potatoes, which put an end to malnutrition and periodic famine in northern Europe and allowed the land to support a much larger population than it ever could have planted in grain. Since fewer hands were needed to farm it, the potato also allowed the countryside to feed northern Europe’s growing and industrializing cities. Europe’s center of political gravity had always been anchored firmly in the hot, sunny south, where wheat grew reliably; without the potato, the balance of European power might never have tilted north.
