THE POTATO SAFFORD 521 



as " a kind of ground nut, which when boiled becomes as soft as a 

 cooked chestnut, but which has no thicker skin than a truffle." After- 

 wards, in writing of the elevated Collao region, he speaks of it in 

 greater detail. The inhabitants of that part of the world live in 

 villages surrounded by cultivated fields: "Their principal sustenance 

 is papas, which, as I have already stated in this history, are like 

 turmas de tierra. These they dry in the sun and keep from one 

 harvest to the other. And they call this papa, after it is dried, 

 ' chufio,' and among them it is esteemed and held precious ; for they 

 have no ditches like many others in this kingdom to irrigate their 

 fields, and if there is a dearth of natural water to make their crops 

 grow they suffer from lack of food and work unless they are pro- 

 vided with this sustenance of dried papas. And many Spaniards 

 have become rich and returned to Spain prosperous only from 

 carrying chuiio to sell to the mines of Potosi." -^ 



Cieza also describes the great sandy desert along the Pacific coast 

 traversed at intervals by ribbons of verdure, where streams from 

 the Andes make their way seaward, not alwa3'^s, however, reaching 

 their destination. In this region he was much impressed by the 

 numerous cemeteries to which I have already referred, and by the 

 vestiges of cultivated fields which, even at that early time, had long 

 been abandoned, and whose ancient tillers were sleeping in the 

 adjacent tombs. 



Cieza's Chronica, first published in folio at Seville in 1553, was 

 followed the next year by a small size edition printed at Antwerp by 

 the famous publisher Jan Steeltz and by a third, in Italian, printed 

 at Rome in 1555. It was eagerly read as the first authentic account 

 of South America. 



Padre Jose de Acosta, a Jesuit missionary, who was in South 

 America from 1571-1576, was the next author to treat of the Peru- 

 vian papas which he observed in their original habitat. After writ- 

 ing of yuca or manioc in his account of the edible roots of the 

 New World, he says : " In the elevated region of the Sierra of Peru 

 and the provinces which they call the Collao, composing the greater 

 part of that kingdom, where the climate is so cold and dry that it 

 will not permit the cultivation of wheat or maize, the Indians use 

 another kind of roots which they call ' pappas,' a kind of turmas 

 de tierra that send up scant foliage (echan arriba una poquilla hoja). 

 These pappas they collect and leave in the sun to dry well, and 

 breaking them they make what they call ' chunyo ' Avhich will keep 

 for food in that form many days and serves them for bread; and 

 of this chunyo there is great commerce in that kingdom Avitli the 



^ Parte primera de La Chronica del Peru — Hecha par Pedro de Cieza de Leon, Ant- 

 werp edition, p. 243. 1554. 



