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Gardens of New Spain
How Mediterranean Plants and Foods Changed America
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William W. Dunmire
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Illustrator:
Evangeline L. Dunmire
Language:
English
Published/Copyright:
2004
About this book
When the Spanish began colonizing the Americas in the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, they brought with them the plants and foods of their homeland—wheat, melons, grapes, vegetables, and every kind of Mediterranean fruit. Missionaries and colonists introduced these plants to the native peoples of Mexico and the American Southwest, where they became staple crops alongside the corn, beans, and squash that had traditionally sustained the original Americans. This intermingling of Old and New World plants and foods was one of the most significant fusions in the history of international cuisine and gave rise to many of the foods that we so enjoy today. Gardens of New Spain tells the fascinating story of the diffusion of plants, gardens, agriculture, and cuisine from late medieval Spain to the colonial frontier of Hispanic America. Beginning in the Old World, William Dunmire describes how Spain came to adopt plants and their foods from the Fertile Crescent, Asia, and Africa. Crossing the Atlantic, he first examines the agricultural scene of Pre-Columbian Mexico and the Southwest. Then he traces the spread of plants and foods introduced from the Mediterranean to Spain’s settlements in Mexico, New Mexico, Arizona, Texas, and California. In lively prose, Dunmire tells stories of the settlers, missionaries, and natives who blended their growing and eating practices into regional plantways and cuisines that live on today in every corner of America.
Author / Editor information
William W. Dunmire (1930–2019) of Placitas, New Mexico, was a retired National Park Service naturalist and writer-photographer on natural history topics.
Reviews
With a light hand, William Dunmire traces the fascinating journeys of plants--from the gardens of the Alhambra, to the floating gardens of Xochimilco, to the sunken gardens of California's Mission San Luis Rey, and to all points in between. Deeply learned, with splendid maps, illustrations, and tables, this is an invaluable reference, but it is also a delight to read.
— David WeberGardens of New Spain is certainly approachable by gardeners, cooks, and amateurs of Southwestern studies as well as professional historians...it is an important addition to the sparse literature in English on the Old Southwest in the colonial era.
— Sixteenth Century JournalThis scholarly document will be as enduring as the plants upon which it focuses and will reach a wide public audience because of its writing style.
— New Mexico Historical ReviewTopics
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Frontmatter
i -
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Contents
v -
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List of Tables
vii -
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List of Maps
viii -
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Preface
ix -
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Prologue
xvii -
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Chapter 1 Pre-Columbian Spain—The Full Hourglass
1 -
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Chapter 2 Mexico before Columbus
31 -
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Chapter 3 Pre-Columbian Agriculture in the American Southwest
59 -
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Chapter 4 European Plantways to the New World: 1492–1521
83 -
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Chapter 5 Old World Agriculture Comes to the Mexican Mainland
111 -
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Chapter 6 Spanish Trade, Technology, and Livestock
147 -
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Chapter 7 New Mexico’s First Mediterranean Gardens
163 -
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Chapter 8 Into Sonora and Arizona
195 -
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Chapter 9 The Corridor into Texas
229 -
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Chapter 10 Hispanic Farmers Return to New Mexico
263 -
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Chapter 11 Mediterranean Connections to Florida and California
291 -
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Epilogue
309 -
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Appendix: Master Plant List
315 -
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Glossary
325 -
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Sources
329 -
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Selected Bibliography
343 -
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Index
363
Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
November 3, 2021
eBook ISBN:
9780292797314
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook ISBN:
9780292797314
Audience(s) for this book
For a non-specialist adult audience
