Growing up in Iran, I always wondered about certain crop names in Farsi. Strawberry, for example, is “توت فرنگی” (toot-e farangi) which roughly translates to “the Frankish berry” or “the European berry.” As a kid I found that name interesting, yet strange. What did Europe have to do with a berry we ate every day?
This week’s lecture answered a question I had carried for years. The modern garden strawberry was developed in 18th-century France as a hybrid of two wild American species, then introduced to Iran from Europe, hence the name.
“The crop itself carries the story of its domestication and origin right in what we call it.”
That hit differently when I thought about my grandfather. Every time I visited him during carrot harvest season, the last day of the trip he would take me out to his farm. We would pick carrots together and fill big boxes and bags for me to bring home because I loved carrot juice. He took such pride in those farms.
Carrots are believed to have first been domesticated in the region of modern-day Iran and Afghanistan. Without knowing it, or maybe he knew all along and I was just too young to ask, he was farming a crop that his ancestors had a hand in shaping over thousands of years of artificial selection.
It is one thing to read about the Fertile Crescent in a geography class. It is another to realize the food on your table and the names you grew up saying are living artifacts of those 10,000-year-old domestication events.
From your HORT 162 reflection, “Foundations of Modern Crop Production.” The title and excerpt display are editorial choices for this sample archive.