A Brief History of Bongs

The Vault Cannabis Seed Store82

The Vault Cannabis Seed Store82

 

The majestic bong is something that we are likely all familiar with. In modern society, they come in a wide variety of shapes, sizes and styles. We can make them out of household items or pay large amounts of money for beautiful bespoke pieces. They can be enormously long or extremely tiny. When it comes to your perfect bong the sky is the limit. But where did the bong originate? How long have they been around? What is their cultural significance? The history of this fantastic and versatile object is rich and fascinating, so let’s have a look at it.

 

What is a Bong?

 

I’m sure there is little point in my explaining a bong to you, but I’m going to anyway. A bong is a glass, wood, plastic or metal water pipe used for smoking cannabis. The construction of the modern bong is loosely based on the hookah. However, hookas tend to be large relatively stationary structures whereas bongs are smaller and more portable.

Bongs work by drawing smoke from the bowl in which the cannabis is packed, sometimes with tobacco. When this is lit and inhaled through the top of the main tube, the water bubbles pulling in the smoke. The point of smoking through water is to cool the smoke and smooth it so that it can be comfortably inhaled.

 

Where The Bong Began 

 

First, let us look at the word bong. The etymology of this word comes from the Thai word baung or bong. A baung was a wooden tube that was used for smoking a variety of things. The word was first recorded in the English language in 1944.

 

The very earliest bong, not in the form that we know it now, of course, was found in Africa between 1100 and 1400 BCE. A number of these extremely early pipes contained residue that suggested they were used for cannabis. This isn’t particularly surprising as many of the finest landrace strains in the world grew originally in parts of Africa.

Then in 2013 excavations in Russia discovered that bongs were being used up to 2400 years ago. These bongs were thought to be used by those at the top of the hierarchy and some were made of gold. After that bongs were discovered that had been around in 16th century China. These were water pipes that were one step closer to what we would consider a modern bong. The Empress Dowager Cixi was actually buried with three water pipes, even though they were more commonly used by the lower classes.

The introduction of the bong into China came from Persia and the Silk Road along with tobacco, even though there is a good deal of evidence that shows these pipes were used for opium or weed.

Over the next several centuries bongs continued to move around the world, slowly coming into modern and mainstream popularity.

 

How The Bong Became Popular

 

After being picked up all over Asia the bong made its way back into trade circulation via the silk road. Word spread of these fantastic pipes that cooled the smoke and increased the potency. Eventually, around the 1960s, the bong made its way to America. The popularity of the bong in America aligned with the popularity of the glass industry. The earliest glass bongs were created by Bob Snograss who engineered a variety of safe glass bongs that gave a better result than the bamboo alternatives. He then invented the humming process which used gold and silver coloured glass. The trippy aesthetic this gave the bongs is still extremely popular to this day. This method also raised the heat resistance of the glass to prevent cracking while also being non-toxic. This essentially revolutionised the bong industry in North America. Since this essentially happened at the same time as the hippy movement in several parts of the world, the bong exploded in popularity. Glass smoke wear spread like wildfire and became a massive industry. As it spread people began to create new kinds of bongs, from new materials, playing with different shapes and sizes as well as the quality of the smoke.

 

Bongs In The Modern Day

Unfortunately, in 2003, the US government decided to ban bong sales across the country. By this stage, bongs had created a million-dollar industry in North America alone. This certainly caused issues for the US bong industry, but luckily several other countries were still allowed to sell bongs, even somewhere cannabis is not legal. For example, you can still visit headshops all over the UK and purchase “smoking paraphernalia” without any real issue.

 

Canada still had a roaring bong trade, their first accessory retailer Gandalfs opening in 1965. This then became the very first store called The Head Shop. It was announced defiantly that these bongs and pipes were not for tobacco but for cannabis, ignoring the sneaky way in which the accessories were usually sold. By the 1980s these Head Shops were all over Canada and making a serious amount of money from bongs. In 1988 it became briefly illegal to sell drug paraphernalia but that was overturned once medicinal cannabis became legal.

 

Now bongs can be purchased in almost any form you can imagine. Various types of easy to clean and heat resistant glasses and metals. Mini bongs or the kind that a couple of people have to hold to keep it steady. We also understand them enough to have a wide variety of homemade bongs, gravity bongs and even collapsable bongs. We have come pretty far from the earth bongs of ancient Africa or the bamboo pipes of the Ming Dynasty. Bongs are also far from done in their evolution and will continue to change and improve, whether you like classic glass or futuristic materials. Once you know what you’re looking for you can visit any head shop or online store to find the very best bong for you. That is only a compact history of this fascinating instrument, as always feel free to keep researching if you want to know more.

 

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Remember: It is illegal to germinate cannabis seeds in many countries including the UK.  It is our duty to inform you of this fact and to urge you to obey all of your local laws to the letter.  The Vault only ever sells or sends out seeds for souvenir, collection or novelty purposes.

 

Photo by Hennie Stander on Unsplash

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