[Sca-cooks] Peanuts are New World?

[Terry Decker]

This has popped up several times over the years so I'm surprised you don't 
have any of the discussions in the Florilegium.

Arachis hypogea is a New World plant originating somewhere in central South 
America (Peru, Brazil, Paraguay and Bolivia have all been mentioned). 
Peanuts have been eaten for at least 8,000 years with the earliest specimens 
appearing in Peruvian archeological sites.  Cultivation in South and Central 
America appears to have been widespread, so they may have entered the 
Columbian exchange early on.

They appear to been brought to Africa and Asia by the Portuguese and were 
probably food in the slave trade by 1560.  The first African slaves in 
English North America were sold in Jamestown in 1619, but prior to 1700, 
there were only about 20,000 African slaves in the colonies.  The peanut 
probably arrived in North America from Africa in the 18th Century with the 
massive influx of slaves for the Southern plantations.

Peanuts were likely quickly added to the African diet because they are very 
similar to the Bambara groundnut (Vigna subterranea) and the Hausa groundnut 
(Macrotyloma geocarpum).

Bear

> Cariadoc posted on the SCA FB group, where there is some discussion of Old 
> World/New World foods and the demo game:
> <<< Peanuts are from the New World. Some early sources thought they were 
> African, but apparently that's because the Portuguese introduced them to 
> West Africa early and they caught on. >>>
>
> I thought myself, from discussion here I thought, that peanuts came from 
> Africa with the black slaves.
>
> Can someone give me a more comprehensive description? Something I can add 
> to the Florilegium?
>
> Since I often have trouble coming up with 10 New World foods for the demo 
> game, maybe I'll add peanuts. :-)
>
> Thanks,
>   Stefan