Figure 69—Floral Remains.
Figure 70—Floral Remains.
Maize (Zea mays) was originally thought to have descended from teosinte, (Euchlaena), a wild plant occurring in Mexico. Now however, most authorities believe that a primitive maize originated as a distinct plant. (Mangelsdorf and Reeves, 1939). Teosinte, according to their hypothesis is a later hybrid of maize and its distant relative, Tripsacum. (A common species of Tripsacum is Gama grass.) Pollen studies of deep cores taken in Mexico City indicate that wild maize may have grown in that area well back into the last iinterglacial. (Barghoorn, Wolfe and Clisby, 1954).
From these obscure beginnings, maize underwent considerable development and diversification, and later in many cases mixed with teosinte. One of the basic races which evolved is represented by a modern Mexican type called “Chapalote”. (Wellhausen et al., 1952). The three specimens assigned to Complex D at LoDaisKa were identified as belonging to the Chapalote type. W. C. Galinat has reviewed the early distribution of Chapalote as follows: “The present-day Mexican race of maize called ‘Chapalote’ was one of the basic races in North America in prehistoric times. A re-examination of the actual cobs, photographs or descriptive literature covering 14 sites in northwestern Mexico and the southwestern United States suggests, that the archaeological maize from this area was either pre-Chapalote, Chapalote or a more evolved and more tripsacoid derivative called ‘Basketmaker’ corn. The Mexican states with prehistoric Chapalote are Michoacan (lava impressions), Sonora (Dark Cave), and Chihuahua (Swallow Cave, Slab Cave, Tau Cave, Olla Cave). In the region now the United States, Chapalote occurred in Arizona (Richards Cave, Tonto Cave, Painted Cave), Colorado (Cottonwood Cave, LoDaisKa Cave), and New Mexico (Bat Cave, Tularosa Cave, Cebollita Cave).”[8]
In investigating interrelationships one criterion to consider is the degree of evolution of the Chapalote: Specimens from LoDaisKa are less primitive than the pre-Chapalote pod-pop corn from the first stratum of Bat Cave (Dick, n.d., and Mangelsdorf and Smith, 1949). At the other extreme they are less evolved than the material from Cottonwood Cave. (Hurst, 1948). They are closer to some of the specimens from the pre-ceramic levels of Swallow Cave, Chihuahua (Mangelsdorf and Lister, 1956).
A second criterion for comparison is the amount of mixing with teosinte. Several archaeological sequences in this area show a rather sudden alteration in maize type due to an introgression of teosinte, e.g. Bat Cave, Swallow Cave, Tularosa Cave. Mangelsdorf and Lister (op. cit., p. 173-4) conclude that “a very marked change in the maize of northwestern Mexico and adjoining area of New Mexico occurred at about 750 ± 250 A.D.” The LoDaisKa specimens show no evidence of teosinte introgression. In this they approximate most closely the pre-ceramic material from Swallow Cave, maize from Strata II and III of Bat Cave and early levels of Tularosa Cave.
Figure 71—Zea mays, Chapalote type.
Above, fragments of cobs from LoDaisKa Site.
Below, Modern Chapalote maize. (Lent by W. C. Galinat).
2× actual size.