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The Columbian exchange of crop plants, livestock, and diseases in both directions between the Old World and the New World. In 1972, Alfred W. Crosby, an American historian at the University of Texas at Austin, published the book The Columbian Exchange, [2] thus coining the term. [1]
When complete, the list below will include all food plants native to the Americas (genera marked with a dagger † are endemic), regardless of when or where they were first used as a food source. For a list of food plants and other crops which were only introduced to Old World cultures as a result of the Columbian Exchange touched off by the ...
Food historian Lois Ellen Frank 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 back to the Old World, dramatically transforming the cuisine there. [17] [18] [19] According to Frank, [20]
Many pre-Columbian civilizations established permanent or urban settlements, agriculture, and complex societal hierarchies. In North America, indigenous cultures in the Lower Mississippi Valley during the Middle Archaic period built complexes of multiple mounds, with several in Louisiana dated to 5600–5000 BP (3700 BC–3100 BC).
Silver from the Americas flowed mostly across the Atlantic and made its way to the Far East. [29] A popular route was around the Cape of Good Hope into the east, and sometimes it came over land. [14] Major outposts for the silver trade were located in Southeast Asian countries, such as the Spanish Philippines. [30]
The book is illustrated with monochrome reproductions of historic depictions of the exchange, such as of "King Ferdinand looks out across the Atlantic as Columbus lands in the West Indies", and with maps such as of the distributions of blood group genes in the world's aboriginal populations. The book was first published in 1972.
The Three Sisters planting method is featured on the reverse of the 2009 US Sacagawea dollar. [1]Agricultural history in the Americas differed from the Old World in that the Americas lacked large-seeded, easily domesticated grains (such as wheat and barley) and large domesticated animals that could be used for agricultural labor.
Though the Columbian Exchange introduced many new animals and plants to the Americas, Indigenous civilizations already existed there, including the Aztec, Maya, Incan, as well as various Native Americans in North America. The development of agriculture allowed the many different cultures to transition from hunting to staying in one place. [2]