Brief Carrot History and Timeline
Both the wild and the cultivated carrots belong to the species Daucus carota. Wild carrot is distinguished by the name Daucus carota, Carota, whereas domesticated carrot belongs to Daucus carota, sativus.
The Carrot has a somewhat obscure history, surrounded by doubt and enigma and it is difficult to 
pin down when domestication took place. The wide distribution of Wild Carrot, the absence of carrot root remains in archaeological excavations and lack of documentary evidence do not enable us to determine precisely where and when carrot domestication was initiated.
Over thousands of years it moved from being a small, tough, bitter and spindly root to a fleshy, sweet, pigmented unbranched edible root. Even before the introduction of domesticated carrots., wild plants were grown in gardens as medicinal plants. Unravelling its progress through the ages is complex and inconclusive, but nevertheless a fascinating journey through time and the history of mankind.
pin down when domestication took place. The wide distribution of Wild Carrot, the absence of carrot root remains in archaeological excavations and lack of documentary evidence do not enable us to determine precisely where and when carrot domestication was initiated.Over thousands of years it moved from being a small, tough, bitter and spindly root to a fleshy, sweet, pigmented unbranched edible root. Even before the introduction of domesticated carrots., wild plants were grown in gardens as medicinal plants. Unravelling its progress through the ages is complex and inconclusive, but nevertheless a fascinating journey through time and the history of mankind.
The Wild Carrot is the progenitor (wild ancestor) of the domestic carrot. It is clear that the Wild Carrot and Domestic Carrot are not the same species and both co-exist in the modern world. It is a popular myth that domestic carrot was developed from Wild Carrot, probably because of its similar smell and taste. Botanists have failed to develop an edible vegetable from the wild root and when cultivation of garden carrots lapses a few generations, it reverts to another ancestral type, a species that is quite distinct.
Wild Carrot is indigenous to Europe and parts of Asia and, from archaeological evidence, seeds have been found dating since Mesolithic times, approximately 10000 years ago. One cannot imagine that the root would have been used at that time, but the seeds are known to be medicinal and it is likely the seeds were merely gathered rather than actually cultivated.
Wild carrot has a small, tough pale fleshed bitter white root; modern domestic carrot has a swollen, juice sweet root, usually orange. Carrots originated in present day Afghanistan about 5000 years ago, probably originally as a purple or yellow root like those pictured here. Nature then took a hand and produced mutants and natural hybrids, crossing both with cultivated and wild varieties. It is considered that purple carrots were then taken westwards where it is thought yellow mutants and wild forms crossed to produce orange. Finally some motivated Dutch growers took these mutant orange carrots under their horticultural wings and developed them to be sweeter and more practical. It's a long story.
Time Period | Location | Colour |
Pre-900s | Afghanistan and vicinity | Purple and yellow |
900s | Iran and northern Arabia | Purple, Red and yellow |
1000s | Syria and North Africa | Purple, Red and yellow |
1100s | Spain | Purple and yellow |
1200s | Italy and China | Purple and red |
1300s | France, Germany, The Netherlands | Red, Yellow & White |
1400s | England | Red & white |
| 1500's | Northern Europe | Orange, Yellow & Red |
1600s | Japan | Purple and yellow |
1600s | North America | Orange and white |
1700s | Japan | Orange and Red |
| Sources - Rubatzsky and Banga. Also Carrot Museum's Curator research material Reference material is here.Notes: Red was often confused with purple. Orange carrots may have been around well before 1100 - see here. The above listing is a "best guess" as there is much conflicting evidence. Carrots were also probably White throughout these periods, often confused with Parsnips (also white). There was (and still is!) enormous confusion when trying to sort out the individual histories of carrots and parsnips. The Latin name for the parsnip genus is thought to come from, meaning "food". This would further explain the historical confusion of the two vegetables, as well as offer a testament to how important they both were in the ancient diet. | ||
Early evidence
Fossil pollen from the Eocene period (55 to 34 million years ago) has been identified as belonging to the Apiaceae (the carrot family).
Almost five thousand years ago, carrots were firstly cultivated in the Iranian Plateau and then in Persian Empire. Western and Arabic literatures along with the studies by US Department of Agriculture (USDA) reveal that carrots were originated in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran. It should be noted, however, that there were no Afghanistan or Pakistan in those olden days and the Iranian Plateau (a term which covers Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran) must be considered as the land of origin for carrots.
The Carrot Field of Iran |
 |
| There is a specific place in present day Iran that is called as the Carrot Field or Carrot Plain (in Persian: Dasht-e Haveej د شت هویج ). That Field may be an evidence for the long standing historical record of carrot recognition and cultivation in Iran. The Field is located in Afjeh village near Lavasan, a city north east of Tehran the capital of Iran. Presently, the farming activities in the Carrot Field are reported as various crops (but not much carrots) and fruits (mostly Cherry گیلا س ). |
It is said that the cultivated and edible carrot dates back about 5,000 years ago when the purple root was found to be growing in the area now known as Afghanistan. Temple drawings from Egypt in 2000 BC show a purple plant, which some Egyptologists believe could have been a purple carrot. However Egyptian papyruses containing information about treatments with seeds were found in pharaoh crypts but there is no direct or documentary reference to carrot.
Many colourful varieties were later found in Asia and there is also evidence of their use in Greece during the Hellenistic period. However, it is not known whether or not the Egyptians or Greeks cultivated a very edible plant or if they only grew wild carrots. Mostly they were used medicinally. It likewise found a place as a medicinal plant in the gardens of ancient Rome, where it was used as an aphrodisiac and in some cases as part of a concoction to prevent poisoning. Mithridates VI, King of Pontius (120bc-63bc) had a recipe including Cretan carrots seeds, which actually worked!
Carrots were said to be recognized as one of the plants in the garden of the Egyptian king Merodach-Baladan in the eighth century B.C, once again there is no documentary evidence for this.
The Carrot was well known to the ancients, and was mentioned by Greek and Latin writers by various names, but it was Galen (circa second century A.D.) who called it Daucus to distinguish the Carrot from the Parsnip. Carrot and parsnip have often been confused in historical references and in many cases were interchangeable, as those early carrots which were "dirty white" were very similar (in looks at least) to parsnip. They are of course from the same family. In classical and mediaeval writings both vegetables seem to have been sometimes called pastinaca yet each vegetable appears to be well under cultivation in Roman times. Since in many cases only the written word exists, if the Medieval writer called the plants "pastinaca", it is difficult to know if they were referring to carrots or parsnips.
Throughout the Classical Period and the Middle Ages writers constantly confused carrots and parsnips. This may seem odd given that the average carrot is about six inches long and bright orange while a parsnip is off white and can grow 3 feet, but this distinction was much less obvious before early modern plant breeders got to work. The orange carrot is a product of the 16th and 17th centuries probably in the Low Countries. Its original colour varied between dirty white and pinkish purple. Both vegetables have also got much fatter and fleshier in recent centuries, and parsnips may have been bred to be longer as well. In other words early medieval carrots and parsnips were both thin and woody and mostly of a vaguely whitish colour. This being the case, almost everyone up to the early modern period can perhaps be forgiven for failing to distinguish between the two, however frustrating this may be for the food or agriculture historian.
Pedanius Dioscorides (c. 40-90ad) catalogued over 600 medicinal plant species during his first century travels as a roman army doctor and accurately describes the modern carrot.
The name Carota for the garden Carrot is found first in the Roman writings of Athenaeus in 200 A.D., and in a book on cookery by Apicius Czclius in 230 A.D.
After the fall of Rome, a period often referred to as the Dark Ages, carrots stopped being widely seen (or at least recorded) in Europe until the Arabs reintroduced them to Europe in the Middle Ages around 1100. Scribes continued to reproduce and embellish previous manuscripts, rather than observing and representing the existing native plants,
The third book of Dioscorides the Greek – Roots - sets out an account of roots, juices, herbs, and seeds — suitable both for common use and for medications. The Greek Herbal of Dioscorides: Illustrated by a Byzantine in A.D. 512. gives an illustration of an orange carrot, probably the first depiction and certainly well before other illustrations in the 16th century. (modern translation here)
Domestication
The purple carrot existed in Central Asia for several centuries before it was brought west by the Arabs in about the 10th century.
The purple carrot existed in Central Asia for several centuries before it was brought west by the Arabs in about the 10th century.
Modern research has shown that there are two distinct groups of cultivated carrots from which the modern orange carrot derives, these are distinguished by their root colours and features of the leaves and flowers.
Eastern carrot (anthocyanin) - identified by its purple and/or yellow branched root, grey green leaves which are poorly dissected and an early flowering habit. Eastern carrot was probably spread by Moorish invaders via Northern Africa to Spain in the 12th century. It is considered that the purple carrot was brought westward as far as the Arab countries from Afghanistan (where the purple carrots of antiquity are still grown).
Western carrot (carotene) - identified by its yellow, orange, white or red unbranched root and yellowish green leaves more clearly dissected and slightly hairy. It is thought that Western carrots originated later in Asia Minor, around Turkey and could have formed from a mutant which removed the anthocyanin (purple colour).
The origin of the cultivated carrot is clearly acknowledged to be purple and in the Afghanistan region mainly because it was known to exist there well before reliable literature references or paintings gave evidence of Western carotene carrots. It is thought the carotene carrot was domesticated in the regions around Turkey. The precise date is not known but thought to be before the 8th century.
The purple carrot spread into the Mediterranean in the 10th century where it is thought a yellow mutant appeared. The purple and yellow carrots both gradually spread into Europe in subsequent centuries. It is considered that the white carrot is also a mutant of yellow varieties.
Orange carrots probably arrived from mutations of yellow forms, and then from human selection and development, probably in the Netherlands. It is thought that humans made selections from a gene pool involving yellow rooted eastern carrots, cultivated white-rooted derivatives of wild carrot (grown as medicinal plants since classical times) and wild unselected populations of adjacent Daucus Carota subspecies in Europe and the Mediterranean.
Some scholars think that orange carrots did not to appear until the 16th century, although there is a Byzantine manuscript of 512 ad, and an 11th century illuminated script, both of which depict an orange rooted carrot, and suggesting it was around long before. (see here)
After the fall of Rome, gardens and vegetables are rarely mentioned again until 795 ad, when King Charlemagne included carrots in the list of plants recommended for cultivation in the Frankish empire covering western and central Europe.
It is known that purple or red and yellow carrots were cultivated in Iran and Arabia in the 10th century and in Syria
in the 11th.
By the 12th century carrots were reported in Spain, followed by Italy in the 13th, France, Germany and Holland by the 14th century. English sightings occur in the 15th century.
in the 11th.By the 12th century carrots were reported in Spain, followed by Italy in the 13th, France, Germany and Holland by the 14th century. English sightings occur in the 15th century.
Throughout the Medieval writings, carrots are confused with parsnips. When Linnaeus created scientific names, he called carrots Daucus carota parsnips Pastinaca sativa, so the two are clearly different. Before Linnaeus, however, Pastinaca sativa was used for both plants.
Fuchs in 1542 described red and yellow garden carrots and wild carrots, but names them all Pastinaca (Meyer Trueblood and Heller1999).
Gerard (1633) uses the English name carrot, but calls it Pastinaca in Latin: Pastinaca sativa var. tenuifolia, the yellow carrot and Pastinaca sativa atro-rubens, the red carrot. Gerard distinguishes parsnips from carrots and calling the parsnip Pastinaca latifolia sativa and P. latifolia sylvestris. Gerard notes the name similarity and is dissatisfied with it. He gives daucus as a name for carrot in Galen, but notes that many Roman writers called it pastinaca or other names.
The plants were not confused on purpose, but since we have in many cases only the written word, if the Medieval writer referred to "pastinaca", it is impossible to know if they were carrots or parsnips.
Many 16th century herbalists made reference to the cultivation and use of carrot roots and seeds, including its efficacy against the bites of venomous beasts and a whole manner of stomach ailments. (See Herbals and Manuscripts page here)
The Spanish introduced the carrot on the island of Margarita, off the coast of Venezuela, in1565.
North America, particularly the parts that would become the Thirteen Colonies, got its carrots somewhat later, with the arrival of the first English settlers in Virginia in1609. When the English moved into Australia in 1788, carrots were with them there, as well.
The modern orange carrot was developed and stabilised by Dutch growers in the 16-17th century, evidenced from variety names and contemporary art works. (Art pages start here). A tale, probably apocryphal, has it that the orange carrot was bred in the Netherlands in the seventeenth century to honour William of Orange. Though the orange carrot does date from the Netherlands in the sixteenth century, it is unlikely that honouring William of Orange had anything to do with it! Some astute historian managed to install the myth that the aboriculturists work on an unexpected mutation was developed especially to give thanks to King William I as a tribute to him leading the Dutch revolt against the Spanish to gain independence from Spain. There is no documentary evidence for this story!
Whatever the origins, the Long Orange Dutch cultivar, first described in writing in 1721, is the progenitor of the orange Horn carrot varieties (Early Scarlet Horn, Early Half Long, Late Half Long). All modern, western carotene varieties ultimately descend from these varieties. The Horn Carrot derives from the Netherlands town of Hoorn in the neighbourhood of which it was probably developed. Horenshce Wortelen (carrots of Hoorn) were common on the Amsterdam market in 1610. The earliest English seedsmen list Early Horn and Long Orange.
Some images of the carrots varieties which Vilmorin described in "The Vegetable Garden" in 1856 :
 |  |  |  |
| Early Half Long | Dutch Horn | English Horn | Half Long Danvers |
In 1753 Linnaeus published the "Species Plantarum," and established conventions for the naming of living organisms that became universally accepted in the scientific world, including Daucus Carota.
The cheap and accessible orange root was constantly popular as a staple food throughout Victorian times and became even more so during the two World Wars when other food sources became scarce.
Research and development continues to take place to produce disease resistant varieties, together with research into other uses for the root such a bio fuel and its use in construction as an alternative to fibre glass.
The current yellow/orange varieties (containing carotene) through gradual selection in Europe, now form the basis of the commercial cultivars around the world, mainly through their superior taste, versatility and nutritional value.
There is a lot more detail of the history of carrots through the ages, and the next pages in the Carrot Museum go on to give the full history from pre-historic seeds, to Ancient Egypt in 2000 bc. through to how the Greeks and Romans used carrots in medicine and then food.
There is a more detailed analysis of the available evidence surrounding its origins, cultivation and domestication, and journey across Europe, also exploring the emergence of the ubiquitous orange carrot, here.
Follow its steps through the dark ages and then enlightenment with 17th century herbalists who recommended carrots and their seeds for a wide variety of ailments. Finally after many years as a low class vegetable, mainly used for animal fodder, it came of age during the food scarcity of the two World Wars, and people had to be more inventive with fewer resources.
It is a long and fascinating story.
There is a more comprehensive study and analysis of the various theories of the domestication of carrots and the arrival of the orange carrot on the page dedicated to the Road to Domestication and the Colour Orange - here.
