ORIGIN AND EARLY HISTORY OF THE PEANUT 25 



grown by Mr. Harrison from "Guinea seed" because it differed from 

 those commonly found in the Caribbean Islands. 



Du Tertre ( 10) gave a very good description of the peanut plants so 

 that one can easily recognize the runner type, pods with two or three 

 seed with red seedcoats. This same type of peanut was also observed by 

 Labat (14) and described as apparently a wild plant on Guadeloupe in 

 1697. 



^ Apparently the Indians of the West Indies and those of the Florida 

 mainland had occasional contacts and in this way the Florida Indians 

 probably .obtained the peanut. However, proof of the pre-Columbian 

 presence of peanuts in either Florida or the Texas-New Mexico area has 

 not yet been found. 



The records found to date are not clear as to the origin of the various 

 types grown in the United States. Several authors mentioned importa- 

 tion, for the New York market, of peanuts from Africa ; and the small- 

 seeded runner, known successively as African, Wilmington Runner, 

 North Carolina Runner, Georgia Runner, Southeastern Runner, etc., 

 very probably came from Africa. The Spanish variety was imported 

 from Spain in 1871 (2). Valencia was probably received from the same 

 source. The origins of the Virginia type, the Tennessee Red, and the 

 Tennessee White are still uncertain. The two latter resemble closely the 

 peanuts most commonly grown in Mexico and Central America. Che- 

 valier (8) described A. hypogaea L. var. macrocarpa A. Chev. to include 

 Jumbo, Virginia Runner, Virginia Bunch and Samatiga, with Jumbo as 

 the type. He states further that Jumbo originated at Bahia, Brazil, but 

 failed to indicate the authority for this statement. Jumbo, as known in the 

 United States, is not a variety distinguishable from Virginia Runner and 

 Virginia Bunch. It should be thought of as a large-seeded strain of 

 either Virginia Runner or Virginia Bunch and considered as a market 

 classification rather than a variety of peanuts. 



SELECTED REFERENCES 



(1) acosta, jose de. 



157l historia natural t moral de las indias. 



(2) Anon. 



1898. JOURNAL OF COMMERCE (NORFOLK, VIRGINIA). November 5. 



(3) Badami, v. K. 



1935. arachis hypogaea linn. groundnut or peanut. original habitat 

 AND ITS DISTRIBUTION IN THE WORLD. Jour. Mysore Agr. and Exp. 

 Union IS (4):141-1S4. 



