SC - Hatd Cheese Stefan (was Cressee webbed)

[Laura C. Minnick]

Dear Dr. Buell,

I apologize if my comments sounded like an attack on you or criticism of
your book as a whole. That was not my intent -- rather I was expressing a
pet frustration of mine, to do with the use of English names for spices
which don't actually have a standard English nomenclature. Think, for
example of the terrible confusion around the world over the term "pepper"
(which, incidentally, comes up even in Chinese studies where the
Xanthoxylums [native to the country and used back to pre-history] are
confused with the Capsicums [native to Central America] because both are
translated into English as "pepper"). As the particular field of research I
have been pursuing for some years is the history of spices (as opposed to
the more usual history of the spice trade), I take details about them more
seriously than most historians do. However, my complaint had to do with only
one small detail from your book, and I in no way am in a position to comment
on the whole, of which I have heard only favourable things.

You have some justice in taking me to task for commenting on your book
without having read it -- but only *some*, since I would have read it if I
could. I would dearly like to read it, but have been unable to get my hands
on it. The price, at $225 US, put it out of my range to purchase it when it
first came out (and now discussion on the Cooks List has indicated that it
is unavailable even if one does have the means to buy it). I have tried to
get it through interlibrary loan, but as yet my library (at Okanagan
University College) has not been able to get a copy out of any other
institution in Canada (our borrowing range, generally). The Interlibrary
Loans Librarian says she will try to see if she can get it from one in the
States, but that takes time. If, at any point, the book becomes available in
electronic form or in print again, I am anxious to read it. (If you have a
copy you could yourself lend me, I would be glad to pay the postage and
insurance both ways)

I see that, although "Stuart is ancient and not very reliable and out of
date", your more recent and indeed much better source (I agree, I would like
very much to be able to read Chinese and use it also) is in agreement with
Stuart's botanical identification, so there really is no issue there. The
only issue is with the given *English* name, which is not a translation of
the Chinese name in use in Mongol times (or, as far as I know, in Chinese at
a later date). Rather it is a English name ascribed by late 19th century
Englishmen (Sir Arthur Hart and the Chinese Maritime Customs -- in a
document even older and more out-of-date than Stuart). Possibly by that time
some African Grains of Paradise was being shipped to China, but the Amomum
xanthoides and A. villosum (which is what is identified as "sha-ren or
su-sha ") would be coming from Southeast Asia. So it is a 19th century
misnomer which has now been read back to Mongol times. I am sure you do, as
you explain, make it clear in your book that you are using these Maritime
Customs terms, but is this pointed out again at that place where you use the
term "Grains of Paradise"? Since, as I have said, I have been unable to get
my hands on a copy of the book to read it, I don't know. But if not, I am
sure you are familiar with the tendency of readers, even of scholars, to
read only the small part of a book which is relevant to their question of
the moment, and not to check through forewords, afterwords, and explanatory
notes. Will it be obvious to the cursory reader that the English term used
is one ascribed only in the 19th century, and which refers to species of
amomum which not even the largest English dictionaries (e.g. The OED)
include in their definitions of Grains of Paradise? I agree that there would
be from your point of view as authors an attraction to a consistent
Englishing such as the Maritime Customs terms give, and it will work fine in
probably 90 to 95 percent of cases, but in this particular case it is
problematic. I would be much more comfortable in this case with the use
either of the transliterated Chinese term, or the botanical name.

I agree entirely with you that "it was quite common for several spices or
herbs to occur under the same name" and there is often difficulty in pinning
down exactly what botanical species may be identified with what given name
at a particular time and place (Indeed, my current research work is largely
concerned with determining what can be pinned down with some certainty, and
what cannot). However, my issue, which I reiterate, is that modern academics
should be doing what we can to clear up the confusion, rather than adding to
it. "Grains of Paradise" has a generally accepted botanical identification
as Aframomum melegueta or A. grani-paradisi; applying it to only very
distantly related Asian species will add to the confusion.

Possibly the term "Grains of Paradise" was used of these Southeast Asian
amomums earlier than the late 19th century, but I haven't seen it so (and I
have done considerable reading, as the bibliography of materials I have on
Chinese spice use, given below, will show). Are there sources
(Chinese-language or other) which give it as an equivalent any earlier than
the Maritime Customs list?

As to contacts between Africa and China, I agree that there was some
knowledge of Africa (particularly East Africa) in China, and passage of some
commodities. But to leap from that to acknowledging trade in a particular
rather minor *West* African spice (or rather medicament, since I haven't
found evidence of its use as a spice in the literature of the Islamic world,
from which China would perforce receive it) is rather bold. Particularly
since such a trade would need to be extensive enough to make the spice
available to be called for by the cookery writer. The sources available to
me (particularly Wheatley 1959, Chau Ju-kua 1911, Ma Huan 1970, Schafer
1963, and Wang 1958) don't give any hint of such trade in Aframomum
melegueta. However, I am reliant on sources in European languages. Are there
other untranslated Chinese-language sources I have missed, which might
support such an inference? I would be delighted to know if this is so (since
it would provide a whole new facet to the history of Grains of Paradise
which I am working on).

Finally, once again I want to assure you that I did not intend to attack
you, and that if my world were too strong it was probably the late night and
grumpiness coming through. I admire those scholars such as yourself who are
able to make available to the rest of us the otherwise closed books of
Chinese and other non-European languages.

Yours sincerely.
Francesco Sirene (mka David Dendy, MA)

Bibliography:

Anderson, E.N.
 1988 The Food of China. (New Haven: Yale University Press)

Chang, K.C., ed.
 1977 Food in Chinese Culture: Anthropological and Historical Perspectives.
(New Haven: Yale University Press)

Chau Ju-Kua
 1911 Chau Ju-Kua: His Work on the Chinese and Arab Trade in the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries, entitled ‘Chu-fan-chi'. (St. Petersburg [reprint,
Amsterdam: Oriental Press, 1966])

Hsiang Ju Lin and Tsuifeng Lin
 1969 Chinese Gastronomy. (New York: Hastings House).

Laufer, Berthold
 1919 Sino-Iranica: Chinese Contributions to the History of Civilization in
Ancient Iran [Field Museum of Natural History Publication 201;
Anthropological Series Vol. XV, No. 3] (Chicago: Field Museum of Natural
History)

Li Shih-chen, compiled
 1973 Chinese Medicinal Herbs translated and researched by F. Porter Smith
and G.A. Stuart (San Francisco: Georgetown Press)

Ma Huan
 1970 Ying-Yai Sheng-Lan: ‘The Overall Survey of the Ocean's Shores' [1433].
trans. by J.V.G. Mills (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press for the
Hakluyt Society)

Ptak, Roderich
 1993 "China and the Trade in Cloves, circa 960-1435", Journal of the
American Oriental Society, vol. 113, no. 1, pp. 1-13.
 1994 "The Northern Trade Route to the Spice Islands: South China Sea - Sulu
Zone - North Moluccas, (14th to early 16th century)", Archipel, vol. 43, pp.
27-56.

Sabban, Françoise
 1983 "Cuisine a la Cour de l'Empereur de Chine au XIVe siècle: Les aspects
culinaires du Yinshan zhengyao de Hu Sihui", Medievales, no. 5, pp. 32-56.

Schafer, Edward H.
  1963 The Golden Peaches of Samarkand: A Study of T‘ang Exotics. (Berkeley:
University of California Press).

Schafer, Edward H., and Benjamin E. Wallacker
 1957 "Local Tribute Products of the T'ang Dynasty", Journal of Oriental
Studies, vol. IV (1957-58), pp. 213-

Simoons, Frederick J.
 1991 Food in China: A Cultural and Historical Inquiry. (Boca Raton, FL: CRC
Press)

Sinoda, Osamu
 1977 "The History of Chinese Food and Diet", Progress in Food and Nutrition
Science, vol. 2, pp. 483-497

T‘ien Ju-Kang
 1980 "Chêng Ho's Voyages and the Distribution of Pepper in China", Journal
of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, no. 2, pp.
186-197.

Ts'ao Yung-Ho
 1982 "Pepper Trade in East Asia", T'oung Pao, vol. 68, no. 4-5, pp.
221-247.

Wang Gungwu
 1958 "The Nanhai Trade: A Study of the Early History of Chinese Trade in
the South China Sea", Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic
Society, vol. 31, part 2 (June 1958), pp. 1-135.

Wheatley, Paul
 1959 "Geographical Notes on some Commodities involved in Sung Maritime
Trade", Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. 32,
part 2, pp. 2-140.
 1961 The Golden Khersonese: Studies in the Historical Geography of the
Malay Peninsula before A.D. 1500. (Luala Lumpur: University of Malaya Press)

Yamada, Kentaro
 1976 (A Study of the History of Perfumery and Spices in the Far East).
(Tokyo: Ch  -K ron Bijutsu Shuppan) [in Japanese with English summary]