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Re: maize in ancient india: strong transpacific links are indicated



In article <59ua4m$na4@news1.io.org>, Yuri Kuchinsky quoted:
> 
>      ...the size and shape of "ears" in husks, partly husked or
>      entirely dehusked; the proportional shapes of "kernels" that
>      are normally wider than thick; the expansion of the "kernel"
>      adjacent to the missing "kernel"; the smaller sized "kernels"
>      at the tip; one tip with undeveloped, tiny "kernels" and the
>      bottom four-fifth normal; the normality of parallel rows over
>      tessellate row conditions or tessellate "kernels" at the base
>      and parallel rows in the middle and tip of the "ear";... (p.
>      178)

The pictures I've seen are not convincing to me, although they do
strongly resemble some types of sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench),
an old world grain closely related to maize, long cultivated in India.
Cf variability in JD Snowden's 1936 _The Cultivated Races of Sorghum_, 
(Adlard and Sons, London).  Occam's razor.

Show me some maize *tassels* with the supposed "ears", and I'll
gladly reconsider.  Or pollen deposits, or physical remains that
can be accurately dated.

Kay Lancaster    kay@fern.com  


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