1494 - Agriculture
Agriculture
Christopher Columbus plants the first wheat ever seen in the New World, but efforts to cultivate wheat in the West Indies and elsewhere in tropical Spanish America will be uniformly unsuccessful (see 1621).
Christopher Columbus's men find Jamaica covered with 30-foot trees (Pimenta dioica) bearing spicy green berries that turn brown when dried, bear some resemblance to oversized black peppercorns, and have an aroma suggestive of a blend of cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Pimenta officinalis will come to be known as allspice, pimiento, or pimento (Spaniards will call it Pimenta Jamaica, or Jamaica Pepper).
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