Suggested Readings

Chapter 11: Cultivation and Domestication

Childe, V. G. (1951). Man Makes Himself. New York: New American Library.

In this classic, originally published in 1936, Childe presented his concept of the “Neolithic Revolution.” He places special emphasis on the technological inventions that helped transform humans from food gatherers to food producers.

Coe, S. D. (1994). America’s First Cuisines. Austin:  University of Texas Press.

Writing in an accessible style, Coe discusses some of the more important crops grown by Native Americans and explores their early history and domestication. Following this she describes how these foods were prepared, served, and preserved by the Aztec, Maya, and Incas.

Diamond, J. (1997). Guns, Germs, and Steel. New York: Norton.

This book, which won a Pulitzer Prize and became a best-seller, tries to answer the question: Why are wealth and power distributed as they are in the world today? For him, the answer requires an understanding of events associated with the origin and spread of food production. Although Diamond is a bit of an environmental determinist and falls into various ethnocentric traps, there is a great deal of solid information on the             domestication and spread of crops and the biological consequences for humans. It is a lively book that can be read with pleasure.

MacNeish, R. S. (1992). The Origins of Agriculture and Settled Life. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.

MacNeish was a pioneer in the study of the start of food production in the New World. In this book, he reviews the evidence from around the world in order to develop general laws about the development of agriculture and evolution of settled life.

Rindos, D. (1984). The Origins of Agriculture: An evolutionary perspective. Orlando: Academic Press.

This is one of the most important books on agricultural origins to appear in recent times. After identifying the weaknesses of existing theories, Rindos presents his own evolutionary theory of agricultural origins.

Zohary, D., & Hopf, M. (1993). Domestication of Plants in the Old World (2nd ed.). Oxford: Clarenden Press.

This book deals with the origin and spread of domestic plants in western Asia, Europe, and the Nile Valley. Included is a species-by-species discussion of the various crops, an inventory of remains from archaeological sites, and a conclusion summarizing present knowledge.