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Barley is a
cereal grain derived from the
annual grass
Hordeum vulgare.
Barley serves as a major animal
feed crop,
with smaller amounts used for
malting (mostly
for
beer and certain
distilled beverages) and in
health food. It is used in soups, stews and
barley bread in various countries, such as Scotland and in
Africa.
In 2007 ranking of cereal crops in the world, barley was fourth
both in terms of quantity produced (136 million tons) and in area
of cultivation (566,000 km²).
Etymology
The
Oxford English
Dictionary records the derivation from the
Old English bærlic "barley", although
the
-lic ending may indicate it was an adjective
pertaining to the crop or plant, rather than a noun. It was first
recorded around 966 CE in the compound word
bærlic-croft.
The old English word was
bære, which was related to the
Latin word
farina "flour", and gave
rise to
bærlic meaning "of barley". It survives in the
north of Scotland as
bere, and
refers to a specific strain of six-row barley grown there. The word
barn, which originally meant
barley-house, is also rooted in these words.
Biology
Barley is a member of the
grass family. It
is a
self-pollinating,
diploid species with 14
chromosomes. The wild ancestor of domesticated
barley,
Hordeum vulgare subsp.
spontaneum, is
abundant in grasslands and woodlands throughout the
Fertile Crescent and is abundant in
disturbed habitats, roadsides
and orchards. Outside of this region the wild barley is less common
and is usually found in disturbed habitats.
Domestication
Wild barley has a brittle
spike; upon
maturity, the
spikelets separate,
facilitating
seed dispersal.
Domesticated barley has non-shattering spikes, making it much
easier to harvest the mature ears. The non-shattering condition is
caused by a
mutation in one of two
tightly linked genes known as Bt
1
and Bt
2; many
cultivars possess
both mutations. The non-shattering condition is
recessive, so varieties of barley that exhibit
this condition are homozygous for the mutant
allele.
Two row and six row barley
Two-row and six-row barley
Spikelets are arranged in triplets which alternate along the
rachis. In wild barley (and other
Old World species or
Hordeum) only the
central spikelet is fertile, while the other two are reduced. This
condition is retained in certain cultivars known as two-row
barleys. A pair of mutations (one dominant, the other recessive)
result in fertile lateral spikelets. This produces six-row barleys.
(See
Cultivars). Recent genetic studies
have revealed a mutation in one gene,
vrs1 is responsible
for the transition from two-row to six-row barley
Two-row barley has a lower protein content than six-row barley and
thus more fermentable sugar content. High
protein barley is best suited for animal feed.
Malting barley is usually lower protein('low grain nitrogen',
usually produced without a late fertilizer application) which shows
more uniform germination, needs shorter steeping, and has less
protein in the extract that can make beer cloudy. Two-row barley is
traditionally used in English ale style beers. Six-row barley is
common in some American
lager style beers,
especially when
adjuncts such as corn and
rice are used, whereas two-row malted summer barley is preferred
for traditional German beers. Four-row is unsuitable for
brewing.
Hulled and naked barley
Hulless or "naked" barley (
Hordeum vulgare L. var.
nudum Hook. f.) is a form of domesticated barley with an
easier to remove hull. Naked barley is an ancient food crop, but a
new industry has developed around uses of selected hulless barley
in order to increase the digestible energy of the grain, especially
for swine and poultry. Hulless barley has been investigated for
several potential new applications as whole grain, and for its
value-added products. These include bran and flour for multiple
food applications.
Classification
In traditional classifications of barley these morphological
differences have led to different forms of barley being classified
as different species. Under these classifications two-rowed barley
with shattering spikes (wild barley) is classified as
Hordeum
spontaneum K.Koch.
Two-rowed barley with non-shattering spikes is classified as
H.
distichum L., six-rowed barley with
non-shattering spikes as
H. vulgare L. (or
H.
hexastichum L.), and six-rowed with shattering spikes as
H. agriocrithon Åberg.
The fact that these differences were driven by single-gene
mutations, coupled with
cytological and
molecular evidence, has led most
recent classifications to treat these forms as a single species,
H. vulgare L.
History
Barley in Egyptian
hieroglyphs
Barley was one of the
first
crops domesticated in the Near East, at the same time as
einkorn and
emmer
wheat.
Wild barley (H. vulgare ssp.
spontaneum) ranges from North
Africa and Crete
in the west,
to Tibet in the east. The earliest evidence
of wild barley in an archaeological
context comes from the Epipaleolithic
at Ohalo
II
at the southern end of the Sea of Galilee
. The remains were dated to about 17000
BCE.
The earliest domesticated barley occurs at
Aceramic Neolithic sites, in the Near East such as the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B layers of
Tell Abu Hureyra, in Syria
.
Barley has been grown in the Korean Peninsula since the Early
Mumun Pottery Period (c.
1500–850 BCE) along with other crops such as millet, wheat, and
legumes.
In the
Pulitzer Prize-winning book
Guns, Germs, and Steel,
Jared Diamond argues that the
availability of barley, along with other domesticable crops and
animals, in southwestern
Eurasia
significantly contributed to the broad historical patterns that
human history has followed over approximately the last 13,000
years;
i.e., why Eurasian civilizations, as a whole, have
survived and conquered others.
Barley beer was probably the first drink developed by Neolithic
humans. Barley later on was used as currency.Alongside emmer wheat,
Barley was a staple cereal of
ancient
Egypt, where it was used to make
bread and
beer. The general name for barley is
jt (hypothetically pronounced "eat");
šma
(hypothetically pronounced "SHE-ma") refers to
Upper Egyptian barley and is a symbol of Upper
Egypt. The Sumerian term is
akiti.According to
Deuteronomy 8:8, barley is one
of the "
Seven Species" of crops that
characterize the fertility of the
Promised
Land of
Canaan, and barley has a
prominent role in the
Israelite sacrifices described in the
Pentateuch (see e.g.
Numbers 5:15). A religious
importance extended into the
Middle Ages
in Europe, and saw barley's use in
justice,
via
alphitomancy and the
corsned.
In ancient Greece, the ritual significance of barley possibly dates
back to the earliest stages of the
Eleusinian Mysteries. The preparatory
kykeon or mixed drink of the
initiates, prepared from barley and
herbs,
referred in the
Homeric hymn to
Demeter, whose name some scholars believe
meant "Barley-mother". The practice was to dry the barley
groats and roast them before preparing the porridge,
according to
Pliny the Elder's
Natural History
(xviii.72). This produces
malt that soon
ferments and becomes slightly alcoholic.
Pliny also noted barley was a special food of gladiators known as
hordearii "barley-eaters". However, by Roman times, he
added that wheat had replaced barley as a staple.
Tibetan barley has been a
staple food in
Tibet since the fifth century A.D. It along
with a cool climate that permitted storage, produced a civilization
that was able to raise great armies. It is made into a flour
product called
tsampa that is still
a staple in Tibet, and into hand-rolled balls.
In medieval Europe, bread made from barley and rye was peasant
food, while wheat products were consumed by the upper classes.
Potatoes largely replaced barley in Eastern
Europe in the 19th century.
Production
Barley output in 2005.
Dots are centred on the capital of each country and do not
reflect the internal distribution of barley production within that
country.
Barley was grown in about 100 countries worldwide in 2007. The
world production in 1974 was 148,818,870 tonnes; since then, there
has been a slight decline in the amount of barley produced
worldwide.
German botanical illustration of
barley
Cultivation
Barley is a widely adaptable crop. It is currently popular in
temperate areas where it is grown as a summer crop and tropical
areas where it is sown as a
winter crop.
Its
germination time is anywhere from 1
to 3 days. Barley likes to grow under cool conditions but is not
particularly winter hardy.
Barley is more tolerant of soil salinity than wheat, which might
explain the increase of barley cultivation in Mesopotamia from the
2nd millennium BC onwards. Barley is not as cold tolerant as the
winter wheats (
Triticum aestivum), fall rye (
Secale
cereale) or winter
Triticale (×
Triticosecale Wittm. ex A. Camus.), but may be sown as a
winter crop in warmer areas of the world such as Australia.
Barley has a short growing season and is also relatively drought
tolerant.
Plant diseases
This plant is known or likely to be
susceptible to
barley mild mosaic bymovirus as
well as
bacterial blight.
Barley can be susceptible to many diseases but plant breeders have
been working hard to incorporate resistance. The devastation caused
by any one disease will depend upon the susceptibility of the
variety being grown and the environmental conditions during disease
development.
Uses
Algicide
Barley
straw, in England
, is placed
in mesh bags and floated in fish ponds or water gardens to help
reduce algal growth without harming pond plants and animals.
Barley straw has not been approved by the EPA for use as a
pesticide and its effectiveness as an algaecide in ponds has
produced mixed results during university testing in the US and the
UK.
Animal feed
Half of the United States' barley production is used as an animal
feed. Barley is an important feed grain in many areas of the world
not typically suited for maize production, especially in northern
climates - for example, northern and eastern Europe.
Barley is the
principal feed grain in Canada
, Europe, and
in the northern United
States. A
finishing diet
of barley is one of the defining characteristics of Western
Canadian beef used in marketing campaigns.
Alcoholic beverages
A large part of the remainder is used for
malting, for which barley is the best suited grain. It
is a key ingredient in
beer and
whisky production. Two-row barley is traditionally
used in
German and
English beers. Six-row barley was
traditionally used in
US
beers, but both varieties are in common usage now. Distilled
from green beer, whisky has been made from barley in Ireland and
Scotland, while other countries have utilized more diverse sources
of alcohol; such as the more common corn, rye and molasses in the
USA. The grain name may be applied to the alcohol if it constitutes
51% or more of the ingredients.
Non-alcoholic drinks such as barley water and barley tea (called mugicha in Japan
), have been
made by boiling barley in water. Barley wine was an alcoholic drink in the
1700's; it was prepared by boiling barley in water, the barley
water then was mixed with white wine and other ingredients like
borage, lemon and sugar were added. In the
1800's a different barley wine was made prepared from recipes of
ancient Greek origin.
Food
Oats, barley, and some products made
from them
Barley contains eight
essential
amino acids. According to a recent study, eating whole grain
barley can regulate blood sugar (i.e. reduce blood glucose response
to a meal) for up to 10 hours after consumption compared to white
or even whole-grain wheat, which has a similar
glycemic index. The effect was attributed to
colonic fermentation of indigestible carbohydrates. Barley can also
be used as a
coffee
substitute.
Hulled barley (or covered barley) is eaten after removing the
inedible, fibrous outer hull. Once removed, it is called dehulled
barley (or pot barley or scotch barley). Considered a
whole grain, dehulled barley still has its
bran and
germ making
it a nutritious and popular
health
food. Pearl barley (or pearled barley) is dehulled barley which
has been steam processed further to remove the bran. It may be
polished, a process known as "pearling". Dehulled or pearl barley
may be processed into a variety of barley products, including
flour, flakes similar to
oatmeal, and
grits.
Barley-meal, a wholemeal barley flour which
is lighter than wheatmeal but darker in colour, is used in porridge and gruel in Scotland
.
Barley-meal gruel is known as
Sawiq in the
Arab world. With a long history of cultivation in
the
Middle East, barley is used in a
wide range of traditional
Arabic,
Kurdish,
Persian, and
Turkish foodstuffs including
kashkak,
kashk and
murri. Barley soup is traditionally eaten
during
Ramadan in Saudi Arabia. It is also
used in soups and stews in Eastern Europe. In Africa, where it is a
traditional food plant, it has the potential to improve nutrition,
boost food security, foster rural development and support
sustainable landcare.
The six
row variety bere is cultivated
in Orkney
, Shetland
, Caithness
and the Western Isles
in the Scottish Highlands and islands. The
grain is used to make
beremeal, used locally in
bread,
biscuits, and the
traditional beremeal
bannock.
Measurement
Barley grains were used for measurement in England, there being 3
or 4
barleycorn to the
inch and 4 or 5
poppy seeds
to the barleycorn. The statute definition of an inch was 3
barleycorns, although by the 19th century this had been superseded
by standard inch measures. This unit still persists in the
shoe sizes which are used in Britain and the
USA.
The barleycorn was known as
arpa in Turkish, and the
feudal system in Turkey employed the term Arpalik, or
"barley-money", to refer to a second allowance made to officials to
offset the costs of fodder for their horses.
Ornamental
A new stabilized
variegated variety of
Hordeum vulgare, billed as
Hordeum vulgare
varigate, has been introduced for cultivation as an ornamental
and pot plant for pet cats to nibble on.
Research
The chlorophyll binding a/b protein is missing in albostrains of
barley, and they have been used to study
plastid development in plants. Researching white
streaked strains, plant scientists have gained a greater
understanding of reporter
gene
expression in the production of
chloroplast proteins.
Cultural significance
In
Islam, the
Prophet Muhammad prescribed barley for
seven diseases. It was also said to soothe and calm the bowels.
Avicenna in his 11th century work
The Canon of Medicine
wrote of the healing effects of barley water, soup and broth for
fevers.
In English folklore, The figure of
John
Barleycorn in the
folksong of the same
name is a personification of barley, and of the alcoholic beverages
made from it, beer and whiskey. In the song, John Barleycorn is
represented as suffering attacks, death, and indignities that
correspond to the various stages of barley cultivation, such as
reaping and malting. He may be related to older pagan gods such as
Mímir or
Kvasir.
References
Cited texts
See also
External links
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