hemp (n.)
Old English hænep “hemp, cannabis sativa,” from Proto-Germanic *hanapiz (source also of Old Saxon hanap, Old Norse hampr, Old High German hanaf, German Hanf), probably a very early Germanic borrowing of the same Scythian word that became Greek kannabis (see cannabis). As the name of the fiber made from the plant, by c. 1300. Slang sense of “marijuana” dates from 1940s; scientific applications for the narcotic derived from hemp date to 1870.
cannabis (n.)
1798, “common hemp,” from Cannabis, Modern Latin plant genus named (1728), from Greek kannabis “hemp,” a Scythian or Thracian word. Also source of Armenian kanap’, Albanian kanep, Russian konoplja, Persian kanab, Lithuanian kanapės “hemp,” and English canvas and possibly hemp. In reference to use of the plant parts as an intoxicant, from 1848. Related: Cannabic.
bhang (n.)
“dried leaves of Cannabis Indica,” 1590s, from Hindi bhang “narcotic from hemp,” from Sanskrit bhangah “hemp,” which is perhaps cognate with Russian penika “hemp.” The word first appears in Western Europe in Portuguese (1560s). It also was borrowed into Persian (bang) and Arabic (banj
