doi.org
Indigenous Nomenclature Reveals Prehistoric Interaction Related to Cacao in Amazonia and Diffusion to Mesoamerica - Ethnobotany and Economic Botany
Cacao (Theobroma cacao) and related species were initially cultivated in pre-Columbian South America, from where one of 11 genetic groups was introduced into Mesoamerica. Cacao-related terminology is homogeneous across much of Mesoamerica, reflecting a single ancestral form, *kakaw(a), that diffused coincidentally with or subsequently to the species’ introduction ca. 3800 years before present. After European colonization, it also entered languages such as Spanish and English. Here, I focus attention on South America, and ask whether traces of older cultural processes related to the domestication of cacao and spread of cultivated varieties can be detected in linguistic terminology in the continent of its origin. Using a comprehensive set of cacao terms in 336 Indigenous languages, I show statistically how a variable yet consistently definable set of terms recurs at higher than chance frequencies in South America. This finding suggests borrowing of linguistic terminology that occurred deep in the past, plausibly attendant upon the domestication of cacao. The relevant South American set of terms, furthermore, encompasses the Mesoamerican cacao word on formal grounds. This is consistent with a hypothetical scenario in which one or more words originating in South America were introduced to Mesoamerica as the designation of Theobroma cacao concomitantly with the introduction of the tree itself.
