The History of Rice And its Domestication

Introduction

We all know rice, right? It’s such a common and popular cereal grain, that, in all likely hood, is something that most everyone tried at least once throughout their lives. To many of us, it’s not very spectacular or impressive. It’s just the common white rice. It’s a simple, basic meal that is a good source of energy and nothing more.

But you might be a little wrong in some of those assumptions. Oh, sure, it is a basic meal. It is a great source of energy. And it might be common, but it is far from unimpressive. In fact, rice is the single most popular grain on the planet; feeding well over half of the earth’s population. Chances are, in any place on earth, there’s someone, somewhere, enjoying some rice right now!

Another detail to note is the rice is really not “simple”, at least not in the traditional sense of the word. There are thousands upon thousands of varieties of rice that exist today! Over 100,000 varieties are stored in seed banks around the world, although, it is worth noting that many of them are no longer cultivated in any reasonable degree and are mostly preserved out of historical value and for worst-case scenarios. At the current time, only around 40, 000 varieties are still actively cultivated around the world; not an insignificant number of course, but a little sad in some ways. And these varieties can be used in so many different dishes! From food like risotto to sushi to biryani to dosa to rice pudding to sake and so on. Rice is an incredibly versatile and interesting grain that’s a cornerstone for the cuisine of many different cultures!

These varieties can be fairly similar to one another but that’s not the case for all of them. Many have numerous differences between each other to the point where it can be surprising that they’re technically the same species of rice at all. Texture, strength, starch content, even color can vary significantly from grain to grain.

As a note on the last point, color is generally a reliable way to note different varieties of rice, barring one exception: Brown Rice. All white rice starts off as brown rice in their life-cycle, with the brown pigment being several outer layers on the rice grain. Removing these outer layers can provide for a much more pleasant eating experience, as it makes the rice softer, lighter, less hardy and arguably even more flavorful, although this does come at the expense of nutritional content that is lost in the process. Other colors like red and greens are much clearer indicators of differing varieties due to the presence of pigments not commonly found in other varieties.

Where did all this rice come from?

One might ask; where did many of these varieties come from? Did they all exist naturally? While that might be the case for some of them, most of them were actually domesticated and specifically cultivated by humans to suit specific needs, like certain climates, resources, and even just cultural preference. That last point is worth noting, since it can be very important for many people. In fact, some rice grains are cultivated to preserve certain traits so well, that it is done at the expense of the rice’s health! For example, one specific rice called Ambemohar is heavily prized for its fragrance in certain regions of India, however, the rice is heavily susceptible to disease after being so cultivated for so many years. But this is not a concern for the people who desire this rice; if anything, its difficulty and rarity make it a much more prized cooking ingredient.

Rice is part of the Poaceae family of plants; it’s a fairly broad family of grasses and cereal grains that includes other plants like maize, wheat and bamboo. In fact, if you look at these plants, many similarities can be seen around them, such as their leaf shapes and even the way they produce their grain. This family is widespread throughout the world, although Rice as we know it, was primarily found in two separate regions in the world. And it was in these two regions that rice was domesticated and cultivated by humans, but interestingly they were domesticated at different times, independently from one another; a sort of convergent evolution in a sense, one might argue!

While these two grains are both “rice” in the typical sense, they are still different species from each other and, as a result, they are fairly different from each other, so it is only right to give each specific species its due and look at them both!

Oryza Sativa

The first one is Oryza Sativa or Asian Rice. This is the most common and popular rice available to us. If a person has eaten rice only once in their life time, it is more than likely that this is the species of rice that they have eaten. It is the earliest version of domesticated rice; some estimates state that this specific rice was domesticated as early as 13,500 years ago although more reasonable estimates place the number around 8000 to 9000 years ago; still a might long time ago! It was first cultivated in China, upon the banks of the Yangtze River basin. Prior to this, millet were the primary grain consumed in China but over time, rice gradually became the dominant grain consumed in the region; while the northern regions (where millet was primarily grown and consumed) were unsuited for growing rice, the yields of rice in South China were so large and plentiful that they easily dwarfed the amount of millet being produced, making rice the popular core food stuff in the region, and further encouraging its spread to the greater area around like India, Indonesia, Thailand and so on, where it would become a dominant core grain.

As an interesting note, the rice species that was originally domesticated all those thousands of years ago, was not Oryza Sativa, but a wild ancestor; domestication and specific breeding resulted in the Sativa breed we use today, and curiously, even within the species that are some prominent divergences which are worth looking at.

Japonica Rice

First off, we have Japonica rice (also known as Sinica Rice), which is the traditional “form” of Oryza Sativa. As such, it should come as no surprise that this specific variant remains popular in and around the region it was first cultivated: China, Japan and their immediate neighbors. It is also arguably the more popular variant of Oryza Sativa. It is immediately recognizable due to the shape of the grain; each grain is round and short, almost oval-like in shape. When cooked, they develop a very mild and neutral taste and they also become very, very sticky. This is an important characteristic of this rice, and it is what makes it so popular in the East-Asian region. Japonica rice has a very high content of a starch called amylopectin; this starch is what gives the rice its characteristic stickiness and glutenous texture. This stickiness is heavily desired for this rice as it makes it perfect for dishes like Sushi and Onigiri, which need the rice’s stickiness to hold their shape during preparation. In fact, this stickiness is how this specific rice can be eaten with chopsticks! Some of the specific breeds of rice in this variant are Akita Komachi and Koshihikari.

Indica Rice

Meanwhile, the other prominent divergence for Oryza Sativa is called Indica rice, and this specific variant showcases how Sativa has changed significantly over time. Oryza Sativa did not remain in the East Asian area, but eventually migrated further south towards Indonesia, Thailand and, very importantly for this variety, India. Upon reaching the Indian subcontinent, farmers there took the opportunity to breed Oryza Sativa with another local rice breed; the result was a shift away from the traditional characteristics of Oryza Sativa; instead of short, round grains, the grains were now long and thin. The rice, upon cooking developed a subtle, almost nutty flavor and a floral aroma and, very importantly, the rice did not stick together after being cooked. This new breed of Indica Rice had a much lower amylopectin content and instead had a much higher amylose content, which resulted in a fluffier grain upon cooking but also allowed the grain to flake apart easily. This “dry” texture was perfect for dishes like Biryani and Pulao. But if you try to eat most Indica rices with chopsticks, you’re going to have a bad time, since you’ll only be able to life one grain at a time; it is possibly that this is one reason why Indian people seem to prefer to eat rice with their hands. Some of the breeds in this variant are Basmati and Ambemohar.

Interestingly, it would be wrong to say that all Indica rice follows this specific trend of “non-sticky”, flakiness. In South India for example, there are specific varieties of Indica rice like Sona Masuri and Pooni that have been cultivated to have lower amylose content than most other Indica rice. These are particularly useful for certain dishes in the region like Idli and Dosa, which are made from crushing the rice into a paste; the low amylopectin content of traditional Indica rices would prevent this paste from binding with itself like a dough, but by lowering the amylose content and increasing the amylopectin slightly, they developed a grain that acts as a sort of “middle” ground; not quite as sticky as Japonica rice, but not as flaky as Indica rice.

Similarly, in Thailand, another variety of Indica rice was developed in a similar way; Jasmine rice, is a sticky long-grain rice; much sticker than the South Indian rice varieties but that has a very fragrant and distinct flavor to it. These broad examples showcase how these rices can be incredibly similar yet incredibly different from one another; everyone who gets rice just seeks to domesticate it to suit their needs and shift it slightly!

Oryza Glaberrima

So, we’ve looked at Oryza Sativa and so many of its sub-varieties and we’ve seen how different they can be. But things get even more different at this point, when we look at the second large species of rice, Oryza Glaberrima

Oryza Glaberrima, also known as African Rice, was first grown in West Africa, around 3000 years ago. As mentioned before, it was actually domesticated independently from Asian rice and as such, is completely different from its sister species. When it was first cultivated, the region used to be a great deal wetter but over time as the region became hotter and drier, the rice seemed to let itself become domesticated, becoming dependent on humans providing enough water through irrigation! It was incredibly popular in its birth region and remains popular to this day, with many people from the area preferring it to its counterpart, but it sadly has failed to make a significant mark outside of its region because it faces such stiff competition from its sister. Furthermore, because it was domesticated only 3000 years ago, compared to Asian rice’s lower estimate of 8000 years, it has not had the chance to diversify and specialize in the same way that Asian rice as with the Indica and Japonica variants.

The same but different...

Oryza Glaberrima and Oryza Sativa are both rice in the traditional sense of the world, but they’re also incredibly different from one another. For example, African Rice tends to be much hardier than Asian rice. Having grown in its harsh, arid environment, it is much more resilient to temperature change, lack of water and harsh living conditions. And it also is said to have a better nutritional content than its Asian counterpart; this specific piece of information is a little suspect, but on general people have claimed that African rice provides much more energy than Asian rice.

However, it is not all perfect; African rice has been noted to shatter quite easily. “Shattering” is a little different from what it sounds like; it not actually about the breaking of individual grains, but rather the plant releasing the ripened grain to eventually grown into a new plant. This is perfectly fine for Wild rice, but for domesticated rice this is a huge problem. Why? Because we want to eat the rice! If a rice breed has a high level of shattering, that prevents us from being able to harvest all of the ripened rice grain for our own consumption. This high level of shattering in African rice is noted to be a result of its relatively recent domestication; basically, it is still “wild” to some extent and it prevents us from being able to harvest all of the crop when it is time to do so and as a result, this significantly lowers yields of African rice. This is a significant issue for this species and furthermore, since it has not had the chance to specialize for specific cultural niches and wants like the Indica and Japonica rices, it does not have significant influence to spread outside its regional bubble.

Attempts have been made to cross-breed African and Asian rice, but unfortunately, the two are completely different species from each other, which makes the process very difficult. While they are both rice, being different species generally makes the hybrids less than the sum of their parts; more often than not, they will not have any of the desired characteristics and are also sterile, ensuring that they cannot proliferate even if we wanted them. Still, efforts continue to be made on this front; should we develop a rice species with the strengths of both species, it can be incredibly beneficial to literally billions of people. But until then, we will have to stick with our specific rice niches.

As a separate note, Oryza Sativa and Oryza Glaberrima are not the only to species of rice to exist; they are simply the ones with the widest availability. There are actually many other Oryza strains like Rugipogon, Nivara, Australiensis and more (See images below). Most of these are wild rices; for example Oryza Rugipogon is the ancestor of Oryza Sativa, still found in its native regions today while Oryza Nivara was the species that was crossed with Oryza sativa to give us the Indica sub-branch. Meanwhile, Oryza Australiensis is a wild variety only found in Australia. There are so many different varieties of rice that are found in the wild, that it can seem strange that we’re limited to just two for our day-to-day lives.

Oryza Rugipogon

Oryza Nivara

Oryza Australiensis

There's a Rice for Everyone!!

But even these two varieties are more than enough for us. Even just Asian rice has provided so many thousands of sub varieties for us to use. Among the numerous varieties of rice that I’ve already mentioned, there are so many others. For example, Arborio rice is a version developed in Europe, specifically for use in dishes like Risotto to help develop that creamy, thick sauce and texture. Another one is Yamada Nishiki rice; a Japonica variant used almost exclusively in Sake production for its ability to develop a better flavor and mouth feel. While it might feel like overkill to have so many thousands of forms of rice available to us, its important to recognize the cultural aspect to rice as well and how important it is in its various forms to our vast, multi-cultural population. Rice is a hugely important grain to so many people and its worth recognizing that and even opening up to trying different ones!

Risotto!

Sake!

Sushi!

Payasam (a.k.a. Kheer)

Citations

Gross, Briana L., and Zhijun Zhao. “Archaeological and Genetic Insights into the Origins of Domesticated Rice.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 111, no. 17 (2014): 6190–97. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23772475.
Mintz & Schlettwein-Gsell. "Food Patterns in Agrarian Societies: The Core-Fringe-Legume Hypothesis". Gastronomica 1.3 (2001): 40-52
Spengler, Robert. Chapter 2 in Fruit from the Silk Road, 2019.
Kovach, Michael J, Megan T Sweeney, and Susan R McCouch. 2007. “New Insights into the History of Rice Domestication.” Trends in Genetics 23 (11): 578–87. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tig.2007.08.012.
Kumar, Tuk-Tuk. History of rice in India: Mythology, culture, and Agriculture. Delhi: Gian Publishing House, 1988.
Sweeney, Megan, and Susan McCouch. 2007. “Complex History of the Domestication of Rice.” Annals of Botany 100 (5): 951–57. https://doi.org/10.1093/aob/mcm128.

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