 3; Santoscoy, _Nayarit_, 32.
Schultes (_Peyote and Plants Used_, 135) lists _Cotyledon caespitosa_
Haw. as a Crassulaceous “peyote.”
[5] _Peyotes, Datos para Estudia_, 111, 206, 208. This non-cactus
“peyote” of Tepic may have been the false clue leading Rouhier to believe
an earlier range of peyote into Tepic.
[6] Schultes, _Peyotes and Plants Used_, 135. The Reko etymology
preferred by Schultes (p. 136) so far as botanical evidence goes
derives peyotl from Aztec pi- (small) and -yautli or -yolli (herb with
narcotic odor or action), making “peyotillo” a double diminutive.
Schultes has accepted, at the instance of the present writer, the thesis
that _Cacalia_ spp. might well enough fit the “velvety, cocoon-like”
etymology, but argues nevertheless that “this etymology does not seem to
explain the application of the same name to the great array of plants
which possess no soft or silky parts whatsoever.” Schultes is undoubtedly
right on this point in terms of descriptive botany; yet may not some
items be included in our lists illegitimately? _Anhalonium prismaticum_
Lem., for example, is called hikuli, not peyote, and is only partly its
terminological equivalent. And does the “little narcotic” etymology
explain all these instances?
[7] Urbina, in Harms, _Über das Narkotikum_, 31; Schultes, _op. cit._,
135.