Palms are tropical miracles. Heinrich Heine, the German poet, stated "Unter den Palmen wandert man nicht ungestraft", i.e., one does not wander unpunished under the palms. It was Professor H.C.D. de Wit who taught me this in the late 1950s, and it is a pleasure to forward this message to the next generation in such an appropriate book. Both authors, as I know them, will bear the punishment of the palms. They will never be without palm nostalgia if and when living somewhere outside this world's tropical and subtropical palm belt. Palm nostalgia goes further than palms alone. It concerns the landscape, the short but splendid sunsets and last, but not least, the tropical people. Their elegance of living, structured in subtler ways than managers will ever understand, their laughter which may be a more decisive weapon against the troubles besetting the tropics than mere economics, and their unique life force erupting on festive as well as sad occasions under the palms will always remain with those who w3)ldered beneath these trees. I know. I was there.

Palms are tropical miracles. Heinrich Heine, the German poet, stated "Unter den Palmen wandert man nicht ungestraft", i.e., one does not wander unpunished under the palms. It was Professor H.C.D. de Wit who taught me this in the late 1950s, and it is a pleasure to forward this message to the next generation in such an appropriate book. Both authors, as I know them, will bear the punishment of the palms. They will never be without palm nostalgia if and when living somewhere outside this world's tropical and subtropical palm belt. Palm nostalgia goes further than palms alone. It concerns the landscape, the short but splendid sunsets and last, but not least, the tropical people. Their elegance of living, structured in subtler ways than managers will ever understand, their laughter which may be a more decisive weapon against the troubles besetting the tropics than mere economics, and their unique life force erupting on festive as well as sad occasions under the palms will always remain with those who w3)ldered beneath these trees. I know. I was there.

This book explores the degree to which landscapes have been enriched with palms by human activities and the importance of palms for the lives of people in the region today and historically. Palms are a prominent feature of many landscapes in Amazonia, and they are important culturally, economically, and for a variety of ecological roles they play. Humans have been reorganizing the biological furniture in the region since the first hunters and gatherers arrived over 20,000 years ago.

The palms are among the most abundant, diverse, and important families of plants found in the Amazon. Based on extensive field work, this book provides a systematic treatment of all palms that occur naturally in the Amazon region. Each species is exhaustively described with reviews of their distribution, habitat, and ecology. Introductory chapters describe the physical setting of the Amazon region as well as on the biogeography and ecology of the palm family. This first modern treatment of the 135 species of Amazon palms provides a definitive account of their ecology, uses, and biogeography. It will be welcomed by students, teachers, and researchers of botany, ecology, agronomy, and conservation biology.