SC - Medieval cows

[LrdRas at aol.com]

In a message dated 10/5/98 6:55:41 AM Eastern Daylight Time, sunnie at exis.net
writes:

<< Out of curiosity, did they have a seperation of dairy and meat animals in
period,
 or is this simply an anomoly of modern breeding exercises.  I ask only
because I
 know that breeds of dogs were cultivated and bred in period, so I was
wondering if
 livestock was as well.
 
 Brenna >>

Animal husbundry is a field in which I have only a cursory knowledge of.
unfortunately. 

There are others such as Margali on the list who have a better working
knowledge of animal breeding in general. Some of the farms in my area used to
compare each others livestock and it was a scramble come breeding season.
Farmer A would 'rent' out his best bull or pig to Farmer B, etc. with the
animal staying at a place for a couple of days. Then it was off to another
heifer or sow.

There was much lively discussion as to who's animals were better than others
and compeat the farm shows, county fair and 4-H level were intense. We used
lard extensively and for us fat pigs were the best. The farm next door sold
bacon and they sought long, lean pigs as the best. I can still remember heated
arguments over the 'scrawny' pigs that our neighbor raised.

Given the huge quantities of animals served at major feasts during the MA, it
would be absurd to assume that everytime a nobleman held a feast he would
descimate his herds by killing 10000 chickens, 500 pigs, and 2000 milking
cows. The large numbers of animals alone seem to show that animals were raised
for meat and other animals were raised for eggs, milk, etc.

I don't have the definitive answer to your question but I would certainly be
interested in any research that has been done along these lines. One of the
bad things about studying cookery is that it oftentimes intails studying the
ingredients used and their individual histories. This demands delving into
other disciplines such as agriculture, animal husbandry, trade and many other
areas, each area as equally vast  as the discipline of cooking. This is
rendered even more difficult when we are trying to grasp the entirety of an
agricultural society while embracing modern technological society where
agriculture is at best second man on the totem pole.

<sigh....so much to learn, so little time>

al-Sayyid Ras
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