did europe have corn before columbus discoverec america?

Question

Im looking at a painting from 1476, and in the description of all if its symbolism they describe corn (which kinda looks like young corn stalks, but yellow) as being this very symbolic thing in the painting. but i was under the impression that corn was isolated to america untill at least 1492...when columbus sailed the ocean blue. Is this not true?

Answer 1

The corn plant (called maize in other parts of the world) is native to the Americas. There was no corn anywhere other than the Americas before Europeans reach the New World. Same goes for the chili pepper, tomato, chocolate, and lots of other common food crops. Before maize came onto the scene, the English word "corn" just meant "grain."

Answer 2

Maize is a cereal grain that was domesticated in Mesoamerica and then spread throughout the American continents. It spread to the rest of the world after European contact with the Americas in the late 15th century and early 16th century. The term maíze derives from the Spanish form of the Arawak Native American term for the plant. However, it is popularly called corn in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia. Corn is a shortened form of "Indian corn", i.e. the Indian grain. The English word "corn" originally referred to a granular particle, most commonly cereal grains. It is called mielies or mealies in southern Africa. Hybrid maize is preferred by farmers over conventional varieties for its high grain yield, due to heterosis ("hybrid vigor"). Maize is one of the first crops for which genetically modified varieties make up a significant proportion of the total harvest.
While some maize varieties grow 7 m (23 ft) tall at certain locations (Kuleshov 1933), commercial maize has been bred for a height of 2.5 m (8 ft). Sweetcorn is usually shorter than field-corn varieties.

Maize is widely cultivated throughout the world, and a greater weight of maize is produced each year than any other grain. While the United States produces almost half of the world's harvest, other top producing countries are as widespread as China, Brazil, France, Indonesia, and South Africa. Worldwide production was over 600 million metric tons in 2003 – just slightly more than rice or wheat. In 2004, close to 33 million hectares of maize were planted worldwide, with a production value of more than $23 billion.
Gavin Menzies, in his book 1421 - The Year China Discovered the World, claims to show that Maize was most likely transplanted from the Americas by the Chinese during their great voyages of the 15th century (although this claim is widely disputed

Answer 3

what you are looking at in the painting is more than likely some kind native sorghum, grasses used to make grain, of southern Europe.... corn wasn't introduced to Europe until the late 15 century and early 16th century....

Answer 4

I agree that in the PBS program I, Claudius, the meaning of the term 'corn' was indeed the non-american use of the word and that it most likely should have been seen as wheat in America. That however does not mean that maize was not in the new world until after Columbus.

Utterly decisive evidence for the presence of American maize in the Old World has been found in Asian art and archaeology. These were the first items to document extensively that corn ears were represented in sculptures in India –– hundreds of them –– on original temple walls in Karnataka State, southern India. This art absolutely dates from the 11th to the 13th centuries AD, but there are some representations that date to be much older. This is clearly well before Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492.

Researches have now independently identified maize, as well as a number of other plants of American origin, sculpted on Indian temples and monuments. The evidence of maize in archaeological sites in China and its depiction in Hoysala Temples in India, both dated before the 15th century AD, suggests that this domesticated crop was diffused by human action before the arrival of Columbus in the New World. The implications of this evidence are of great magnitude, since the presence of maize in Asia indicates that humans were able to migrate between both hemispheres; more than likely through trans-oceanic means of travel.

The sculptures in India are built into temples as load bearing walls with mortise and tenon joints at top and bottom of each sculpted block. They bear the load of stone beams and stone roofs on top.

Temples are dated in written historical records in South India. They contain who built the structures, when they were built, the cause for which they were built, and who the sculptors were. Archaeological discoveries in the last decade have similar carvings of maize, etc., and indicate that the sculptural work was typical of sculptures of the reigning Hoysala Dynasty of the 11th to 13th centuries. Yes, that is indeed several hundred years before Columbus was even born.

Direct observations in the temples show that no two maize ears are identical. Each of the more than 100 temples has similar carvings. Over 80 large ears are present in the last and most beautiful Somnathpur temple with several hundred examples of smaller ears elsewhere, in the roof for example, and these corn ears demonstrate that the designers appreciated the multi-seeded fertility symbol, just as they carved the images of the Annonas and sunflowers, which are multi-seeded fruits decorating the walls and courtyards.

Maize breeders in India, China, United States, and Great Britain, who have seen extensive collections of the illustrations, concur that only sculptors with abundant ears of maize as models could have created these illustrations of maize. No other biological product has these assemblages of anatomical characteristics that are within the envelope of variations of maize. I grant that these findings have been thought to be impossible in the earlier belief systems that maintained that there was no significant contact between New and Old World. These anti-diffusionist beliefs have to give way to reality.

Archaeological findings have been found to verify this and archaeologists are currently finding much more evidence of contact between Asia and the Americas. Many of these relate to DNA complexity of biotic forms that can be tested for indications of genetic similarities and genetic distances, but written literature, paintings, sculptures, and archaeological finds all support not detract from the diffusion hypothesis of very ancient sailing contact in the building of high civilizations around the world.

Answer 5

not exactly. but Generaly these crops are found in american continents only.