8 INDIAN CORN CULTURE. 



Eai-s of Indian corn are occasionally found 

 in vessels placed in ancient Indian tombs or 

 mounds in Chili, Peru and Central America. 

 The Smithsonian Institute at Washington has 

 numerous interesting specimens of corn, ex- 

 humed frpm mounds and tombs, that must be 

 very ancient. One specimen was discovered 

 deposited in an earthen vessel eleven feet under 

 ground in a grave with a mummy, near Ari- 

 quipe, Peru.* Marcay refers to corn found in 

 Aymara Indian tombs in South America, that, 

 from the material accompanying it, must belong 

 to a period long before the Spanish conquest.f 

 Among the ruins of Peru are stone carvings of 

 ears of corn, executed centuries ago, before the 

 discovery by Europeans. 



Original Home. — The original home of In- 

 dian corn is thought by some to be Central 

 America or Mexico, south of the twenty-second 

 degree of north latitude.:}: In 1888 Prof. Dug6s 

 collected at Moro Leon, north of Lake Cuitzco, 

 Mexico, several corn plants which have been 

 termed wild maize, and considered by some to 

 be the original parent of Indian corn. Plants 

 from this source were grown at the Cambridge, 



* Report Unite<3b States Department of Agriculture, 1870 

 p. 420. ' ' 



t Travels in South America, I, p. 69. 



t Maize: A botanical and economical study, by John W. 

 Harshberger, 1893, p. 202. 



