BOTANICAL MUSEUM LEAFLETS 
HARVARD UNIVERSITY 
VoL. 14, No. 10 
WHENCE CAME MAIZE TO ASIA? 
BY 
Paut C. MANGELSDORF AND Doucuas L. OLIvER’ 
THE intriguing question of pre-Columbian trans- Pacific 
diffusion is with us again and modern Kon-Tikis now 
compete with ancient Alexandrian fleets in the alleged 
South Pacific Regatta. To the interested but confused 
onlooker, it might appear that the specialists are divided 
into two opposing camps with adventurous diffusionists 
in bitter conflict with obstinate and reactionary propo- 
nents of independent invention. To some of the individ- 
ual specialists involved, the issue may, indeed, have this 
emotional coloring. Basically, however, the lines are 
drawn between those who are short on facts and use them 
uncritically (although sometimes with superb imagina- 
tion) and those who demand evidence and valid reason- 
ing. In the paper on maize in Assam, which is the prin- 
cipal basis for this critique, neither the authors’ selection 
of facts nor their reasoning from those facts can, in our 
opinion, support their theory of a pre-Columbian diffu- 
sion of maize across the Pacific. In their favor, however, 
it must be added that they do not profess to know in 
which direction the diffusion took place. 
The question as to which part of the world gave rise 
to maize is by no means new, since it is one upon which 
‘Associate Professor of Anthropology and Assistant Curator of 
Oceanic Ethnology, Peabody Museum, Harvard University. 
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