''Aegilops'' is a genus of

Eurasia Eurasia ( , ) is a continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. According to some geographers, Physical geography, physiographically, Eurasia is a single supercontinent. The concept of Europe and Asia as distinct continents d ...

n and

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

n plants in the grass family,

Poaceae Poaceae ( ), also called Gramineae ( ), is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos, the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivate ...

. They are known generally as goatgrasses.''Aegilops''.
Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS). Some species are known as invasive

weed A weed is a plant considered undesirable in a particular situation, growing where it conflicts with human preferences, needs, or goals.Harlan, J. R., & deWet, J. M. (1965). Some thoughts about weeds. ''Economic botany'', ''19''(1), 16-24. Pla ...

s in parts of

.Watson, L. and M. J. Dallwitz. 1992 onwards
''Aegilops''.
The Grass Genera of the World. Version: 18 December 2012.

Description

These are

annual plant An annual plant is a plant that completes its life cycle, from germination to the production of seeds, within one growing season, and then dies. Globally, 6% of all plant species and 15% of herbaceous plants (excluding trees and shrubs) are ...

s, sometimes from

rhizome In botany and dendrology, a rhizome ( ) is a modified subterranean plant stem that sends out roots and Shoot (botany), shoots from its Node (botany), nodes. Rhizomes are also called creeping rootstalks or just rootstalks. Rhizomes develop from ...

s. The taller species reach about 80 centimeters in maximum height. The flat leaves are linear to narrowly lance-shaped, and are up to 15 centimeters long and one wide. The

inflorescence In botany, an inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a plant's Plant stem, stem that is composed of a main branch or a system of branches. An inflorescence is categorized on the basis of the arrangement of flowers on a mai ...

is a spike with 2 to 12 solitary spikelets each up to 1.2 centimeters long. Some spikelets have one or three awns, and some have none.''Aegilops''.
The Jepson eFlora 2013.
Triticeae Genus Fact Sheets. Intermountain Herbarium. Utah State University.

Origin of wheat

Genus ''Aegilops'' has played an important role in the

taxonomy of wheat During 10,000 years of cultivation, numerous forms of wheat, many of them hybrids, have developed under a combination of artificial and natural selection. This diversity has led to much confusion in the naming of wheats. Genetic and morphologic ...

. The familiar

common wheat Common wheat (''Triticum aestivum''), also known as bread wheat, is a cultivated wheat species. About 95% of wheat produced worldwide is common wheat; it is the most widely grown of all crops and the cereal with the highest monetary yield. Ta ...

(''Triticum aestivum'') arose when cultivated

emmer Emmer is a hybrid species of wheat, producing edible seeds that have been used as food since ancient times. The domesticated types are ''Triticum turgidum'' subsp. ''dicoccum'' and ''T. t. ''conv.'' durum''. The wild plant is called ''T. t.'' s ...

wheat hybridized with ''

Aegilops tauschii ''Aegilops tauschii'', the Tausch's goatgrass or rough-spike hard grass, is an annual grass species. It is native to Crimea, the Caucasus region, western and Central Asia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, the western Himalaya, and parts of China, and has b ...

'' about 8,000 years ago.Petersen, G., et al. (2006)
Phylogenetic relationships of ''Triticum'' and ''Aegilops'' and evidence for the origin of the A, B, and D genomes of common wheat (''Triticum aestivum'').
''Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution'' 39(1), 70–82. ''Aegilops'' and ''

Triticum Wheat is a group of wild and domesticated grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known wheat species and hybrids include the most widely grown comm ...

'' are genetically similar, as evidenced by their ability to hybridize, and by the presence of ''Aegilops'' in the evolutionary heritage of many ''Triticum'' taxa. ''Aegilops'' is sometimes treated within ''Triticum''. They are maintained as separate genera by most authorities because of their

ecological Ecology () is the natural science of the relationships among living organisms and their environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere levels. Ecology overlaps with the closely re ...

characteristics, and because when united they do not form a

monophyletic group In biology, a clade (), also known as a monophyletic group or natural group, is a group of organisms that is composed of a common ancestor and all of its descendants. Clades are the fundamental unit of cladistics, a modern approach to taxonomy ...

(the lowest common class will need to include some other genera).

Ecology

Some ''Aegilops'' are known as weeds. '' A. cylindrica'', which is commonly known as jointed goatgrass, infests wheat fields, where it outcompetes wheat plants, reducing yields. Its seeds mix with wheat grains at harvest, lowering the quality of the crop. It can also harbor

pests PESTS was an anonymous American activist group formed in 1986 to critique racism, tokenism, and exclusion in the art world. PESTS produced newsletters, posters, and other print material highlighting examples of discrimination in gallery represent ...

such as the Russian wheat aphid (''Diuraphis noxia'') and

pathogenic In biology, a pathogen (, "suffering", "passion" and , "producer of"), in the oldest and broadest sense, is any organism or agent that can produce disease. A pathogen may also be referred to as an infectious agent, or simply a germ. The term ...

fungi A fungus (: fungi , , , or ; or funguses) is any member of the group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and mold (fungus), molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as one ...

. Other ''Aegilops'' are weeds of rangeland and wildland habitat.

Prehistoric wild food source

During the

Mesolithic The Mesolithic (Ancient Greek language, Greek: μέσος, ''mesos'' 'middle' + λίθος, ''lithos'' 'stone') or Middle Stone Age is the Old World archaeological period between the Upper Paleolithic and the Neolithic. The term Epipaleolithic i ...

era, nomadic peoples found goatgrasses (''Aegilops'') growing wild, along with wild wheats and barleys, and harvested them using bone

sickles Sickles may refer to: People * Carlton R. Sickles (1921–2004), American lawyer and congressman from Maryland *Daniel Sickles Daniel Edgar Sickles (October 20, 1819May 3, 1914) was an American politician, American Civil War , Civil War veteran ...

inset with sharp flakes of flint. The harvested plants were left to dry for a few days, then the edible grains were separated out from the rest of the plant material by beating the plants with a wooden flail, or by rolling them against a hard surface. The seeds were then carefully singed in the embers of a fire to burn away the remaining non-edible plant material. Some grains were accidentally burnt, and since the charred grains do not biodegrade some have been found by modern archeologists.

Etymology

The genus name ''Aegilops'' is

botanical Latin Botanical Latin is a technical language based on Neo-Latin, used for descriptions of botanical taxa. From 1935 to 2011, the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature mandated Botanical Latin to be used for the descriptions of new taxa (other tha ...

and comes from the

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

('), which is of uncertain origin. If the word is from (', “goat”) + (', "eye; looking like"), it could mean "goatlike herb", "a herb liked by goats", or perhaps "a grass similar to that liked by goats". On the other hand, it also referred to some species of

oak An oak is a hardwood tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' of the beech family. They have spirally arranged leaves, often with lobed edges, and a nut called an acorn, borne within a cup. The genus is widely distributed in the Northern Hemisp ...

, and since it resembles the

Proto-Indo-European Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. No direct record of Proto-Indo-European exists; its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-Euro ...

word for "oak", , this could be the source instead. In any case, it may be from the Pre-Greek substratum language. The word ' is claimed to be the longest word in the

English language English is a West Germanic language that developed in early medieval England and has since become a English as a lingua franca, global lingua franca. The namesake of the language is the Angles (tribe), Angles, one of the Germanic peoples th ...

to have all of its letters in alphabetical order, and with no letters repeated.

Species

; Accepted species * '' Aegilops bicornis'' - Egypt, Libya, Cyprus, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Sinai, Jordan, Israel Kuwait * '' Aegilops biuncialis'' - Mediterranean Basin, Rumenia, Ukraine, Caucasus * '' Aegilops caudata'' - Balkans, Middle East * '' Aegilops columnaris'' - Middle East * '' Aegilops comosa'' - Greece, Turkey * '' Aegilops crassa'' – Persian goatgrass - Middle East to Central Asia * '' Aegilops cylindrica'' – jointed goatgrass - from Czech Republic to Pakistan * '' Aegilops geniculata'' - from Portugal + Canary Islands to Iran * '' Aegilops × insulae-cypri'' - Cyprus * '' Aegilops juvenalis'' - from Turkey to Kazakhstan * '' Aegilops kotschyi'' – ovate goatgrass - from Tunisia to Uzbekistan * '' Aegilops longissima'' - Middle East, Egypt * '' Aegilops lorentii'' - from Spain + Cape Verde to Iran * '' Aegilops mutica'' - Turkey, Transcaucasus * '' Aegilops neglecta'' – three-awned goatgrass - from Portugal + Canary Islands to Kazakhstan * '' Aegilops peregrina'' - from Morocco to Iran * '' Aegilops searsii'' - Syria, Jordan * '' Aegilops sharonensis'' - Israel * ''

Aegilops speltoides ''Aegilops speltoides'' ( syn. ''Sitopsis speltoides'' ( Tausch) Á.Löve) is an edible goatgrass in the family Poaceae native to Southeastern Europe and Western Asia, which is often used for animal feed, and it has grown in cultivated beds. T ...

'' - from Greece to Iran * ''

'' - from Crimea to

Henan Henan; alternatively Honan is a province in Central China. Henan is home to many heritage sites, including Yinxu, the ruins of the final capital of the Shang dynasty () and the Shaolin Temple. Four of the historical capitals of China, Lu ...

* '' Aegilops triuncialis'' – barbed goatgrass - from Portugal + Morocco to Kazakhstan * '' Aegilops umbellulata'' - from Crimea to Iran * '' Aegilops uniaristata'' - Italy, Balkans, Turkey, Caucasus * '' Aegilops vavilovii'' - from Caucasus to Saudi Arabia * '' Aegilops ventricosa'' - from Morocco + Balearic Islands to Caucasus ; Formerly included species Species once regarded as members of ''Aegilops'' but now considered better suited to other genera: '' Ctenium'', '' Dactyloctenium'', '' Elymus'', '' Eremochloa'', '' Ophiuros'', '' Parapholis'', '' Rottboellia'', and ''

References

External links

{{Authority control Poaceae genera