Source:Sorenson:Ancient American Setting:184:Amaranth

The grain "Amaranth" in Mexico

Parent page: Book of Mormon/Plants/Wheat

The grain "Amaranth" in Mexico

John L. Sorenson: [1]

Amaranth, considered an Old World grain, was grown and used in Mexico at the time the Spaniards arrived. Botanist Jonathan Sauer thought its origin to be American, but he noted too that it was widely distributed in the Old World in pre-Columbian times. Its uses in the two hemispheres were strikingly similar also (it was popped and eaten as "popcorn balls" on special feast days); the similarities have suggested to some scholars that amaranth seed was carried across the ocean in ancient times.[2]

Notes

  1. John L. Sorenson, An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City, Utah : Deseret Book Co. ; Provo, Utah : Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 1996 [1985]), 184-185.
  2. Jonathan D. Sauer, "The Grain Amaranths: A Survey of Their History and Classification," Missouri Botanical Garden Annals 37 (1950):561-632. George F. Carter, "Domesticates as Artifacts," in The Human Mirror: Material and Spatial images of Man, ed. Miles Richardson (Baton Rouge: Louisiana Stage University Press, 1974), pp. 212-13. (Sorenson, Chapter 5, endnote 65. Note: This is erroneously indicated in the text as endnote 64).