SC - Armored Rape???

[Philip & Susan Troy]

Hullo, the list!

In my neverending battle for Truth, Justice, and Stirring Up Trouble, I
ran across this and thought I'd share it with da cooks on da list. I've
been playing with my most recent acquisition, Mary Ella Milham's new
translation of Platina's "De Honesta Voluptate et Valitudine" copyright
1998 Arizona Board of Regents for Arizona State University, ISBN
0-86698-208-6.

In semi-short, here's the deal: in Book VIII, recipe 62, Platina tells
us how to make "rape in armor" (Milham translates the Latin "rapum" as
"rape"). It is a dish of cooked rape sliced, layered with cheese, and
baked. You know: the ubiquitous armored turnips. Now here's my
question...how did we in the SCA come to the comfortable conclusion that
rapes are turnips? I know I've seen at least one glossary
identification, in Curye on Inglysch, in which Constance Hieatt and
Sharon Butler define rapes as turnips. Very well. We also have reason to
believe that in the case of some modern root vegetables, the root was
not necessarily the primary edible portion of the plant. Beets come to
mind as an example; illustrations of their harvest (see a Tacuinum
Sanitatis) indicate the tops were [at least sometimes] cut from the
roots, which were left in the ground. 

On the other hand, we do have fair reason to assume turnips were pulled
from the ground, suggesting the entire thing, root, stem, and greens,
was eaten. Turnips, on the other hand, are referred to elsewhere in both
Platina and elsewhere as, I believe, napi or napones. 

Now, bearing in mind that the plant that we call rape today, whose seeds
we use for rapeseed (canola) oil, and whose leaves and stalks we seem to
use for animal fodder, has little or no bulbous root, what do people
think of the chances we've been making armored turnips all these years
when the dish is actually supposed to be armored turnipy, cabbagey,
mustardy greens and stalks? Does anyone out there have an accessible
copy of Gerard's or another near-period herbal, which might specify
exactly what part of the rape plant was commonly used for food?

Thanks in advance for any light anyone can shed on this bulbous
mystery...

Adamantius  
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______________________________________
Phil & Susan Troy
troy at asan.com
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