Wheat in history*

Wheat is an ancient grain. Thought to have originated in southwestern Asia, it has been consumed as a food for more than 12,000 years.

Wild grasses resembling wheat in various degrees have been found in many parts of the world. On southwestern Europe and in Asia Minor grows Triticum aegilopoides, a wild grass which might be a parent of one species of wheat, einkorn.

Wheat played an important role of religious significance and was part of the sacred rituals of many cultures. Greek, Roman, Sumerian and Finnish mythology had gods and goddesses of wheat. This exceptionally nutritious grain is still considered to be sacred in some areas of China.

Wheat was the cereal of choice for its bread making properties. Varieties of bread wheat became more common, and overtime bread became commercially available. There is evidence in Athens from the fourth century BC, in Rome from the second. Bread was normally made at home.

The important of cereal in the diet throughout the Roman is confirmed by the Prices Edict (issued by Roman Emperor Diocletian in year 301 AD), which gives first place to wheat, followed by other crops. Wheat was not native to the Western Hemisphere and was only introduced here in the late 15th century when Columbus came to the New World.

Wheat was first cultivated along the Atlantic Coasts in early seventeenth century, moving westwards as the country was settled.

While wheat was grown in the United States during the early colonial years, it was not until the late 19th century that wheat cultivation flourished, owing to the importation of an especially hardy strain of wheat known as Turkey red wheat, which was brought over by Russian immigrants who settled in Kansas.

Today, the largest commercial producers of wheat include the Russian Federation, the United States, China, India, France and Canada.
Wheat in history