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Plants Across the Pacific

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 June 2018

George F. Carter
George F. Carter*
Affiliation:
Isaiah Bowman School of Geography, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland
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Extract

The Value of plant evidence has been pointed out. Man does not invent plants. The identical plant in cultivation in pre-Columbian times in the Old World and the New World virtually proves that voyages were made between these two cultural worlds. “Virtually proves” because the domestic plants in question have at best only remote possibilities of being carried to or from America by natural means and even less possibility of parallel evolution to botanical identity.

To establish a case only two things must be done. First, the pre-Columbian presence in both the Old and the New World of a given plant must be established. Second, the question of its possible natural dispersal must be examined. The homeland of the plant in question need not be determined, for our interest is only in its transfer. When the identical plant occurs in both hemispheres in pre-Columbian times and when natural means of dispersal are improbable, human carriage is the only probable alternative.

Type
Research Article
Information
Memoirs of the Society for American Archaeology , Volume 9: Asia and North America Transpacific Contacts , 1953 , pp. 62 - 71
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1953

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References

* The true significance of the name Kumar may not yet have been grasped. It may not be American. It only occurs in America in one small area. The Sanskrit names for the edible lotus (e.g., Kumad) would provide good roots for Kumar. Could the Asiatic word for a familiar edible rhyzome (the lotus) have been applied to the new root crop (sweet potato) carried back from America? Why is Kumar so restricted in its distribution in America and so widespread in the Pacific? Is there a linguistic tie to the Sanskrit names for the lotus? Is it meaningful to discuss the distribution of the lotus apart from such inquiry and coupled to the art evidence concerning the parallel utilization of the lotus motif in the Old World and the New World? In passing: I am aware that botanists have recently discovered that sweet potatoes can produce seed. I don't know that this in any way affects the problem of oceanic transportation. Rates of change in the plant may be affected. However, T. W. Whitaker has called my attention to the fact that vegetative reproduction makes possible the instantaneous preservation and propagation of any differences that might arise in sweet potatoes and provides an excellent possible means for getting rapid differentiation under cultivation and selection.