[Sca-cooks] Foods available in early Anglo Saxon England

Dragon dragon at crimson-dragon.com
Mon Mar 24 13:52:20 PDT 2008


Amy Cooper wrote:
>I apologize, as this is only vaguely food related, since I'm actually
>looking for dyestuffs...
>
>I'm part of a team for Cloth of Gold in a couple weekends in Ealdormere.
>We're doing an early Anglo-Saxon outfit from the southern part of what is
>now England. There's not a lot of information out there that we can find on
>what would have been used for dyes. We plan to make the argument that if it
>was used for food, it likely would have been used for dyes (oh hey, that
>stain is pretty! how can I replicate it?). I'm no clothing expert, I'm just
>running with it as the foodie on the team. My question is twofold:
>
>1) What berries (if any) would have been available?
>2) Would the Romans have brought beets with them?
>
>On the other hand, if anyone knows of a foodstuff, that would have been
>available in early Anglo-Saxon England, is pretty easily found now, and is
>capable of dying wool sort of red/purple (we're using madder in another part
>of the outfit, and don't have time for indigo/woad/weld, and want to stay
>away from yellow-greens), please speak up! The dye-ing experts on the team
>have scoured their Anglo-Saxon books to no avail, and have several natural
>dyes books available, but they are not sure what would have been available
>in the time/place we're trying to do.
---------------- End original message. ---------------------

How about listing the items that will give the colors you want? It 
might be easier to go down a list and confirm or deny them than to 
try to make an all inclusive list.

Dragon

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  Venimus, Saltavimus, Bibimus (et naribus canium capti sumus)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~




More information about the Sca-cooks mailing list