IIRC: Maize was particularly difficult to domesticate, and yet (with work and extensive acculturation?) it was ultimately disseminated widely across central and north America. It’s protein profile is inferior to wheat and especially to pulses. Diamond implied that maize got such traction because it was the best they had, not because it was great.
I don’t remember much about the discussion of amaranth in the book. I remember some mention of quinoa (first I’d ever heard of it, back then), which was a great protein source, but unpalatable without a lot of preparation (and maybe difficult to cultivate?).
They were probably originally domesticated as meat animals. But after they had been domesticated and were bred to tolerate human contact, the herdsmen could expand the product line for things like milk and wool. And for things like riding, pulling plows and wagons, and carrying loads on their backs.
Not surprising if you think about it, but one reason it’s been so hard to date the origin of dogs is that it appears dogs and other canids interbred at various times and in various places, so there isn’t a clean divergence in the lineage. Which, as it terns out, is not so different from us!!
Pulses were domesticated in the Americas too. Lima beans, in fact, were independently domesticated in Central America and the Andes.
But maize couldn’t be that bad, or it wouldn’t have survived as a valuable crop after the introduction of Old World crops.
I don’t think he mentioned amaranth at all, but I understand it was a major food crop in Mesoamerica. Its cultivation declined under Spanish rule and there’s some speculation this was a deliberate suppression because the plants were used in Aztec religious ceremonies. So it became kind of a forgotten crop until relatively recently. It’s still not getting the attention that its cousin quinoa gets.
I’m not so sure. When i read about the nomadic peoples who live with reindeer, I was struck that reindeer were only barely domestic. Basically, these giant herds wandered around on their traditional migration routes, and packs of humans claimed ownership this or that part of the herd. I bet that’s how herd animal got domesticated. People followed the herds, and took to selectively culling the least desirable animals, and perhaps castrating the less desirable males until they got around to eating then.
I think maize produces a lot of calories per acre. It’s still not super popular outside if the Americas, though.
It’s huge in Southern Africa, having largely replaced the pre-colonial sorghums and millets, and become the staple summer rainfall grain 9and hence the staple grain for most of the region).
I thought of ordinary deer in this sense. The young have little fear of humans, and the adults don’t have that great fear as seen in suburban areas plagued by those antlered vermin. I’m still see a problem with humans who don’t understand the concept and benefits of domestication doing this and not just eating the deer they’ve domesticated.
Reindeer bring up my question about dairy production though. Lapps milk their reindeer, so possibly that benefit was seen early in the development of domesticated animals.
