The Intriguing Tapestry of Chicken History

Sometimes I come across a question or idea and become so fixated upon it that I must find an answer. It consumes my thoughts until I finally give in and plunge headfirst down a new rabbit hole of information. Today, that question found its way to me in a peculiar way.

While reading a piece of Native American literature titled “Landscape, History, and The Pueblo Imagination from a High Arid Plateau in New Mexico” by Leslie Marmon Silko I came across a line that gave me pause, see if you can find it:

“Accounts of the appearance of the first Europeans in Pueblo country or of the tragic encounters between Pueblo people and Apache raiders were no more and no less important than stories about the biggest mule deer ever taken or adulterous couples surprised in cornfields and chicken coops.”

Did you catch it? I’m genuinely curious. Maybe it’s just me, but the focus of my interest fell upon the last two words. “Chicken coops.” For whatever reason, those two words signaled a blaring question in my mind: Did the Native Americans have chickens?

Turns out the answer is far more fascinating than I’d anticipated. Like I said, a good question like this doesn’t just send me looking for an answer. I become a proverbial cannon ball and launch myself into the side of a mountain of questions.

Where did chickens come from? How did they spread around the world? Does the fact that chickens are found nearly everywhere mean they’re biologically successful? I know they’re eaten like crazy, but the goal of biological life is to reproduce, right?

And these are only the initial questions! As any scientist knows, the more questions you answer, the more you will find. In many ways, it’s an addiction. That’s right. I have a problem. I’m addicted to science. Whether it’s a thirst for knowledge, or a simple gratification of discovery, I’m stuck.

Even in a few short minutes of research, I learned more about chickens than the average American will ever know.

Now, it is with great pleasure, that I present these findings to you:

• Through analyzing DNA, researchers have created a sort of “chicken map” that tracks the movement of chickens by Polynesian travelers. (National Geographic)
• Chickens spread around the world because of human involvement. (Forbes)
• Chickens arrived in South America before they arrived in North America. (Forbes)
• While we do have some understanding of chicken history, it is difficult to pinpoint facts, leaving much to speculation and theories. (Forbes)
• Chickens didn’t arrive in North America until Europeans arrived. (Forbes)

Alright, I think that’s enough chicken talk for one blog, but hopefully you learned something interesting. Personally, I find it incredible that chickens are such a large part of human civilization, yet it seems they’ve been a part of us so long that we’ve lost track of exactly how they became so interconnected with us.

Finally, I believe I’ve answered my original question. Could there have been “chicken coops” in Silko’s stories? Absolutely! Chickens may have been introduced to North America by Europeans, but its possible, perhaps even likely, that natives would have taken to the chickens and started farming them.

Only one thing is certain: Chicken history is fascinating.