“…Following the literature from the early days of phytolith activity in paleoethnobotany to the present, it can be seen how identifrcation criteria have developed and evolved•from Pearsall's (1978) original use of broad size categories (e.g., small, large, extralarge) to identify maize leaves with cross-shaped phjrtoliths; to the development of more precise size and shape criteria for these cross-body forms (Pipemo 1984;Pearsall and Piperno 1990); to use of robust statistical approaches in cross-shaped phytolith identification (e.g., friarte MulhoUand 2003;Pipemo 1988; to the widespread recognition of maize cob phytoliths (e.g., Bozarth 1993a, Bozarth andGuderjan 2004;friarte 2003bMulhoUand 2003), and finally, incorporation of starch grain data. The latter allows the generation of two independent lines of empirical data, providing evidence-often from the same plant processing stone tools or ceramic cooking vessels• for the presence of two different parts of the same, consumed structure of the plant, its kernels and chaff (glumes/cupules) (see Dickau et al, 2007;Iriarte et al 2004;Perry et al 2006Perry et al , 2007Pearsall et al 2003, Pipemo et al 2000. During the course of this research, a great deal of data have been generated from Panama and Ecuador.…”