品種分類に映し出される人びとと植物との関わり
エチオピア西南部の農耕民マロの事例から
1997 年 1997 巻 51 号 p. 29-50
詳細
1997 年 1997 巻 51 号 p. 29-50
This study describes the folk classifications of cultivated plant varieties among the Malo with special reference to their classifications of boyna, taro [Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott] and uutsa, enset [Ensete ventricosum (Welw.) Cheesman.].
The Malo, one of the Omotic-speaking agricultural peoples, live in the steep mountainous area of Southwestern Ethiopia, whose elevations range from 600m to 3, 400m above the sea level. Their population is about 70, 000.
The people cultivate about eighty kinds of plants, and give them vernacular names almost in accordance to taxonomic species. However, this classification differs from the botanical taxonomy because it is basically a practical classification based on the way they cultivate and utilize. Thus, I call these vernacular names ‘folk species’.
They recognize varieties among the twenty-three folk species which most of the people cultivate. In particular, they recognize a number of varieties among the root and cereal crops which are important staple foods. Furthermore, they classify several major varieties of taro and enset into ‘sub-varieties’ according to the slight differences in color of the petiole or pseudostem. Therefore, there is a tendency for the plants which most of the people cultivate and value highly to be classified in detail.
It may be partly due to their interests which vary with the degree of each plant's importance to them. But from my observation in the fields, those plants that are classified in detail exhibit great variation in morphology and color. Then it seems quite natural for them to be classified into such large numbers.
Such great variation among cultivated plants is now considered to have been formed in the interactive processes between the human and the plants. I think, in the processes, the selection has been for those plants that are valued highly and paid much attention to. It is indicated by the Malo behavior to their cultivated plants that they add into their varieties' inventory what are considered new to them. In this light, the Malo folk classifications of cultivated plants is thought to be understood as suggesting such selection processes and reflecting the interactive relationships between the people and the plants.
