![New World Domesticated plants](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/New_World_Domesticated_plants.JPG)
New World crops are those
crop
A crop is a plant that can be grown and harvested extensively for profit or subsistence. When the plants of the same kind are cultivated at one place on a large scale, it is called a crop. Most crops are cultivated in agriculture or hydroponic ...
s, food and otherwise, that were native to the
New World
The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. 3 ...
(mostly
the Americas
The Americas, which are sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North America, North and South America. The Americas make up most of the land in Earth's Western Hemisphere and comprise the New World. ...
) before
1492 AD and not found anywhere else at that time. Many of these crops are now grown around the world and have often become an integral part of the cuisine of various cultures in the
Old World
The "Old World" is a term for Afro-Eurasia that originated in Europe , after Europeans became aware of the existence of the Americas. It is used to contrast the continents of Africa, Europe, and Asia, which were previously thought of by the ...
. Notable among these crops are the
Three Sisters:
maize
Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...
,
winter squash
Winter squash is an annual fruit representing several squash species within the genus ''Cucurbita''. Late-growing, less symmetrical, odd-shaped, rough or warty varieties, small to medium in size, but with long-keeping qualities and hard rinds, are ...
, and climbing beans.
List of crops
Timeline of cultivation
The new world developed
agriculture
Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to ...
by at least 8000 BC. The following table shows when each New World crop was first domesticated.
Dissemination to the Old World
The transfer of people, crops, precious metals, and diseases from the Old World to the New World and vice versa is called the
Columbian Exchange
The Columbian exchange, also known as the Columbian interchange, was the widespread transfer of plants, animals, precious metals, commodities, culture, human populations, technology, diseases, and ideas between the New World (the Americas) in ...
.
Food historian
Lois Ellen Frank
Lois Ellen Frank is an American food historian, cookbook author, culinary anthropologist, and educator. She won a 2003 James Beard Foundation Award for her cookbook ''Foods of the Southwest Indian Nations'', the first cookbook of Native American ...
calls potatoes, tomatoes, corn, beans, squash, chili, cacao, and vanilla the "magic eight" ingredients that were found and used only in the Americas before 1492 and were taken via the
Columbian Exchange
The Columbian exchange, also known as the Columbian interchange, was the widespread transfer of plants, animals, precious metals, commodities, culture, human populations, technology, diseases, and ideas between the New World (the Americas) in ...
back to the
Old World
The "Old World" is a term for Afro-Eurasia that originated in Europe , after Europeans became aware of the existence of the Americas. It is used to contrast the continents of Africa, Europe, and Asia, which were previously thought of by the ...
, dramatically transforming the cuisine there.
According to Frank,
See also
*
First agricultural revolution
The Neolithic Revolution, or the (First) Agricultural Revolution, was the wide-scale transition of many human cultures during the Neolithic period from a lifestyle of hunting and gathering to one of agriculture and settlement, making an incre ...
*
List of food plants native to the Americas
A number of popular and commercially important food plants are native to the Americas. Some are endemic, meaning they occur naturally only in the Americas and nowhere else, while others occur naturally both in the Americas and on other continen ...
*
Neolithic founder crops
The founder crops (or primary domesticates) are the eight plant species that were domesticated by early Neolithic farming communities in Southwest Asia and went on to form the basis of agricultural economies across much of Eurasia, including South ...
*
Timeline of agriculture and food technology
Paleolithic
* 30,600 BC – Pestle used as a tool in southern Italy to grind oats.
Neolithic Revolution
* 8,500 BC – Neolithic Revolution, the first agricultural revolution, begins in the ancient Near East
* 8,000 BC – domesticated wheat at P ...
References
{{Prehistoric technology, state=collapsed
*
History of agriculture