NO. 1 CULTURAL DEVELOPMENT IN LATIN AMERICA 
5 
al., 1956), as have caves in northern Coahuila (Taylor, 1956, pp. 
215-234). Perhaps the most significant data have been forthcoming 
from Tamaulipas where MacNeish, working with early desert culture 
material, uncovered evidence of certain food plants which apparently 
were domesticated very early. This would mark the beginning of an 
economic shift where some men in northern Mexico left the natural 
state as soil members and took upon themselves the role of soil para- 
sites and began an agricultural existence. This interval of change 
must have been long and arduous, lasting perhaps 5,000 to 6,000 
years. 
The introduction of gourds and squashes into the area of northern 
Mexico may first have been regarded by the indigenes as a supple- 
ment to their wild-plant food sources. The southern Tamaulipas caves 
in the Ocampo district have recently provided data suggesting that 
the bottle gourd (Lagenaria sic er aria) appeared probably as a camp 
follower plant around 7000 B.C. (MacNeish, 1958; Cutler and 
Whitaker, 1961, p. 483). This plant, as well as members of the squash 
family (Cucurbita pepo), which became a primary food source, were 
domesticated in the Ocampo area perhaps by 6000 B.C., as both have 
been associated with the Infiernillo Culture of southern Tamaulipas. 
It has been proposed that both plants disseminated through northern 
Mexico and into the Mogollon desert cultures of New Mexico and 
Texas by 3000 B.C. (MacNeish, 1960). 
The desert cultures were apparently slow in accepting Zea mays, 
which followed in the wake of the gourd-squash group about 3000 
B.C. Primitive pod corn has been identified in Tamaulipas in the La 
Perra Horizon and found to be similar to the Bat Cave maize (Dick, 
1954, p. 141), the latter associated with the Chiricahua Horizon of 
the desert culture continuum. 
It may be suggested that beans (Phaseolus vulgaris) reached 
northern Mexico by 1000 B.C. (op. cit., p. 143). After this date, and 
only when a cluster of these plants had been accepted by the people, 
does a recognizable revolution occur in the northern Mexican cul- 
tures. Certain architectural innovations appear, such as the making 
of pit houses and storage bins. Finally, with the appearance of pot- 
tery the cultures become more independent of one another and take 
on individual area characteristics. Routes of acceptance through north 
Mexico remain in question, although several have been suggested for 
transmission of pod corns (Jones, V., 1949, p. 246). The Sierra Ma- 
dre Occidentales are thought to be the way by which the Hohokam- 
Basketmaker corn complex traveled ; the Mexican complex spreading 
