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Re: maize in Europe and India: a twisted tale
In article <[email protected]> [email protected] (Piotr Michalowski) writes:
>In article <[email protected]> [email protected] (Peter van Rossum) writes:
>>The fact is that no one has reported Precolumbian corn cobs in Old World
>>contexts even though they are extremely durable (for plant remains),
>>extremely easy to identify, and should be very widespread if they made
>>up any significant portion of a people's diet. This should give us pause
>>for concern that the identification is not correct.
>I have no expertise in this matter, but have been following this thread of
and >on. I have one simple question that goes along with the above
statement. If >corn (maize) were to have been introduced into the "Old
World" at such an >early date, would it not have spread rapidly and been in
wide use since, as it >did when it was definitely introduced after
Columbus & Co? If such a thing >had happened, we certainly would have
evidence for widespread use of such a >plant, conspiracy or no--am I correct
in this assumption?
That is the way I view it. *If* corn had been introduced at an early date
and its use continued for 1000+ years then it should have existed at
numerous sites. Given that it probably would have been used as a food, and
its remains are resilient (compared to other plants) then we should find
its remains. I argue that since no excavation has reported such remains
this should give us pause to question whether the sculpture identification
is accurate. Contrary to what Yuri says I don't claim that this proves
for certain that it didn't exist but it should make us much more skeptical
than folks like Yuri would have us believe. That's why I don't agree
with Yuri when he says that these sculptures are good candidates for
a "smoking gun" type of evidence which would prove for certain that
some kind of contact did occur.
Peter van Rossum
[email protected]
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