570 MAN AS A CONQUEROR 



cultivated in great terraced fields at the time of the Incas. When 

 Jacques Cartier first viewed the site of the present city of Mon- 

 treal, he saw there a village surrounded by cornfields. From earli- 

 est times the growing of grains and the progress of civilization have 

 gone hand in hand. 



Sheep, cattle, swine, and dogs appear to have been domesticated 

 as far back as the Bronze Age. The dog was probably one of the 

 first animals used by man, its domestication making possible that of 

 other animals, especially sheep, goats, and cattle. The horse, which 

 must have roamed wild in Europe during the Old Stone Age, was then 

 used for food by the savage cavemen. Later horses were domesti- 

 cated, but there are no authentic records of their use until about 

 2000 B.C., when they were used in Babylon, and three hundred years 

 later, when they were introduced into Egypt. They reached their 

 peak of usefulness in quite recent times. 



Looking back on the history of agriculture we find that it is a 

 story of very gradual crop improvement, both in yield and quality 

 of product. Take, for example, the staple wheat. While the exact 

 form of the parent wheats is not known, we do know that a wild wheat 

 (an emmer) grows today without cultivation in the highlands of Syria 

 and Palestine. As far back as 300 B.C. Theophrastus, the Greek 

 "Father of Botany," reported several varieties of wheat. Different 

 types of Indian corn, flint, sweet, soft, and popcorn, were known as 

 early as 800 a.d. in the Mayan cities of Yucatan, while as many as 

 1000 varieties of rice are said to exist in India and China, where rice 

 was probably first cultivated. 



The early use of plants must have been merely to piece out the 

 family food supply as hunting became poorer. Then as domestication 

 of animals took place and man ceased a nomadic existence, grains 

 were used as food for cattle and horses. At still later stages of his 

 civilization man began to work for qualities, which were not thought 

 of in earlier civilizations ; more abundant or better fruits and grains, 

 stronger beasts of burden, swifter horses, a better milk supply, and 

 fleece that would supply better material for yarns. 



Since man only, of all the animals, is able to make a record of what 

 he has learned and to hand this knowledge down to the next genera- 

 tion, the results of this social inheritance are seen in the plant and 

 animal production of today. First man, or more likely the woman 

 who did the work, must have noticed that certain plants grew better 

 and produced larger crops and more desirable fruits when given more 



