BOTANICAL MUSEUM LEAFLETS 
HARVARD UNIVERSITY 
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS, MARCH-APRIL 1979 VOL. 27. No. 3-4 
MONOPTERYX ANGUSTIFOLIA and 
ERISMA JAPURA: 
Their Use by Indigenous Peoples in 
the Northwestern Amazon! 
DARNA L. DUFOUR* AND JAMES L. ZARUCCHI** 
The collection of wild vegetable foods is an integral part of the 
subsistence pattern of indigenous peoples in the tropical forest 
of South America. The role of these foods in the indigenous diet 
ranges from trail snacks and emergency foods to important 
sources of nutrients. Outstanding examples are palm fruits, 
palm hearts and Brazil nuts. 
This paper is focused on two wild vegetable foods collected in 
the northwestern Amazon, the seeds of Monopteryx angustifolia 
Spruce ex Bentham and Erisma Japura Spruce ex Warming. 
Ethnobotanical information on these species is meager, but they 
are seasonally important food resources in the northwestern 
Amazon. The seeds of both are collected in large quantities, can 
be stored for long periods of time, and are available during the 
rainy season when animal protein is not particularly abundant. 
| A preliminary draft of this paper, entitled “Vegetable Protein in the Diet of Indians in 
the Northwestern Amazon” by Darna L. Dufour, was presented at the sixth annual 
meeting of the Canadian Association for Physical Anthropology, Niagara-on-the- 
Lake, Ontario, November 1978. 
*Department of Anthropology, State University of New York, Binghamton, New York 
13901. 
**Botanical Museum and Department of Biology, Harvard University. 
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