After examining the cobs, the researchers determined that the
Peruvian sites’ ancient occupants didn’t only pop their corn:
they also ground it into flour and may have cooked it in other
ways as well. At this early stage of maize’s history, however,
it didn’t represent a major component of their diet. This would
change by the 12th century, when maize cultivation became vital
to the Inca Empire’s rise and subsequent expansion across Peru.
Corn was first domesticated from a wild grass in Mexico nearly
9,000 years ago, according to study co-author Dolores Piperno, a
curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History.
It then made its way across Central and South America, where
hundreds of distinct maize types—including the ancestors of
sweet corn, which many people eat today—arose. The cobs and
other corn scraps found at Paredones and Huaca Prieta indicate a
diversity of kernel shapes and colors, a sign that this process
was already in full swing. “Our results show that only a few
thousand years [af