How Was Cannabis Domesticated?

From bountiful hemp harvests to meticulously crafted local strains, modern cannabis has become a versatile organism shaped by millennia of human intervention. Cultivated selectively over generations for fibers, seeds, and medicinal or psychoactive substances, the plant known as cannabis sativa is one of the most deliberately engineered species on the planet that today provides a diverse array of cultivated strains with specialized uses. Whether for industrial applications, medical treatments, or personal enjoyment, the cultivation of this ancient plant has reached an unprecedented level of refinement, with legal commodity markets, clinical research, and advanced genetic engineering contributing to further tailoring its properties to serve human purposes.

Today, the domestication of cannabis continues to evolve, driven by shifting cultural attitudes, legal acceptance, and scientific evidence, which reveals how the plant’s biological history is inextricable from that of human culture. Namely, we can see how the traits we cultivate in cannabis—such as high THC strains for recreational use or CBD-rich hemp varieties for wellness products—mirror our shifting cultural desires and values. To understand cannabis domestication as it occurs today, we need to recognize the domestication of cannabis as not just a biological process, but a cultural one as well.

What is Domestication?

The domestication of plants and animals is thought to be one of the most important advancements in human history. At the start of the Holocene about 11,000 years ago, numerous human societies transitioned from sustaining themselves on hunter-gathering to cultivating plants and animals. This transformation to new methods of obtaining food thus led to an explosion of domestication of crops and livestock. Today, these plant and animal species, selected by our early pastoral and farming ancestors, largely sustain human society.

However, humans are not the only species that have engaged in the process of domestication. Termites, ants, and beetles have actively engaged in a human-like process of domesticating certain fungal species. Although we often associate domestication exclusively with humans, a broader biological definition describes it as a coevolutionary process. In this process, one species creates and maintains an environment that enables it to control the survival and reproduction of another species that, in turn, provides essential resources. This leads to the evolution of traits that benefit the domesticating species, which in turn are selected for the benefit of the continued reproduction of the domesticated species in a mutualistic evolutionary feedback process over generations.

Tracing the Prehistoric Origins of Cannabis

Wild Cannabis is said to have been spread across Europe in the Pleistocene, with two subspecies—Cannabis sativa subsp. Sativa and Cannabis sativa subsp. Indica—originating in Europe and Asia, respectively. Genetically diverse varieties of wild Cannabis plants evolved different traits under the various pressures of natural selection found in the diverse environments where they were able to thrive. Humans then further selected these specimens to produce fiber, seed, or drug products.

Farmers and breeders would select plants with traits that would make them useful to humans, resulting in different frequencies and types of traits to arise between wild populations and their cultivated descendants. In regions where people originally encountered the versatile resource, cultivators began to sow seeds from plants expressing traits that differed from the norm in ways that were beneficial to humans, breeding specimens that would produce larger seeds, taller stalks, and/or more resin. 

As a result of this process of artificial selection, the traits of the wild cannabis plants became radically changed to suit human cultivation needs and techniques. Important genes related to flowering time, seed germination, seed size, and stress responses provide evidence of the distinct departure of cultivated cannabis from the genes of wild cannabis. For example, naturally selected feral cannabis populations evolved traits like slow and uneven germination, while humans bred domesticated seeds to germinate quickly and uniformly in line with agricultural norms.

Early Uses and Domestication of Cannabis by Humans 

People believe cannabis is one of the oldest crop species in the world. The plant has been economically important for millennia because of its usefulness as various critical resources, including paper, textiles, rope, seeds, and medicinal or psychoactive drugs. It is unknown whether early humans first used Cannabis as a source of fiber, food, or mind-altering compounds, but these early cultivators eventually developed differing techniques to increase the yield and quality of all these products. These varieties of cannabis plants have different physical features, phytochemical compositions, and uses.

Two distinct varieties of the plant, the hemp and drug types, have been shown to have diverged genetically from their wild ancestral members about 12,000 years ago, suggesting that humans have long been cultivating the plant for fibers and medicinal purposes throughout human history. Humans have used artificial selection to develop numerous cannabis varieties from two original subspecies. They domesticated hemp-type cannabis plants for traits related to branch formation, while they bred drug-type plants for specific phytochemicals and higher potency.

Some researchers argue that humans first domesticated cannabis in Central Asia around 12,000 BCE. However, a recent genome-wide phylogeographic study suggests that cannabis originated in East Asia (China), which served as a unique center of domestication from where all cannabis types spread across the world.

Other authors propose that there were actually two centers of cannabis domestication: one in the Caucasus, where cannabis subspecies bred for hemp fiber originated, and the second in south-eastern China, where the early plants domesticated for narcotic uses originated. 

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Evolution and Culture: Breeding and Cultivating Cannabis Under Prohibition

The 20th-century prohibition of cannabis marked a distinctive shift in how humans interacted with and cultivated the plant, ultimately driving significant changes in its genetics. One of the most profound effects attributed to prohibition-era breeding is the dramatic increase in THC (tetrahydrocannabinol) content over time. As legal restrictions banned individuals from producing their own cannabis plants, outdoor growing operations became less practical, and cultivators would thus favor compact, resin-rich plants that could deliver maximum potency per square foot. This way, growers could make more money from their legally high-risk crop by ensuring potent flowers. By prioritizing plants that provide stronger psychoactive effects to make products that were more desirable on the black market, breeders brought about new, highly potent THC-rich cannabis strains.

The need for discretion also propelled advancements in indoor growing techniques for producing cannabis plants. Rather than growing cannabis crops under the sun, artificial lights and ventilated grow rooms became the norm. This led growers to select for more indica-type cannabis strains, as these are more compact for indoor growing versus their sativa relatives. Moreover, the refinement of hydroponic systems and controlled-environment agriculture further allowed growers to manipulate and measure the effects of various light cycles, nutrients, and humidity with precision, which facilitated even more nuanced genetic selection. As a result, modern cultivation practices have significantly reduced the global genetic diversity of cannabis plants—both hemp and drug varieties—compared to the 1970s and 1980s, when traditional farmers grew diverse types in their natural habitats across isolated geographic regions.

Planting a New Era: Post-Prohibition Cannabis Cultivation

With the development of new medicines and the legalization of industrial hemp with the 2018 US Farm Bill, there has been renewed economic interest in hemp fiber as well as medicinal cannabinoids like CBD (cannabidiol). As research expands and markets open up, breeders are introducing plants with tailored cannabinoid profiles and other desirable properties that will appeal to the emerging industries surrounding hemp and medicinal cannabis. Advances in genetic sequencing and tissue culture propagation are further refining the selection process, allowing growers to preserve rare genetics and develop plants with novel characteristics. Freed from the secrecy imposed by prohibition, today’s cannabis breeders have access to cutting-edge agricultural science, which has driven cannabis cultivation into a new phase of data-enhanced precision farming.

With refined technologies and greater knowledge of cannabis phytochemicals, today’s growers are also able to focus on traits beyond just potency. An emerging interest in the therapeutic potential of cannabinoids other than THC has resulted in a resurgence of breeder interest in producing balanced and diverse cannabinoid ratios, with breeders developing strains that feature high CBD, CBG (cannabigerol), and even other rare cannabinoids like CBN and THCV (tetrahydrocannabivarin).  There has also been a revived interest in terpenes, which were once an afterthought in the selection process, and the compounds are now fundamental to strain identity, as connoisseurs seek flowers featuring specific aromatic profiles that influence flavor and effects.

Cannabis Evolution in the Future

From the earliest specimens of cultivation over 12,000 years ago to today’s flowers on the legal market, the story of cannabis is one of continuous evolution—both of the plant itself and of the cultures that have grown it. Each stage of human beings’ domestication of cannabis reflects the shifting priorities and values of human societies, and as we enter a new era of cannabis breeding, it is fascinating to see what new insights and developments can be gained from emerging variants of this special plant.