1. Corn:

The introduction and promotion of corn corn was originally called maize, and there are many common names in various places, such as fanwheat, jade wheat, jade millet, baogu, baolu, hand, pearl rice, etc., and there are also six grains (also written as barley grain or deer valley), which means that there is another kind of grain in addition to the five grains. Corn is native to the Americas. According to Yuan Jiaming's "Dietary Instructions" (around 1367), some people talked about maize, and the Yuan Dynasty Shangshi Bureau (a special agency in the Yuan Dynasty court to manage the emperor's diet) had imperial wheat noodles, thinking that there was corn in the Yuan Dynasty in China. This is not necessarily true. The so-called o-wheat noodles are nothing but the best wheat noodles used by the autocratic emperor. The part of the "Dietary Instructions" that talks about maize is likely to have been added by later generations, which may not be reliable. Corn has long been a staple food crop for the Native Americans, and there are many stories about corn, as well as ancient corn kernels and statues of corn gods made of large amounts of gold, clay and ears of corn. In the history of other countries, until the fifteenth century, there was no record or any indication of maize. So to speak. Corn only came to the countries of the Old World after Columbus discovered America in 1492. How corn came to China, Western scholars have different speculations. Some believe that corn was brought to Mecca from Spain by the Arabos, from Mecca to Central Asia Minor to northwestern China, or from Mecca to Muslim India to southwestern China, and then from northwest or southwest to eastward to the provinces. This speculation needs to be further studied. The earlier Chinese texts they cited were generally limited to Li Shizhen's Compendium of Materia Medica (1578) in the Ming Dynasty, and some only cited Tian Yizhen's Liuqing Rizha (1573). In fact, there are rich records about corn preserved in the records of various provincial capitals and counties in China. According to the records of the provincial chronicles and the county annals, corn was first introduced to China in Guangxi in 1531, less than 40 years after Columbus discovered America. By the end of the Ming Dynasty (1643), it had spread to ten provinces, including Hebei, Shandong, Henan, Shaanxi, Gansu, Jiangsu, Anhui, Guangdong, Guangxi, and Yunnan. There are also two provinces of Zhejiang and Fujian, although there is no record in the Ming Dynasty Chronicles, but there are other documents to prove that corn has been cultivated in the Ming Dynasty. During the more than 50 years in the early Qing Dynasty, until the end of the 17th century (that is, the 39th year of Kangxi), there were six provinces of Liaoning, Shanxi, Jiangxi, Hunan, Hubei and Sichuan that recorded corn in the Fang Zhi than in the Ming Dynasty. After 1701, there were more records of corn, and by 1718, two provinces of Taiwan and Guizhou had been added. According to records, in less than 200 years from 1531 to 1718, corn has spread throughout 20 provinces in China. Let's look at the earliest records of the provinces chronologically: Guangxi 1531, Henan 1544, Jiangsu 1559, Gansu 1560, Yunnan 1563, Zhejiang 1573, Fujian 1577, Guangdong 1579, Shandong 1590, Shaanxi 1597, Hebei 1622, Hubei 1669, Shanxi 1672, Jiangxi 1673, Liaoning 1682, Hunan 1684, Sichuan 1686, Taiwan 1717, Guizhou 1718。 The above-mentioned chronological order does not represent the actual sequence of introduction, because there are often omissions and late loads in the records of Fang Zhi and other documents. However, it is worth noting that the records of Guangxi are about 30 years earlier than Gansu or Yunnan, more than 60 years earlier than Shaanxi, more than a century and a half earlier than Sichuan, almost two centuries earlier than Guizhou, in addition, Jiangsu is also earlier than Gansu and Yunnan, Zhejiang, Fujian, and Guangdong are all earlier than Shaanxi, and Sichuan and Guizhou are more than 20 years or even more than a century, so it is difficult to imagine that corn first spread by land to the southwest or northwest of China, and then spread eastward. On the other hand, the Portuguese arrived in Java in 1496 and came to China in 1516, and at the same time many Chinese were already living in the Nanyang Islands at that time, and it is very likely that corn was first introduced to China's coastal and coastal provinces by sea. Corn and sweet potato both originated in the Americas and have become important food crops in China for one or two hundred years after they were introduced to China, but there is a clear difference in the process of their spread. There are many moving stories about the spread of sweet potatoes, but not about corn. From the very beginning, the sweet potato attracted the special attention of the famous agronomist Xu Guangqi, who vigorously advocated it, and in his "Complete Book of Agricultural Administration" he discussed in detail the method of cultivating sweet potatoes, while in the case of corn, the only note under the sorghum strips said: "Gai is also planted from other sources", and did not say anything about the cultivation method and its importance. Although there are many records about corn in the Fang Zhi, they are generally very simple, most of them only mention that corn is in the product, or describe some different names and traits of corn, and there are only a few accounts about the promotion and its importance. In short, corn has not received the same importance that intellectuals have given to sweet potatoes. Despite this, corn was introduced to China in obscurity, half a century before sweet potato, and corn had spread to twelve provinces by the end of the Ming Dynasty, while sweet potato had only four provinces. This phenomenon reflects a very important fact: The introduction and popularization of new crops mainly depend on the trial planting and expansion of production by the broad masses of peasants. Industrious and intelligent farmers quickly absorb and use corn as a high-yielding crop suitable for dry fields and mountainous areas. For example, the "Huoshan County Chronicles" (Qianlong 41, 1776) in Anhui Province said: "Forty years ago, people only planted one or two plants in the vegetable garden by chance for children to eat, but now they have extended the mountains and valleys, and they have relied on it for year-round food within 200 miles to the southwest." Another example is Hebei's "Zunhua County Chronicles" (Guangxu 12, 1886) records that during the Jiaqing period (1796-1820), someone brought a few corn seeds from Shanxi to Zunhua, and at first they were only planted in vegetable gardens, but in the Guangxu period (1875-1908), they became the common field crops cultivated in the county. It can be seen that the development is rapid. China originally had a fine tradition of intensive cultivation, and the agricultural technology has a fairly high level, so after the introduction, it can quickly master and improve the cultivation technology in combination with the characteristics of crops and local conditions, and cultivate many varieties suitable for the local area, and create a variety of edible methods. The rapid development of maize was after the second half of the eighteenth century. At present, it is cultivated in all provinces and autonomous regions of the country, and its output far exceeds that of millet, often second only to wheat, and ranks third among grain crops.

2. Potatoes (potatoes):

Wild potatoes are native to the Andes Mountains of South America and were cultivated by local Indians. In the 16th century, the Spanish colonists brought it to Europe, in 1586 the British defeated the Spaniards in the Caribbean, collected tobacco and other plant seeds from South America, and brought potatoes to England, the British climate is suitable for the growth of potatoes, higher yields than other grains and easy to manage, in 1650 potatoes have become the main food crop in Ireland, and began to be popularized in Europe, in the 17th century, potatoes have become an important food crop in Europe. It was brought back to the United States by Irish immigrants in 1719 and began to be cultivated in the United States.

In 1840, when potato wilt broke out in Europe, the Irish economy, which was completely dependent on potatoes, was the most affected, facing the most extreme death, almost a million people starved to death, and millions of immigrants fled to the Americas.

In the 17th century, potatoes have spread to China, because potatoes are very suitable for growing in the cold areas where the original grain yield is very low and can only grow wheat, and soon spread in Inner Mongolia, Hebei, Shanxi, northern Shaanxi, potatoes, corn, sweet potatoes and other high-yield crops introduced from the Americas have become the main food of the poor class, and have played an important role in maintaining the rapid growth of the Chinese population.

The question of when potatoes were introduced to our country is currently inconclusive

There are various theories: the first is that the potato was introduced to China in the 16th century, but it became a food crop very late; the second view is that the potato was introduced to China at the end of the Ming Dynasty in the 17th century; the third view is that the year when the potato was introduced to China has not yet been determined, but there are records of potato planting in the county records of Songxi County, Fujian Province before 1700. In other words, before 1700, the potato was introduced to China; the fourth opinion is that The potato was introduced to Europe in the 16th century and to China in the 17th century. It was first cultivated in North China, Beijing, Tianjin, and Shandong, and later spread to Inner Mongolia; the fifth theory is held by the American scholar De Hi Perkins, who believes that the time when the potato was introduced to China was determined by the time when Europeans discovered the Americas and the Pacific Islands. The potato was introduced to China in the 17th century, and it reached the coast of Fujian through the Philippine Islands, and was first cultivated in Fujian; the sixth opinion is that the potato was introduced to China before Xu Guangqi, Because Xu Guangqi (1562-1633) wrote the "Complete Book of Agricultural Administration" recorded "potato", and in the "Complete Book of Agricultural Administration" volume 28, there is the following passage: "The taro, a potato, a yellow du, vine leaves like beans, the roots are round like chicken eggs, and the inner skin is white and yellow,...... Boiled, steamed, boiled taro juice, washed clothes, white as jade.' It can be seen that the introduction of potatoes before 1633 is undoubtedly before 1633.More precisely, potatoes were introduced to China before 1628, and they are widely known and widely cultivated, because 1628 is the approximate time when the "Complete Book of Agricultural Administration" was published.