Age of Discovery
The history of agriculture in the Age of Discovery and Early modern era was closely tied to the processes of European exploration and colonization. After 1492 the world's agricultural patterns were shuffled in the widespread exchange of plants and animals known as the Columbian Exchange. Crops and animals that were previously only known in the Old World were now transplanted to the New and vice versa. Perhaps most notably, the tomato became a favorite in European cuisine, and maize and potatoes were widely adopted. Other transplanted crops include pineapple, cocoa, and tobacco. In the other direction, several wheat strains quickly took to western hemisphere soils and became a dietary staple even for native North, Central and South Americans. Agriculture was a key element in the Atlantic slave trade, triangular trade, and the expansion by European powers into the Americas. In the expanding plantation economy, large plantations producing crops including sugar, cotton, and indigo, were heavily dependent upon slave labor.
Read more about this topic: History Of Agriculture
Famous quotes containing the words age of, age and/or discovery:
“It were a real increase of human happiness, could all young men from the age of nineteen be covered under barrels, or rendered otherwise invisible; and there left to follow their lawful studies and callings, till they emerged, sadder and wiser, at the age of twenty-five.”
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881)
“A man can no more separate age and covetousness than ‘a can
part young limbs and lechery.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“As the mother of a son, I do not accept that alienation from me is necessary for his discovery of himself. As a woman, I will not cooperate in demeaning womanly things so that he can be proud to be a man. I like to think the women in my son’s future are counting on me.”
—Letty Cottin Pogrebin (20th century)