History

• Wheat likely originated in the so-called Fertile Crescent of the Middle East, land which extended from Israel along the Mediterranean Sea north to southern Turkey and east to Iraq and the Persian Gulf. It was also probably native to southwestern Asia. Some of the earliest specimens have been discovered in Jordan, Syria, and Turkey. Early types of wheat have been excavated in Iraq, dating to over 11,000 B.C. Archaeological research indicates that wheat was being farmed in Egypt's Nile Valley since before 5,000 B.C., and also in China and India. Sumerians (in what is now southeastern Iraq) around 3100 B.C. wrote about both bread and beer made from wheat.

Geography

• Archaeologists have determined that agriculture began there in the Fertile Crescent region, when people began growing wheat and other crops rather than foraging for them. Other ancient cultivated crops include barley, grapes, dates, and nuts. People in this region also were the first to herd goats, pigs, and sheep. It took only a few centuries for people to do away with hunting and gathering as their main source of food, after many thousands of years obtaining food that way.
  
  The first cultivated crop in the Americas was maize in Mexico, which was not purposely planted in large amounts until around 4,000 B.C..

Significance

• Wheat is very significant in history because it is one of the crops which transformed hunter-gatherers into farmers. People had long gathered wheat where it grew wild, but with agriculture, a more dependable food supply was created. This in turn made life easier with more free time, and people were able to turn more attention to other pursuits such as creating textiles and pottery, and doing woodworking and making tools.
  
  Agriculture, along with herding of animals, allowed for the growth of large permanent communities, as well as a privileged elite class in cities. It also resulted in battles for productive areas, evidenced early in the Bible after Moses led the Israelites to the promised land, where they then had to fight to get it away from the people already living there.
  Egypt was the largest producer of wheat in ancient times, with enormous harvests unequaled even today. It became the basis of the nation's economy. Egyptians first created raised yeast breads as a contrast to the unleavened bread which had been the only type available before.

Effects

• European explorers brought wheat to the Americas, and colonists in New England first grew the plant on an island near Massachusetts in 1602. It did not become an important crop until settlers moved west to the prairies, where the land and the climate was more suited to growing wheat. Eventually that area became known as the country's "bread basket," and the United States became a world exporter as well.

Features

• Today, wheat is second only to rice and corn in grain production and in importance to the world's diet. Wheat is hardy and can be grown in hot climates such as Egypt and Africa as well as in cold windy ones like the Midwestern United States. Countries producing the most wheat are the United States, the European Union, Canada, Australia, China and India.