Corn and Native Americans

• TRIBES AFFECTED: Mesoamerican, Northeast, Plains, Southeast, and Southwest tribes
• SIGNIFICANCE: North American corn was first domesticated in Mexico, and by the seventeenth century, it was a staple across much of the North American continent

Corn, or maize (Zea mays), is grown worldwide, but the crop is indigenous to the Western Hemisphere. Only after European contact was maize propagated beyond the American continents. When the Europeans arrived in the Americas, domesticated maize was cultivated from the Canadian Great Lakes region to Argentina. Several varieties of corn were grown in different ecological zones in North and South America, ranging from sea level to high in the Andes and other mountains.

European explorers described maize agriculture among the Aztec, the Maya, and the Inca of Latin America and among the North American Indigenous people, including groups of the Southwest, the Plains, the Southeast, and the Northeast. Indeed, at different times during the early contact period, the survival of European settlers depended on corn and other foods provided by the Indigenous peoples of these regions. In many of these corn-growing areas, the new settlers recorded Indigenous oral traditions, which emphasized the cultural importance of corn. Such was the case among the Maya of Central America and the Iroquois of upstate New York.

Archaeological Information

Studies concerning the prehistoric origin, domestication, and use of corn rely upon archaeological investigations. Perhaps as a result of the contact-period accounts of the primacy of corn agriculture, archaeologists of the early 1900s often overemphasized the importance of corn to prehistoric peoples. Generally, it was suggested that prehistoric cultures that possessed traits such as settled villages or impressive architecture (which indicated a more complex social organization) depended primarily on corn agriculture for their subsistence. By the 1990s, it was recognized that corn was one of several species important to agriculturalists in the Americas, and that, in addition, not all complex societies relied on corn for their subsistence. It was also formerly believed that maize domestication was a rapid process that had an immediate cultural impact. It is now apparent that the process of maize domestication took place over hundreds of years. Maize probably first served merely to supplement local wild plant foods and only later became an important resource. Gradual genetic changes among the maize plants accompanied these slow cultural adaptations. For example, corn cobs became larger, and the number and size of the kernels increased. These and other changes marked the process of domestication. Some maize cobs, kernels, and other remains can be definitively identified as either “wild” or “domesticated,” whereas other plants remain somewhere on a continuum in between.

General theories concerning the speed of the development of agriculture in the Americas are based on specific archaeological information concerning ancient subsistence. At some archaeological sites, corn agriculture is well documented by finds of maize plant remains, while at other locations, lacking botanical data, researchers may rely on indirect evidence, such as the presence of agricultural implements. For example, ancient use of hoes, milling stones, and storage facilities may indicate a dependence on corn, but archaeologists exercise caution in their inferences since these tools were also associated with other crops. For this reason, the strongest demonstration of ancient maize agriculture is the discovery of pieces of corn plants, such as stems, leaves, kernels, and cobs. Cobs often provide additional information (such as the corn variety), which contributes to data concerning its origin, domestication, growth, and use. Smaller plant remains, such as pollen or phytoliths (tiny silica bodies within the plant), can also provide evidence for the presence of corn agriculture.

Botanical remains are best preserved under stable environmental conditions that discourage rotting, such as dry heat, cold, or water inundation. They are also more likely to be preserved when burned to a carbonized state. For these reasons, many plant remains left at sites by past peoples are not preserved in the archaeological record. In addition, the preservation of botanical remains does not ensure that they will be carefully and scientifically excavated by professional archaeologists. However, site looting and destruction are major problems throughout North and Central America.

Corn Domestication

Archaeological sites that provide important evidence concerning the earliest domestication of corn have been found in the Tehuacán Valley, Puebla, Mexico. The Tehuacán archaeological-botanical project was directed by Richard S. MacNeish, who devoted decades to the search for evidence of early corn domestication. MacNeish excavated the dry caves in the Tehuacán Valley because they would have provided shelter for ancient habitation, and he anticipated good preservation of any botanical remains. The Tehuacán sites date back to approximately 11,000 years ago, spanning the period from the time of the Spanish conquest to the present day. Maize pollen and wild maize cobs were excavated from levels dated to around 7000 to 5000 BCE. Cultivated maize was domesticated around 5000 to 3500 BCE. This early evidence of corn agriculture is also helpful for determining the ancestral grasses of Zea mays. Botanists have argued that corn developed from a wild grass called teosinte, although this has not been definitively demonstrated.

In the 1980s, results from bone chemistry analyses contributed to the archaeological understanding of the Tehuacán Valley. Stable carbon isotope tests of Tehuacán human skeletal remains demonstrated that a chemically distinct group of plants, which included maize, composed 90 percent of the ancient diet from 4500 BCE onward.

Based on the available evidence, it seems that North American maize originated in central Mexico. It may have appeared in the southwestern United States approximately 3,000 years ago. The seasonally occupied sites of the corn-growing Cochise may date to approximately 1200 BCE in southern New Mexico. These people obtained corn (the Chapalote variety of Zea mays) and their knowledge of corn agriculture from people in northern Mexico. Those in the Southwest culture area farmed in harsh, unpredictable climatic conditions with the use of highly developed agricultural techniques, ranging from planting strategies to the use of irrigation.

A second variety of corn, Maiz de Ocho (also known as New England flint corn), was introduced later to the Southwest. The earliest use of Maiz de Ocho in this region may date to 1000 BCE, but this date is controversial. Generally accepted Maiz de Ocho dates are considerably later. This corn variety was more productive than the earlier Chapalote, and this variety diffused eastward across the continent. Maize agriculture in the Plains culture area dates to between 800 and 900 CE, while for the Southeast, there are a few dates as early as 200 CE. Agriculture did not provide a substantial contribution to the Southeast diet until around 800 and 1000 and, in some areas, such as the Lower Mississippi, not until as late as 1200. By this time, corn was being grown in regions as diverse as southeast Colorado and upstate New York. Indeed, by 1300, maize agriculture was vital to the economy of the Iroquois.

Despite its utility, successful corn agriculture has distinct requirements. Generally, corn plants need adequate moisture and approximately 120 frost-free days to mature. A healthy crop also requires some weeding and care of the developing plants. Maize growing rapidly exhausts the soil’s nitrogen stores, and these must be replenished through planting other crops (such as beans, which contribute nitrogen), using fertilizers, or allowing the soil to rest fallow. Corn lacks an amino acid (lysine), essential for humans, and a diet based only on corn is inadequate. Many groups ate beans as well, which provided the missing lysine and resulted in a balanced, healthy diet.

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