The story of how strawberries went from small forage item to one of the world’s most popular fruits – though they're technically not a true fruit – involves lots of crossbreeding experimentation, as you might expect, but also a bit of spy craft.

Research:

“A Transatlantic Tango: The Story of the Strawberry. Royal Horticultural Society. https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/grow-your-own/features/history-of-the-strawberry#:~:text=It%20is%20hard%20to%20believe,back%20on%20fortifications%20near%20Concepci%C3%B3n.
Allen, Mike. “The 18th-Century Spy Who Gave Us Big Strawberries.” Atlas Obscura. Nov. 16, 2017. https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/big-strawberries-spy-chile-france
Barnes, Monica. “Frezier, Amédée François (1682-1773).” American Museum of Natural History. January 2008. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/280567727_Frezier_Amedee_Francois_1682-1773
Darrow, George M. “The Strawberry: History, Breeding and Physiology.” New York. Holt, Rinehart and Winston. 1966. Accessed online: https://archive.org/details/strawberryhistor00darr/mode/1up
The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. "strawberry". Encyclopedia Britannica, 29 Jun. 2023, https://www.britannica.com/plant/strawberry
Folta, K.M., Barbey, C.R. “The strawberry genome: a complicated past and promising future.” Hortic Res 6, 97 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41438-019-0181-z
Grubinger, Vern. “History of the Strawberry.” University of Vermont. June 2012. https://www.uvm.edu/vtvegandberry/factsheets/strawberryhistory.html
Hancock, J.F. “Strawberries.” Oxford University Press. 2000.
Petruzzello, Melissa. "list of plants in the family Rosaceae". Encyclopedia Britannica, 7 Mar. 2024, https://www.britannica.com/topic/list-of-plants-in-the-family-Rosaceae-2001612
Sevilla, Elisa, and Ana Sevilla. “STRAWBERRY.” New World Objects of Knowledge: A Cabinet of Curiosities, edited by Mark Thurner and Juan Pimentel, University of London Press, 2021, pp. 207–12. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv1vbd275.34
“Strawberry Facts.” University of Florida Gulf Coast Research and Education Center. https://gcrec.ifas.ufl.edu/fruit-crops/strawberries/strawberry-facts/
Sytsma, Kenneth J.. "Rosaceae". Encyclopedia Britannica, 28 Feb. 2025, https://www.britannica.com/plant/Rosaceae

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A Count of the Voyage from the South Sea to the Coasts of Chile, Peru, and Brazil

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