A legume, Vicia faba, known as the broad bean, fava bean or faba bean depending on region, among the oldest domesticated crops of the Old World, cultivated in the Near East and eastern Mediterranean since Neolithic times, alongside wheat, barley, lentil and pea. Faba bean was historically a staple pulse across Europe, the Middle East, North Africa and parts of China, valued as both a food crop and, as a nitrogen-fixing legume, a soil-improving element of crop rotation before the widespread introduction of the common bean from the Americas after 1492 displaced it from some traditional roles. It remains widely grown today, particularly in China, Ethiopia, Australia, France and the United Kingdom.
Facts
Scientific Name Domestication Region Domesticated When (Circa) Era
Era (category) In the Other Atlases
Sources
1. Vicia faba (Wikipedia)
- lead: flowering plant in the pea and bean family Fabaceae
- lead: widely cultivated as a crop for human consumption
- lead: varieties fed to horses or other animals, called field bean
View the Source2. Vicia faba
Extract, sentence 1
Vicia faba, commonly known as the broad bean
Extract, sentence 2
widely cultivated as a crop for human consumption
Cultivation/History section
Carbonised domestic faba bean remains were discovered at three adjacent Neolithic sites in Israel's Lower Galilee
Cultivation/History section, sentence 3
domestication of the crop may have begun as early as 8250 BCE
lead description or Wikipedia lead (primary-uses)
Faba bean was historically a staple pulse across Europe, the Middle East, North Africa and parts of China, valued as both a food crop and, as a nitrogen-fixing legume, a soil-improving element of crop rotation before the widespread introduction of the common bean from the Americas after 1492 displaced it from some traditional roles.
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