Note to users. If you're seeing this message, it means that your browser cannot find this page's style/presentation instructions -- or possibly that you are using a browser that does not support current Web standards. Find out more about why this message is appearing, and what you can do to make your experience of our site the best it can be.

Science 2 September 1966:
Vol. 153. no. 3740, pp. 1074 - 1080
DOI: 10.1126/science.153.3740.1074
Prev | Table of Contents | Next

Articles

Distribution of Wild Wheats and Barley

Jack R. Harlan 1 and Daniel Zohary 2

1 Oklahoma State University, Stillwater
2 Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel

If we accept the evidence at face value, we are led to conclude that emmer was probably domesticated in the upper Jordan watershed and that einkorn was domesticated in southeast Turkey. Barley could have been domesticated almost anywhere within the arc bordering the fertile crescent. All three cereals may well have been harvested in the wild state throughout their regions of adaptation long before actual farming began. The primary habitats for barley, however, are not the same as those for the wheats. Wild barley is more xerophytic and extends farther downslope and into the steppes and deserts along the wadis. It seems likely that, while all three early cereals were domesticated within an are flanking the fertile crescent, each was domesticated in a different subregion of the zone.

Lest anyone should be led to think the problem is solved, we wish to close with a caveat. Domestication may not have taken place where the wild cereals were most abundant. Why should anyone cultivate a cereal where natural stands are as dense as a cultivated field? If wild cereal grasses can be harvested in unlimited quantities, why should anyone bother to till the soil and plant the seed? We suspect that we shall find, when the full story is unfolded, that here and there harvesting of wild cereals lingered on long after some people had learned to farm, and that farming itself may have orig inated in areas adjacent to, rather than in, the regions of greatest abundance of wild cereals.

We need far more specific information on the climate during incipient domestication and many more carefully conducted excavations of sites in the appropriate time range. The problem is far from solved, but some knowledge of the present distribution of the wild forms should be helpful.


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Population-Based Resequencing Reveals That the Flowering Time Adaptation of Cultivated Barley Originated East of the Fertile Crescent.
H. Jones, F. J. Leigh, I. Mackay, M. A. Bower, L. M.J. Smith, M. P. Charles, G. Jones, M. K. Jones, T. A. Brown, and W. Powell (2008)
Mol. Biol. Evol. 25, 2211-2219
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Molecular Diversity at 18 Loci in 321 Wild and 92 Domesticate Lines Reveal No Reduction of Nucleotide Diversity during Triticum monococcum (Einkorn) Domestication: Implications for the Origin of Agriculture.
B. Kilian, H. Ozkan, A. Walther, J. Kohl, T. Dagan, F. Salamini, and W. Martin (2007)
Mol. Biol. Evol. 24, 2657-2668
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Genome Plasticity a Key Factor in the Success of Polyploid Wheat Under Domestication.
J. Dubcovsky and J. Dvorak (2007)
Science 316, 1862-1866
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Genetic evidence for a second domestication of barley (Hordeum vulgare) east of the Fertile Crescent.
P. L. Morrell and M. T. Clegg (2007)
PNAS 104, 3289-3294
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Adaptive climatic molecular evolution in wild barley at the Isa defense locus.
J. K. Cronin, P. C. Bundock, R. J. Henry, and E. Nevo (2007)
PNAS 104, 2773-2778
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Photosynthesis and Productivity of Old and Modern Durum Wheats in a Mediterranean Environment.
M. Koc, C. Barutcular, and I. Genc (2003)
Crop Sci. 43, 2089-2098
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Regional Subdivision in Wild Barley Allozyme Variation: Adaptive or Neutral?.
S. Volis, I. Shulgina, D. Ward, and S. Mendlinger (2003)
J. Hered. 94, 341-351
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
AFLP Analysis of a Collection of Tetraploid Wheats Indicates the Origin of Emmer and Hard Wheat Domestication in Southeast Turkey.
H. Ozkan, A. Brandolini, R. Schafer-Pregl, and F. Salamini (2002)
Mol. Biol. Evol. 19, 1797-1801
   Full Text »    PDF »
The development and application of molecular markers for abiotic stress tolerance in barley.
B.P. Forster, R.P. Ellis, W.T.B. Thomas, A.C. Newton, R. Tuberosa, D. This, R.A. El-Enein, M.H. Bahri, and M. Ben Salem (2000)
J. Exp. Bot. 51, 19-27
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Site of Einkorn Wheat Domestication Identified by DNA Fingerprinting.
M. Heun, R. Schäfer-Pregl, D. Klawan, R. Castagna, M. Accerbi, B. Borghi, and F. Salamini (1997)
Science 278, 1312-1314
   Abstract »    Full Text »
Use of Barley in the Egyptian Late Paleolithic.
F. Wendorf, F. Wendorf, R. Schild, N. El Hadidi, A. E. Close, M. Kobusiewicz, H. Wieckowska, B. Issawi, and H. Haas (1979)
Science 205, 1341-1347
   Abstract »    PDF »
Beginnings of Fruit Growing in the Old World.
D. Zohary and P. Spiegel-Roy (1975)
Science 187, 319-327
   Abstract »    PDF »
Domestication of Pulses in the Old World: Legumes were companions of wheat and barley when agriculture began in the Near East.
D. Zohary and M. Hopf (1973)
Science 182, 887-894
   Abstract »    PDF »
Agricultural Origins: Centers and Noncenters.
J. R. Harlan (1971)
Science 174, 468-474
   Abstract »    PDF »
Prehistoric Investigations in Southeastern Turkey.
R. J. Braidwood, H. Cambel, and P. J. Watson (1969)
Science 164, 1275-1276
   Abstract »    PDF »
Natural Environment of Early Food Production North of Mesopotamia.
H. E. Wright Jr. (1968)
Science 161, 334-339
   PDF »
Tetraploid Wheats: Seed Protein Electrophoretic Patterns of the Emmer and Timopheevi Groups.
B. L. Johnson (1967)
Science 158, 131-132
   Abstract »    PDF »


To Advertise     Find Products

Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)