Agaves of Continental North America (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780816523955)

This is an indispensable guide to agaves. The uses of agaves are as many as the arts of man have found it convenient to devise. At least two races of man have invaded Agaveland during the last ten to fifteen thousand years, where, with the help of agaves, they contrived several successive civilizations. The region of greatest use development is Mesoamerica. Here the great genetic diversity in a genus rich in use potential came into the hands of several peoples who developed the main agricultural center of the Americas. Perhaps, as the Aztec legends suggest, it was the animals that first showed man the edibility of agave. Evolution in use ranges all the way from the coincidental and spurious, through tool and food-drink subsistence with mystical overlay, to the practical specialties of modem industry and art. The historic period of agave will be outlined here as briefly as that complicated development will allow.

Author: Howard Scott Gentry
ISBN-10: 0816523959
ISBN-13: 9780816523955
Publisher: University of Arizona Press
Language: English
Published: 04/01/2004
Pages: 670
Format: Paperback
Weight: 3.13lbs
Size: 9.94h x 7.04w x 1.66d