What was the earliest food crop in ancient China?

China is one of the oldest ancient civilizations in the world and one of the largest centers of origin of crops in the world. Now many crops were first cultivated from wild plants by working people in China. According to archaeological findings, as early as the early Neolithic period, China planted millet and rice.

Xiaomi: Now we call it Xiaomi, and we call it Xiaomi after hulling. It is cultivated by wild green bristlegrass. Millet is one of the important crops in the loess area of the Yellow River Basin, which has strong drought tolerance and self-growth ability. Carbonized millet grains and shells have been found in Neolithic cultural sites such as Banpo in Xi, Shaanxi, Jiangzhai in Lintong and Beishouling in Baoji. It shows that millet was widely planted in northern China five or six thousand years ago.

Rice: commonly known as rice, it is artificially cultivated from wild rice. A mixture of rice, rice husk, rice stalk and rice leaves was found in Hemudu cultural site more than 7,000 years ago, with an average thickness of about 40 to 50 cm. This is the earliest cultivated rice in the world so far. Indica and japonica rice grains have been found in Neolithic cultural sites in Jianghuai and Jianghan areas, around Taihu Lake and Dianchi Lake in Yunnan, and Jianmen and Haimen in Guangdong. It shows that the original inhabitants of the Yangtze River valley and southern China had mastered the rice planting technology at that time, which shows that China is one of the earliest rice planting areas in the world.

Hemp: Its edible seeds are one of the ancient "five grains" in China. However, hemp is mainly used for spinning and weaving in China. There are traces of flax in the pottery unearthed from Xi 'an Banpo site in Shaanxi Province, which shows that China has a long history of growing cannabis.

During the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, the variety of crops in China began to increase obviously, and the main food crops were millet, rice, millet (commonly known as millet), wheat and glutinous rice (soybean), which basically possessed the main food crops of later generations.

Sorghum: chaotic and drought-tolerant. Its straw is very high and can be used as raw materials for firewood, building materials and manufacturing tools in rural areas. Sorghum rice can also be used to make wine. Therefore, it was also planted in northern China very early. Sorghum was found in the Neolithic cultural sites in Wanquanjing Village, Shanxi Province and Dahezhuang Village, Zhengzhou, Henan Province. Two piles of sorghum (carbonized) were found in the cultural site of the Warring States Period in Zhuangcun Village, Shijiazhuang City, Hebei Province.

Some varieties of food crops cultivated in ancient China first spread to all parts of the world. For example, China's specialty soybean spread to Europe around 1790, when it was only planted as an ornamental plant in Europe. 1873, China soybean was exhibited at the Vienna World Expo, which was a sensation. 1908, 2000 tons of China soybeans were shipped to Britain. Since then, soybeans have been planted on a large scale in European and American countries. Therefore, the names of soybeans in English, French, German and Russian are all similar in pronunciation.

Similarly, some food crops from all over the world that we don't have in China were introduced into China first, and then into China, which enriched our food varieties. For example, corn was introduced from abroad in the Ming Dynasty. It was not taken seriously at first. Planting only in barren fields or hillsides did not show the high yield characteristics of corn. It was not until the mid-Qing Dynasty that corn began to be planted in large areas and became the most important food crop in arid areas, replacing millet to some extent.