Did corn/maize influence the English/German word crop, "top of plant (or field whip)"? How colonial/imperial is the expression "ear of corn" (corn on top)? Did the Aztec/Maya refer to maize as ears? It was everything, body, soul, & soil. Did Europeans reduce corn to an ear/crop?

Italian painter, Giuseppe Arcimboldo's "Summer" (1563). A European woman made of "New world" fruits & vegetables. Notice the "ear of corn." Imagine the 16th century Manifest Destiny. "Ears of maize" in Italian summers while the people of corn die of European disease (cocoliztli).

Please excuse this random morning thought. I'm no art historian, linguist, or colonial scholar, but this ill-formed line of analysis reminds me of @alyshiagalvez's Eating NAFTA. 1492 or 1994, maize became popular on the world culinary stage as it became less accessible in Mexico.