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  • From: "Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] Sunflower debate ends in Mexico, researchers say
  • Date: Thu, 01 May 2008 09:57:29 -0600


Public release date: 29-Apr-2008
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http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-04/fsu-sde042908.php
Florida State University
Sunflower debate ends in Mexico, researchers say

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- Ancient farmers were growing sunflowers in Mexico more
than 4,000 years before the Spaniards arrived, according to a team of
researchers that includes Florida State University anthropologist Mary D.
Pohl.

In an article published in the journal PNAS (Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences), Pohl and lead author David Lentz of the University of
Cincinnati said their evidence confirms that farmers began growing sunflowers
in Mexico by 2600 B.C. The paper is in response to scientists who still
believe that sunflowers were first domesticated as an agricultural crop in
eastern North America and that the Spaniards introduced the sunflower to
Mexico from further north.

“The evidence shows that sunflower was actually domesticated twice -- in
Mexico and then again hundreds of miles away in the Middle Mississippi
Valley,” Pohl said.

In fact, the researchers argue that after the Spanish Conquest, the Spaniards
tried to suppress cultivation of the sunflower because of its association
with solar religion and warfare.

José Luis Alvarado from Mexico’s Institute of Anthropology and History,
Robert Bye from the Independent National University of Mexico, and UC
graduate student Somayeh Tarighatis also are co-authors of the PNAS study.
The research was funded by grants from the National Science Foundation and
the National Geographic Society.

Pohl and Kevin Pope of Geo Eco Arc Research discovered the early domesticated
remains of sunflower a decade ago during an excavation of the San Andrés site
in the modern-day Gulf Coast state of Tabasco. Alvarado found more evidence
for domesticated sunflower in a dry cave deposit at Cueva del Gallo in the
west Mexican state of Morelos in the form of three large achenes, or shells.

“The Cueva del Gallo shells are in excellent condition and have unmistakable
sunflower traits, removing all doubt about the pre-Columbian presence of
domesticated sunflower in Mexico,” Pohl said.

Furthermore, the Mexican sunflower achenes are significantly larger than
those from eastern North America providing further evidence that the Mexican
domestication was a separate process. One of the achenes was radiocarbon
dated to about 300 BC.

Ancient people used the Cueva del Gallo cave for rituals, even bringing their
dead to be buried there, Pohl said. Mesoamerican people traditionally
believed that caves were the conduit for the passage of the sun beneath the
Earth at night and the home of fertility deities as well as the avenue of
communication with their ancestors in the Underworld.

“The Cueva del Gallo sunflower shells give us another perspective on how
Mexican people used sunflowers in worship and provide a clue as to why
cultivation of the Mexican sunflower mysteriously disappeared after Spanish
conquest,” Pohl said. “The Spanish priests probably felt that the sunflower
represented both pagan worship and native political power and tried to wipe
out its use.”

In addition to the physical evidence, researchers also looked at linguistic
traditions to bolster their argument that sunflowers existed in Mexico before
the Spaniards arrived. For example, the modern Otomi word for sunflower, dä
nukhä, translates to “big flower that looks at the sun god,” a clear
reference to pre-Columbian solar worship.

The San Andrés and Cueva del Gallo sunflower finds are further documentation
of prehistoric Mexican peoples’ significant contribution to our repertoire of
domesticated plants, Pohl said. Besides sunflowers, crops of Mexican origin
include corn, peppers, beans, squash and avocadoes.




  • [Livingontheland] Sunflower debate ends in Mexico, researchers say, Tradingpost, 05/01/2008

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