SC - Viking and early Irish foods-long

[Daria Anne Rakowski]

There has been some considerable discussion since I first composed this
and to save space (and time) I will append more to the bottom of this
response.

 On Wed, 18 Mar 1998, Par Leijonhuvud wrote:

> On Tue, 17 Mar 1998, Anne-Marie Rousseau wrote:
> 
> > I know of no extant cookbooks from the Viking age or early Irish. BUT....
> 
> Neither do I, and I don't think they existed in the case of the Viking
> era: not that kind of literacy. Also: no books!
 <snip>
 
  I would disagree with that statement. A professor of mine from times
past once told me that 'one cannot argue from silence' In this he meant
that not only can we not argue that 'silence' is meaningful in source
criticism but also that 'silence' may not have been the case at all!.
Skaldic poetry is generally considered to be the oldest and most reliable
remnants of Norse society and are preserved, it is thought, whole and
relatively uncorrupted in many textual forums that often date to some time 
within the twelfth/early thirteenth centuries. Not completely Viking but
certainly not a sign of previous illeteracy surely.
<snip> 
> Ditto on the praise for Anne Hagens books. Probably the best source
> available. 

On this we are agreed!
<snip>
 
> There is some food mentioned in period literary sources (e.g. Edda
> Saemundar), but not enough to go on. A couple of years ago I thought I
> had been able to document pit-cooking based on a line in (IIRC) 
> Thrymskvida, but it proved to be translational figment (it turned out
> Thor just tossed an oxen on the fire, not into a cooking-pit). Darn.
 
Again, agreed except that there are sketchy descriptions in some of the
sagas that give small but clever clues to food prep. For example in
Eyrbyggja Saga, chapter 39, there is specific reference to porridge being
consumed regularly as well as how and where and in what it was prepared.
The mention of the specific role of cook I also found interesting. I
haven't the time to hunt them up now but there are more brief, cryptic
comments like that one in many sagas.(Eiriks Saga Rauda, Groenlandinga
Saga, Orkneyinga Saga) As was mentioned, archaeology is an
invaluable resource for putting together a picture of Viking eating
habits. Anna Ritchie, amongst others, has done many excavations in Norse
settlement areas in the Northern and Western Isles. (Orkney, Hebrides
etc.) She has postulated that there were two ranges of fish size that were
consumed in these areas, a 'small' range where the fish were "normal"
sized, ie. 15cm or so. Then a larger range that got into the half-meter or
bigger category with a large hole of evidence in the middle. That says
little other than that in the Orkneys fish of two size ranges were
consumed but there is more to it but could take a mini-thesis to
explore/explain properly. Bones and carbonized remains as well as middens
are invaluable resources. If you have the patience to wade through the
reports! ANother place to look might be the brief report made by G.Biglow
in the 11th Viking Congress on Caithness, Orkney and Shetland. (All NOrse
settlement areas) He has turned up some interesting evidence about
potential butchering techniques and a peculiar and exclusively Norse
methode of marrow extraction. Very interesting.

 > One potential source that I haven't seen anything on is what was
> recorded regarding the customs of the Scandinavians while traveling and
> living in the east. Anyone know if this has been explored at all? It
> should be easier nowadays, when the "slavs and only slavs" doctrine is
> less prevalent over there.
> 
I haven't heard of any but then it is a relatively under-developped field.
Again, I would think that archaeological reports (often only in
Russian/slavic language) are the best bet. Those are finally making their
way into the scholarly communities of the 'west' now. Would be a very
interesting line to approach.

Now, recently there was a mention of a lack of adaptation on the part of
the Norse inhabitants of Greeland. I am sorry to burst this particular
balloon but my dissertation is on the Greenland and Vinland settlements
and there is quite specific and detailed information on whaling and
sealing practices in both sagas (see above) THere is further
archaeological evidence that most assuredly puts paid to that nefarious
belief that the Greenlanders died horribly and crippled. The early reoprts
on some of the graves in the Eastern settlement were most definatly
skewed and the much of the scholarly community has now accepted that the
most likely result of the Greenlandish settlement was of slow
assimilation/quick death. Sorry about that rant but it is so near to my
heart that it bugs me when it is so horribly misrepresented.

I agree that we know very little about preparation methods but we do know
some. We have saga and verse refernces, we have archaeological evidence
and we have common cooking sense. We are looking at an a-ceramic culture
in many areas very dependant upon steatite use, which of course alters the
way they cooked. There is plenty more to be said but this is already
pretty darn long... 

 Coll

 > /UlfR > > -- 
> Par Leijonhufvud                  par.leijonhufvud at labtek.ki.se
> Running Windows on a Pentium is like having a brand new Porsche but only
> be able to drive backwards with the handbrake on.
> 
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