Ancient Greece's Deadliest Secret: Did a Hallucinogenic Fungus Power the Eleusinian Mysteries?

Arkeonews
23 February 2026



A new Scientific Reports study suggests that the secret drink of the Eleusinian Mysteries may have contained a detoxified psychedelic derived from ergot fungus, potentially explaining the transformative rituals of ancient Greece.


For more than a thousand years, something extraordinary happened in a vast, torch-lit hall at Eleusis, just west of Athens.

Men and women—citizens, slaves, generals, poets—walked the Sacred Way in silence. They fasted. They prepared. They entered the Telesterion. And when they emerged, many claimed they no longer feared death.

What occurred inside that chamber was so secret that revealing it carried a death sentence. Yet today, modern chemistry may have brought us closer than ever to understanding the hidden engine of the Eleusinian Mysteries.

. . .

Each autumn, initiates reenacted this cosmic drama. After days of fasting and ritual purification, they drank kykeon—a sacred beverage described as a mixture of barley, water, and mint. What happened afterward remains unknown. Ancient sources speak only in hints: overwhelming light, a vision, an experience of transformation, a sense of immortality.

More:
https://arkeonews.net/ancient-greeces-deadliest-secret-did-a-hallucinogenic-fungus-power-the-eleusinian-mysteries/