Chrysti the Wordsmith > Radio Scripts

On November 6, 1492, Christopher Columbus sent two of his men to the interior of a Caribbean island to search for a much anticipated Oriental kingdom and its splendid riches. The Spanish explorers never found that opulent city; instead they were greeted by scores of native islanders, called the Taino, who treated the visitors hospitably and bestowed them with gifts and food.

Columbus' historian wrote that one of the gifts was "a sort of grain like millet,...which it very well tasted when boiled, roasted, or made into porridge." Today we know that grain as corn, but the Taino islanders, and in turn, the Spanish and other Europeans called it maize.

From the Caribbean to Mexico, north and east to what is now Canada, the indigenous people of the Americas had been growing and harvesting this cereal crop for thousands of years before Columbus' arrival. There were many names for this grain throughout the New World, but the word maize was popularized as its seeds were distributed around the globe by traders and travelers. Translated into English from the extinct Taino language, maize means "our mother" or "our life."

Radio Script > Maize