206 AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST [N. s., 22, 1920
they plant later. We saw many Brazilian beans, and many squashes of various sizes, very good for eating; some tobacco, and roots which they cultivate, the latter having the taste of an artichoke. 1 . . . There were also several fields entirely uncultivated, the land being allowed to remain fallow. When they wish to plant it, they set fire to the weeds, and then work it over with their wooden spades (p. 71).
When the Indians wished to clear forest land they did it in great part by help of fire, according to information obtained in the harbor of Gloucester, Mass.
Some of the land was already cleared up, and they were constantly making clear- ings. Their mode of doing it is as follows: after cutting down the trees at the distance of three feet from the ground, they burn the branches upon the trunk, and then plant their corn between these stumps, in course of time tearing up also the roots (p. 92).
The corn, thus grown, the Indians were accustomed to store in granaries situated nearby and placed partly beneath the surface of the ground. These are locally known as " Indian barns," and have been frequently located in the Connecticut river towns in Massa- chusetts [e.g., George Sheldon, in the History of Deerfield]. These Champlain describes as he finds them at Chatham, Mass., on the Cape.
There is a considerable quantity of land cleared up, and many little hills, where they cultivate corn and the various grains on which they live. . . . All the in- habitants of this place are very fond of agriculture, and provide themselves with Indian corn for the winter, which they store in the following manner: They make trenches in the sand on the slope of the hills, some five to six feet deep, more or
1 Helianthus tuberosus, Jerusalem Artichoke. Its history is thus described by Neltje Blanchan, in Nature's Garden: "In a musty old tome printed in 1649, and entitled 'A Perfect Description of Virginia,' we read that the English planters had ' rootes of several kindes, Potatoes, Sparagus, Garrets and Hartichokes ' not the first mention of artichokes by Anglo-Americans. Long before their day the Indians, who taught them its uses, had cultivated it; and wherever we see the bright yellow flowers gleaming like miniature suns above roadside thickets and fence rows in the East, we may safely infer the spot was once an aboriginal or colonial farm. White men planted it extensively for its edible tubers. ... As early as 1617 the artichoke was introduced into Europe, and only twelve years later Parkinson records that the roots had become very plentiful and cheap in London. The Italians also cultivated it under the name Girasole Articocco (sunflower artichoke), but it did not take long for the girasole to become corrupted into Jerusalem, hence the name Jerusalem artichoke common to this day. When the greater value of the potato came to be generally recognized, the use of artichoke roots gradually diminished."
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