What the foragers appear to have been doing is sucking the intact, whole nut.

Holding it in the mouth for extended periods, working it against the molar, allowing slow diffusion of arecoline through saliva across the nut’s exterior surface.

This is an important distinction for several reasons.

First, it changes the chemistry.

Sucking an intact nut produces a slower, lower-level release of arecoline than chewing a prepared quid.

The pharmacological experiments confirmed that this produces a real effect — detectable activity at human brain receptors — but a less intense one than the modern preparation.

The ancient practice was getting them high, but possibly at a lower level than modern users achieve.