Dispersion and ethnobotany of the cacao tree and other Amerindian crop plants

Amerindian coastal shipping along the Pacific coast of America is neglected for the dispersion of pre-columbian crop plants up to now. Indians of the Valdivia Culture and their successors traveled by bout or raft along the co asts from their west ecuadorian home to Peru and Middle America since 2200 B.C, and to Southern Mexico since 1450 B.C. The traveling ceased with the a rrival of Spaniards in 1526. Presumably crop plant export occurred from Western Ecuador to Peru and Midd le America (sweet manioc, Annona cherimla, Carica papaya, early great-grain ed corn) and Mexico (tobacco). On the other hand the pre-columbian crops (P ersea americana, Capsicum annuun) evolved in Mexico were brought to Western Ecuador and neighboring Northern Peru. Shipment by sea would be faster and thus more successful than the time cons uming transportation by land all the way through Colombia and Central Ameri ca. Looking at the distribution map of sweet manioc only shipment of living cut tings appears as a feasible explanation. Similarly one may hypothetize that living plants of Theobroma cacao were shipped from South to Middle America on this Pacific searoute. Since neither wild cacao trees nor primitive cul tigens were found in the area. between Ecuador and Guatemala, thus the land route is highly unlikely. In the Mesoamerican Pre-classic Culture region th e existence of cacao tree is proven since 500 B.C., about thousand years la ter than the first contact of west-ecuadorian Indians with Mexico. The use of T. cacao in indigenous medicine is reported. Surprisingly there is no evidence for pre-columbian domestication of cacao in its natural habi tat Amazonia. This may be explained by the great popularity of similar but much stronger acting drugs like the caffeine drug Guarana and the cocain dr ug Erythroxylum coca var. ipadu.