Stories: The Upas Tree

Poisoned! What better stories than detective, murder and mayhem? Or perhaps what better lessons to ensure we remember how to survive Nature’s deadliest challenges. Fact versus fiction, myth mingled with reality, legend behind history. That’s exactly what I’m going to tell you in this section [Stories].

Upas tree (Antiaris toxicaria)

Why not we begin with the story of our old friend the Upas Ipoh tree (Antiaris toxicaria, Moraceae). It has inspired legends and stories so mysterious and captivating, its infamy pervaded Western literature during the 18^th and 19^thcentury. I’ve talked about Erasmus Darwin’s account of the Hydra-tree-of-death, and you can read it for yourself in the excerpt below. In fact, he is not the only one who have written terrible things about the Upas tree.

 

 

Here’s another poem from the Russian poet Alexander Pushkin (1799 – 1837). He added storytelling into the tree of death, making it even more captivating. I’m going to tell Pushkin’s story as told by his poem ‘The Upas Tree’. Far away in a desert of Java, there stands an Upas tree, a lone watchman of a lifeless land. Poison runs through its body, seeps into the ground and oozes through its bark. No birds fly near, no tigers creep. A black whirlwind rises from the Upas tree of death and kills everything within its vicinity. Even the rain is tainted with poison as it scorches the sand. There was a powerful King who sent men upon men to the tree, to obtain Upas tree’s poison. Those were the men who were condemned of crime, and they were given a choice to be executed, or to perform this suicidal task of retrieving Upas’s poison (and survive if they succeed). During their journey, they would stop by a little hut, where there was a priest who repented them for their sins. All but one managed to return, but he too died in front of his King upon collecting Upas’s poison. The King now full of pride and joy, soaked his weapons in the poison of Upas, and became invincible! He slew all his enemies and conquered every lands for his own.

It is not a coincidence that Darwin and Pushkin both told stories that were remarkably similar, despite the fact that they spoke different languages. That’s because the two obtained their inspiration from a single source, which was plain scientific fraud!  You see, back in the 18^th and 19^thcentury, Westerners were captivated by stories of colonisation in the Indomalaya region. Animals such as the Komodo dragon was claimed to be man-eater that spat fire, let alone a tree like Upas. Thus, there was this bonkers ‘gentlemen’ called Dr. Foersch, who worked for the Dutch East Indies Company. He compiled local legends and his own imaginations, made a claim that he witnessed the Upas tree himself, and published his ‘results’ in the London Magazine, which spawned all the misunderstanding. In Dr. Foersch's own words “This account, I flatter myself, will satisfy the curiosity of my readers…”

Unlike early European colonisers, I have witnessed the fabled Upas tree and this is its true story.

Fraud it may be, but there is always a grain of truth behind legends. We now believe that the bald mountain, black whirlwind and desert of skeletons were likely due to a deadly volcano in Java, which is extinct today. Highly toxic fumes from the volcano such as hydrogen sulfide, sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide and/or high concentration of carbon dioxide could have wiped out all life in their vicinity. Acid rain caused by volcanic gases further corroborates this hypothesis. In fact, local Javanese people called the volcanic gases ‘Awan Upas’, namely, ‘awan’ for cloud; ‘upas’ for poison. At last, we can make sense of how Western colonisers mixed up Upas tree with Upas cloud, and created their own imaginary tree of death.

A live volcano at Bali, Indonesia. The closest I dare venture to 'Awan Upas'. You can see the parched lands around the volcano, yikes!

Our story doesn’t end here because the Upas tree is widely distributed. Its influence is not just limited to the Westerners and their colonial states. In fact, the Upas tree is also found in parts of China and Africa. That means the ancestor of Upas tree existed before the continental separation of Asia and Africa. In China, the Upas tree has a different name, but it is just as intimidating. Instead of Upas, the Chinese called it 见血封喉, which translates as 'instant death upon entering the blood'. Perhaps by coincidence, ancient Chinese also discovered the deadly secrets of the Upas tree, and harboured its sap to make poison arrows. Animals big and small once hit, are claimed to die in no less than seven steps up, or eight steps down a hill. This legend gave rise to a famous Chinese adage called 七上八下 (seven steps up, eight steps down), which means a highly nervous or anxious state of the mind. I suppose one may survive if they stop walking and freeze at the 7.5 step? Hahaha! Anyways, the Chinese actually has recorded history as to how their ancestors discovered the deadly effects of Upas tree, and this will be my final story today.

Here's my little baby Upas tree. In case you wonder, I have ten of them, but they'll have to be pot bound otherwise my house will crumble if they grow to become giants like in the stories I told.

Long ago, there was a hunter who was in pursuit of a big bear. However, the hunter became the hunted, and he was chased by the angry animal in the jungle. Desperate to escape his assailant, the hunter climbed onto a tree, hoping that the bear would give up its chase. But the bear was relentless and so the hunter snapped some branches off the tree, and started poking at his attacker. Perhaps by sheer luck, the bear was injured and after few minutes, fell to the ground and died. It was this eureka moment that we humans discovered the deadly poisonous secret of Nature. The game is changed, and our ancestors rose to the top of the food chain. Same can be said for us today because we owe Nature much of our drugs and medicines, which are again, poison!

That’s all, sweet dreams and good night. We will have more stories next time.