Other names for marijuana run from the botanical (cannabis) to the playful (Mary Jane) to the legal (marihuana, with an h). Some have clear histories, and others, like pot, are still argued over. Here's where the familiar names came from and which word fits where.
Why there are so many other names for marijuana
A plant grown for rope, seed, oil and its effects, then traded and regulated across continents, collects names along the way. Languages borrowed from one another, slang added more, and lawmakers chose their own spellings. So the same plant can be cannabis in a lab, marijuana on a medical card and weed in everyday talk.
The word cannabis: from Greek to botanical Latin
Cannabis came into English through Latin from the Greek kánnabis, and it's the plant's scientific name too: Cannabis sativa. English writers started using the word in the late 1700s. Further back, the trail is uncertain: one dictionary suggests a source in Scythian or Thracian, and the English word hemp, from Old English henep, shares the same ancient root.
How marijuana entered American English
Marijuana is an Americanism of the late 1800s, borrowed from the Mexican Spanish marihuana or mariguana. Where the Spanish word came from is murkier. The popular link to the names María and Juana is probably a folk etymology, an explanation that grew up after the fact.
The word's history is tied up with prohibition politics. Some argue that lawmakers favored the foreign-sounding word to cast cannabis as a Mexican "vice" and build support for bans. Federal law used the spelling marihuana in the Marihuana Tax Act, approved on August 2, 1937, which taxed dealers in the plant and transfers of it.
Pot: the competing origin theories
Pot is American slang from the late 1930s, and its origin isn't settled. Dictionary.com reports that it's said to come from the Mexican Spanish potiguaya. That word is linked to potación de guaya, a wine or brandy steeped with cannabis buds, literally a "drink of grief." The American Heritage Dictionary, on the other hand, says the origin isn't known. So take the drink story as a theory, not settled history.
Weed: from unwanted plant to everyday name
Weed goes back to the Old English wēod, a word that covered herbs, grass and weeds. English speakers have long used it loosely for things people smoke: dictionaries list tobacco and cigarettes among its informal meanings, alongside cannabis. The Online Etymology Dictionary dates the cannabis sense to the 1920s, and today weed is an everyday name for the plant.
Hemp: same species, different legal category
Hemp is the same species as marijuana, Cannabis sativa, but it's grown for different uses, such as fiber, seed and oil, and it sits in a different legal category. Even the 1937 tax law left out the plant's mature stalks, fiber and seed oil. As of October 2026, Michigan law draws the line by THC. Cannabis testing above 0.3%, with THCA included, counts as marijuana, which only licensed marijuana businesses can sell; anything at or below that level is industrial hemp. Our guide to hemp vs. marijuana covers the details.
Mary Jane and other names that personify the plant
Mary Jane, often shortened to MJ, is an English speaker's twist on marijuana. The Spanish word sounds like María and Juana, which become Mary and Jane in English. It's a playful sound-alike, not a clue to where marijuana came from.
Hash, ganja, reefer, bud, herb, kush and newer slang
- Hash is short for hashish, from an Arabic word for dry grass or hay, recorded in English by about 1600. It names resin collected from the plant's flowering tops. For the oil, see our hash oil explainer.
- Ganja comes from a Hindi word for hemp, related to the Sanskrit gañjā, and reached English in the late 1600s.
- Reefer is American slang from the 1920s with an uncertain origin. One suggestion ties it to the Mexican Spanish slang grifa.
- Bud and herb are plain plant words: bud for the flower, herb for the plant.
- Kush names a family of strains with its own story, told in our kush explainer.
- Gas and za are newer slang. Gas usually means pungent, fuel-scented flower, and za (or zaza) is used for flower someone rates as exotic.
Our cannabis glossary covers many more terms.
Which word to use: cannabis, marijuana or marihuana
- Cannabis is the botanical name and the neutral choice. It's the word we use most, and several states that legalized the plant have since switched to it in their laws.
- Marijuana is the common U.S. legal and medical term, as in a medical marijuana card. A 2019 Vanderbilt survey experiment found no evidence that the public sees the two words differently.
- Marihuana, with an h, is how Michigan's statutes spell it, as in the 2018 Michigan Regulation and Taxation of Marihuana Act. The state's plain-language guidance writes marijuana, and its regulator began as the Marijuana Regulatory Agency before becoming the Cannabis Regulatory Agency.
For what the law says today, see our Michigan cannabis laws guide. And however you say it, adults 21 and older can shop at any of High Society's eight Michigan dispensaries with a valid ID. 21+ only. Please consume responsibly.
