Humans must have inhaled smoke from dozens if not hundreds of plants before stumbling across the effects of Marijuana. Why were they inhaling smoke to begin with?

by Under_the_Milky_Way
orthoxerox

Invention of smoking is prehistory, not history. No one will give you a definitive answer, that's like asking why people started drinking fermented juice.

People have burnt countless grasses and woods over the millenia of fire use. They could've used cannabis as tinder, they could've burned it to clear fields for crops or they could've experimented with aromatic grasses to keep insects away or improve the air quality of their dwelling.