[Sca-cooks] Rotten meat and spices...

[Chris Stanifer]

--- Terry Decker <t.d.decker at worldnet.att.net> wrote:
> One of the problems I have with this entire debate is that the words; bad, 
> off, tainted, spoiled, rotten, etc. are defined by subjective experience 
> rather than objective measure.  Our usage of such words is with personally 
> ascribed meaning inside a general definition.  We can only guess at the 
> subjective usage of a person 500 hundred or more years dead.  My experience 
> can position rough boundries for their using or not using not-so-fresh meat, 
> but is not enough to determine gradiations within the range.
> 
> Bear 
> 


I have no problem with this.  And I think it may be this very thing which may have lead, in part,
to the belief that medieval people sometimes ate spoiled meats, highly spiced to mask it.  The
very definition given for 'high' birds might lead the uninitiated person to think that the birds
were hung until they began to rot.  Vehling apparently thought so in his treatment on Apicius. 
And, if a 'learned scholar' on the subject (or at least someone who has been published on it) made
that assumption, then it is logical to assume that the layperson (such as myself) would believe
it, as well. 

Through teeth of sharks, the Autumn barks.....and Winter squarely bites me.


		
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