ABSTRACT
The Middle East has attracted attention, not only for its political importance, but also for its potential value as a source of food supply for the external world. By the Middle East is meant the countries which lie round the eastern end of the Mediterranean and extend farther east to the confines of India. In the ancient world Diodorus Siculus tells us that wheat was discovered by the goddess Isis in the country of Nysa, a high mountain in Phoenicia. The typical wheat of the Mediterranean region, and of all areas where the climate is similar, is Triticum durum or hard wheat. According to ancient writers in the Mediterranean region, wheat requires a rich humid earth, preferably deep valley alluvium, with plenty of ground-water, or fertile volcanic soils retentive of moisture. Except in Egypt, and to a less extent in Iraq, most of the wheat is grown without irrigation.
