[Sca-cooks] Bananas/plantains....

[Terry Decker]

The banana you are referring to was found in a Tudor age midden in London in
June of 1999 and pre-dates general importation of the fruit by around 300
years.  One of the researchers who examined the banana is working on a study
of odd imports of fruit into England, but I don't believe it has been
published yet.  A couple of experts speculated that the banana had come from
Southeast Asia or the West Indies, but I personally think it arrived on a
fast ship from the Canary Islands.   Bananas last ten days to two weeks
after being cut, so regular importation of the fruit into England did not
occur until fast steamers and temperature controlled holds made the trade
viable.

The Portuguese introduced bananas sometime after 1425 and they were in heavy
cultivation by 1496 when Spain took over the Islands.  Introduction was
probably from West Africa as part of the Portuguese slave trade.  Bananas
from the Canary Islands were brought to the New World in 1516-17.

Bananas were first encountered by Europeans around 325 BCE during
Alexander's incurion into India and this encounter is recorded in Pliny.
They were spread from India into Africa and the Mediterranean by the Islamic
Expansion.  They were introduced as far north as Sicily and Cyprus.

The evidence is generally that Europeans knew of bananas, but had no first
hand knowledge of the plant.  A very wealthy noble (the Medici's collected
horticultural specimens) might have had a banana plant or two in a
greenhouse, but that would be very rare.  The fragility of the fruit and the
travel times involved weigh against  the banana as a European food, even in
the Italian city states such as Venice.

Bear



>ISTR at least one discussion in the past about the period-ness of
>bananas and/or plantains....isn't there some evidence of a peel or
>something? in England?
>Would they have possibly been period-appropriate for 16th c. Venice?
>I'm asking for someone on another list....
>--maire