MAIZE GRAIN AS FOOD 



675 



(1 524-33), are said to have been "well acquainted with the CHAP, 

 different modes of preparing this useful vegetable," though it XIV ' 

 seems they did not use it for bread, except at festivals (Fres- 

 co ti, 2). 



629. Maize Adopted as the Staple Food of the African Races. 

 — 1 he size of the grain and the heavy yield and easy cultiva- 

 tion of the maize crop were probably responsible for the early 

 and rapid spread of this cereal over Africa, ousting the much- 

 grown native grains of the continent such as Sorghum vulgare, 

 Eleusine Coracana, Fennisetum spicatum, and Eragrostis abys- 



Fig. 22g. — Shangaan kraal, Zoutpansberg District, Transvaal, with basket for 

 storing maize grain, and wooden mortar and pestle for stamping mielies. 



sinica. Maize is now so largely used as a staple article of 

 food by the Bantu races, that it is somewhat difficult for the 

 younger generation to realize that it has not always been so. 

 But history and the accounts of travellers tell us, and it is 

 confirmed by white men and natives still living, that within 

 the memory of man, maize was not known as a cultivated 

 crop to the natives of certain parts of South Africa (IT 13). 

 South of the Equator it was introduced by the Portuguese 

 voyagers of the sixteenth century (IT 13) under the name of 

 milho, i.e. grain (% 18). 



43* 



