rabbits-msg - 8/20/09 Medieval rabbits. As pets and food. NOTE: See also the files: butchering-msg, ferrets-msg, pets-msg, cats-msg, rabbit-dishes-msg, lamb-mutton-msg. ************************************************************************ NOTICE - This file is a collection of various messages having a common theme that I have collected from my reading of the various computer networks. Some messages date back to 1989, some may be as recent as yesterday. This file is part of a collection of files called Stefan's Florilegium. These files are available on the Internet at: http://www.florilegium.org I have done a limited amount of editing. Messages having to do with separate topics were sometimes split into different files and sometimes extraneous information was removed. For instance, the message IDs were removed to save space and remove clutter. The comments made in these messages are not necessarily my viewpoints. I make no claims as to the accuracy of the information given by the individual authors. Please respect the time and efforts of those who have written these messages. The copyright status of these messages is unclear at this time. If information is published from these messages, please give credit to the originator(s). Thank you, Mark S. Harris AKA: THLord Stefan li Rous Stefan at florilegium.org ************************************************************************ From: alyclepal at aol.com (AlyClePal) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Rabbits in Period: info sought Date: 8 Feb 1997 14:32:05 GMT Greetings, Gentles. As the happy owner of four fully trained house bunnies I've found myself at events and demos with at least 2(they come in pairs). While I do have some documentation about rabbits in period as pets and food sources, I would greatly appreciate being pointed towards more. I am doing a period petting zoo for an event in April and would like to include some facts on all the animals in a childrens coloring handout. Thanks, Alyssa and Corby and Buttercup and Galahad and Gretchen:) From: djheydt at uclink.berkeley.edu (Dorothy J Heydt) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Rabbits in Period: info sought Date: 8 Feb 1997 14:58:55 GMT Organization: University of California at Berkeley Oh, gosh, I raised rabbits back in AS single-digits, and did a fair amount of research at the time. Rabbits (as distinguished from hares) are native to Europe but not to England, having been imported in Roman times. I can't recall when it was that people stopped keeping rabbits in warrens--that is, an area in which you allowed the rabbits to burrow in the ground and then you fed them and trapped them--and started keeping them in hutches. It had happened by the end of our period, because Thomas Tusser, writing in Elisabeth I's time, gives instructions on when to breed them. "Let doe go to buck," he says, in the month of February, meaning you put the doe in the buck's hutch and not vice-versa (else she will defend her territory and probably be unwilling to mate). You might look up a copy of Tusser (One Hundred Points of Good Husbandry and the expanded Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry) and see what else he says. It's been a while. I remember discovering, you will pardon a rather lame pun, that it was best to start breeding the rabbits on Sexagesima Sunday (six weeks before Easter) so as to have cute little two-week-old bunnies to hop around the grass at the Easter barbeque we went to in those days. Dorothea of Caer-Myrddin Dorothy J. Heydt Mists/Mists/West Albany, California PRO DEO ET REGE djheydt at uclink From: jmackie at sharra.otago.ac.nz (LabRat) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Rabbits as Food (was Rabbits in Period) Date: 13 Feb 1997 02:17:44 GMT Organization: University of Otago, Dunedin, NZ if you are in england between the romans and the normans then rabbits are out. the romans wiped them out, the normans reintroduced them. not sure what date the romans finally manged to wipe them out but certainly before the 600AD start of SCA period. keep well jays From: albinsal at pilot.msu.EDU (Sally V Albin) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Rabbit Trivia Date: 15 Feb 1997 14:28:10 -0500 Nice discuussion on bunnies. I love bunnies, (especially in a nice BBQ sauce:)). The reason you could wipe out rabbits and not hare is that they are different species. They're so different they can't interbreed. Amusingly, modern domestic rabbits are descended from the European wild rabbit and can't breed with American wild rabbits either. To the person who stated that rabbit meat is lacking an essental amino acid, where did you get your information? All my info says that rabbit is the healthiest available. Of all the animals general eaten, rabit is the lowest in sodium and fat, the highest in protein, the most digestible, can be cooked any way that you can cook any other meat, and it's 100% white meat. It's also delicious. They're easy to keep in a garage, basement, or backyard and butchering them requires a very small space and very little special equipment. (Can anybody tell I raised the little critters for years:)) Beth From: alyclepal at aol.com (AlyClePal) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Renn. Angora Person!!! Date: 16 Feb 1997 15:18:47 GMT Help, my computer ate your email about bunnies in period before I could get to it, and all the other posts about bunnies just went into the wrong area for me to use. Could you please get back in touch. BTW--the cover of "Italtian Renaisance Interiors" has a painting--in the hall you can plainly see 2 housebuns eating greenery. I'll get the rest of the info on that to you soon. Thanks, Alyssa From: Elaine_Crittenden at dxpressway.com (Elaine Crittenden) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Renn. Angora Person!!! Date: 16 Feb 1997 10:18:39 GMT Organization: Digital Xpressway - Dallas, TX The Cluny tapestries (Musee National dy Moyen Age, Paris France) have more than two dozen "long ears" in all sorts of positions incorprated into the backgrounds of the various scenes. ;-) Also---the Cluny tapestries' period is 1480-1490. .....Elaine (Dallas, TX) aka Lete bithe Spring (Steppes, Ansteorra) Date: Fri, 14 Feb 1997 11:24:06 -0400 From: troy at asan.com (Philip W. Troy) Subject: Re: Rabbits as Food (was Rabbits in Period) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca manth at ozemail.com.au (Aramanth Dawe) wrote: > jmackie at sharra.otago.ac.nz (LabRat) wrote: > > >if you are in england between the romans and the normans then > >rabbits are out. the romans wiped them out, the normans reintroduced > >them. not sure what date the romans finally manged to wipe them out > >but certainly before the 600AD start of SCA period. > > >keep well > >jays > > If anyone knows _how_ the Romans managed to wipe out rabbits, even in > such a relatively small area as England, there are a few thousand > farmers in Australia who would be _very_ interested! > > Aramanth I'd have to say that if the Romans managed to "wipe out" rabbits in Britain, it was presumably prior to 410 C.E. . On the other hand, hares appear to have been unaffected throughout. True, they aren't the same as rabbits, but they are largely interchangable from a culinary standpoint, apart from their size. Adamantius From: Margaret Snellbaker Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Rabbits in period: info sought Date: Tue, 18 Feb 1997 19:11:30 -0500 Organization: University of Pennsylvania **APOLOGIES...THIS IS GRAPHIC AND NOT FOR EVERYONE** This goes back to an "old" posting I just caught up to... and I'd like to relay some interesting, albeit grim, trivia. Mundanely I am a veterinary nurse, and rabbit history and husbandry were part of my education. A small part, but I have a penchant for remembering the wierd stuff, too. So, this is reliable info...I'll find the source if you'd like. Since meat was forbidden during Lent, fish became a primary source of protein. Some monks (Franciscian, I think) are credited with domesticating rabbits, but you rarely find out WHY. Well, for what it's worth, rabbit fetuses were not considered meat. Yes boys and girls, mom rabbit was killed near-term, and during Lent the near-born bunnies were food. I guess this would be the next-closer step beyond veal. One would presume that after Lenten restrictions were over, they resumed the practice of eating weaned rabbits. This would allow them to get more meat per pregnancy, and not have to slaughter the doe. I'm also guessing that this is when they began breeding for color and size differences. In Service to the Kingdom of the East, Amber Artursdottir From: alysk at ix.netcom.com (Elise Fleming ) Date: Wed, 2 Jul 1997 16:21:08 -0500 (CDT) Subject: SC - Re: sca-cooks V1 #184 Greetings! Margaret wrote: >Well, if you're talking about the early Celtic peoples of Britian, >they didn't eat rabbit because rabbits didn't exist in England much >before the Normans. I believe they were a Norman import (again, >working from memory, I believe the source is Ann Wilson's Food and >Drink in Britian) From Maggie Black's _A Taste of History_, page 63, "The Evidence for the Foods Eaten in Roman Britain": "Not only were large game kept in parks, small game such as hares were kept in 'leporia' or hare gardens attached to the villas of the more well-eo-do Romas so that they would be quickly available when needed for the table." Alys Katharine From: Stephen Bloch Date: Mon, 7 Jul 1997 12:07:52 -0400 (EDT) Subject: SC - rabbits and hares Miscellaneous bits of information from various secondary sources: 1) From C. Anne Wilson's _Food and Drink in Britain_, "The hunt scenes on Castorware pottery, with running figures of dogs, hares and deer in low relief, reflect the continuing popularity of the sport in the third and fourth centuries AD. The Nene valley potteries, where Castorware was made, were on the edge of thickly wooded hunting country...." "One creature which disappeared temporarily [during the early medieval period] was the rabbit. The _leporaria_ were lost when the villas decayed, and escapers were unable to withstand the many predators in the vast forest tracts of early medieval Britain...." [in the later medieval period] "Rabbits had been reintroduced from France, and their earliest settlement on islands such as Lundy and the Scillies towards the end of the twelfth century was followed in due course by the establishment of coneygarths on the mainland. As the forest receded and beasts of prey became rarer, escapers from the rabbit warrens bred more readily outside, and eventually there was a large wild population to supplement the enclosed groups. In Scotland, too, every burgh soon had its rabbit warren and warrener. But highlanders had no truck with coneys, and instead coursed the native mountain hare...." "Hares and coneys were the poor man's game, coursed on foot with dogs.... Henry VIII had to forbid the sport for a time, for hares in the snow were too easy a prey, and in his day they had become 'decayed and almost destroyed' at the hands of the hunters...." "Coneys had continued in France from Roman days... By the sixth century AD domestic rabbits were being bred for their litters in French monastic courtyards. But when they eventually reached England again, they were usually enclosed in warrens.... 2) From _The Complete Book of Greyhounds_, ed. Julia Barnes, "... if the Romans did not bring the Greyhound with them, they imported something even more important -- the brown hare. The indigenous hare of the British Isles is the blue hare, which lives in high uplands in Britain and everywhere in Ireland. The Romans obviously considered the bigger and faster European or brown hare as a more suitable quarry for their Greyhounds, and it has flourished in the lowlands and downland of Britain ever since. 3) From "Twelfth Century Greyhounds in Merry Old England", by Laurel E. Drew, in _Celebrating Greyhounds -- the magazine_, "... greyhounds as such were termed _leporariis_. The entire document [the 1183 _Boldon Book_, a census similar to the _Domesday Book_ but covering northeastern England], written in Latin, was issued by the ecclesiastical scholars in the bishop's retinue." The article (and presumably the _Boldon Book_) discusses using greyhounds to hunt deer, but doesn't mention using them for hare or rabbit, aside from the etymological clue in the name _leporariis_. Summing all this up, it appears that (a) One kind of hare was native to at least parts of the British Isles. (b) Another kind of hare, and possibly the coney or rabbit as well, was introduced by the Romans from Europe. (c) Coneys were largely or entirely wiped out by British predators (which presumably found them an easy target by comparison with the larger, faster hares) when the Romans left. (d) Coneys were re-introduced from Europe in the 12th or 13th century. mar-Joshua ibn-Eleazar ha-Shalib Stephen Bloch sbloch at panther.adelphi.edu http://www.adelphi.edu/~sbloch/ Math/CS Dept, Adelphi University Date: Fri, 19 Sep 1997 10:30:51 -0400 (EDT) From: Uduido at aol.com Subject: SC - Hares In a message dated 97-09-19 08:40:42 EDT, you write: << It does stand to reason that a genuine wild rabbit (or hare) would be a little darker in color and stronger in flavor than a factory version. >> For the record hares are NOT rabbits. Hares have a longer more lean body, the hind legs are shapped somewhat differently and they have longer heads and ears. They are also a seperate species, taste different and should not be construed as 'wild rabbits' . Also cooking techniques are somewhat different with hares requiring much lengthier cooking to produce a tender product which is splitting another 'hair'. :-) Lord Ras Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1998 10:55:35 -0400 From: renfrow at skylands.net (Cindy Renfrow) Subject: Re: SC - fetal??? Just an aside to this thread -- "The Hunting Book" by Gaston Phoebus, 14th c.(lots of pictures, little text) says that rabbits were hunted using nets & snares, and spaniels, ferrets, or smoke to chase them into said traps. If ferrets were used, they were muzzled to keep them from eating the rabbits in their burrows. The rabbits were stewed, according to Phoebus. Now, under this system of harvesting the bunnies, there must have been quite a few pregnant does caught. He makes no mention of the fetuses, so I'm assuming they were either put in the stew pot or given to the spaniels & ferrets. BTW, in the pseudo-science of humours, would not fetal rabbits, if eaten separately, have been considered cold & moist, & therefore unsuitable for all but strong hardworking people? I think if you want to find recipes for fetal rabbits you'll need to look in early sources like Apicius & Pliny & Athenaeus, where there are descriptions of things like suckling kid slaughtered with a belly full of milk... I looked in Le Menagier & didn't find anything. Cindy/Sincgiefu Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1998 12:26:29 EDT From: PhlipinA at aol.com Subject: Re: SC - fetal??? Mordonna22 at aol.com writes: << Both my Grandfather, who lived in Alabama all his life, and both of my fathers-in-law who lived in South Carolina called this "wolf season," and said eating squirrels or rabbits at this time of year could kill you or make you mad. >> The reason that rabbits, particularly, and squirrels as well, are not eaten or killed in the summertime is because both are susceptible to a particularly vicious parasite, tullemia, which can be transferred by contact with the blood of an infected animal. This is why, when I was helping Ras butcher the rabbits for Will's Revenge ( and Ras was butchering me ;-P ) I wore rubber gloves and checked every rabbity liver for white spots. We were using domestic rabbits, among which the infection is rare, but with something that nasty, too many precautions cannot be taken. Just one contact with a wild rabbit can pass it- that's why commercial rabbit breeders always have their cages a few feet off the ground. The parasite dies shortly after the first frost, which is why the hunting regulations, at least here in Ohio, are as they are. Phlip Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1998 13:43:34 -0500 From: "Decker, Terry D." Subject: RE: SC - fetal??? > Does anyone know if this is a parasite confined to this continent, or may this > be a reason for a universal "season"? Is it possible that the people of the > era knew of the effects of eating small game killed at this time of the year? > > Mordonna I believe that it is tularemia which is being discussed. Tularemia is a disease caused by a bacteria (Francisella tularensis) which infects rodents and is transmittable to humans by ingestion or blood-to-blood contact. It is an American disease and is named for Tulare County, California where it was first isolated. Bear Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1998 16:34:23 -0500 From: "Decker, Terry D." Subject: RE: SC - fetal??? Here's what Utah Wildlife Resources says about rabbits and tularemia: TULAREMIA IN RABBITS AND HARES Tularemia is a disease which occurs throughout the Northern Hemisphere and can be found in many mammals including hares, rabbits and rodents common in Utah! The disease is also called rabbit fever, fly fever and Ohara's disease. It has a particular affinity for cottontail rabbits. Tularemia is caused by the bacteria (Francisella tularensis). Tularemia can be transmitted to man either by the bite of an infected tick or deer fly, direct contact through the skin via dressing an infected animal, eating of contaminated flesh, or inhalation of dust that is carrying the bacteria. After entering the rabbit's body, via the bite of an infected parasite, the bacteria quickly multiplies and invades different organs such as the liver and spleen. If while dressing your rabbits, you notice one in which the liver, lungs or spleen are covered with tiny, whitish miniature discolorations or one in which the liver and spleen are swollen, it is probable that the rabbit has tularemia. Immediately wash your hands with strong soap and hot water and rinse in disinfectant and discard the carcass. Tularemia is a serious disease, if left unchecked. But don't panic! Based on statistics from around the United States, chances of catching Tularemia are slight! For the full text, try: http://www.nr.state.ut.us/dwr/!disease.htm Bear Date: Fri, 23 Oct 1998 13:58:28 -0800 From: david friedman Subject: Re: SC - Coneys According to C. Anne Wilson in _Food and Drink in Britain_, "until well into the seventeenth century" rabbit meant the baby animal, under a year old, and coney was the general term for the beast. Elizabeth/Betty Cook Date: Mon, 16 Mar 2009 19:51:45 -0400 From: Johnna Holloway Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Messenger Hares To: Cooks within the SCA <<< I think tomorrow we should discuss chocolate bunnies and messenger hares because I have come across this neat church carving of a rabbit that looks like a number of chocolate molds. Johnnae >>> I first came across messenger hares in this imported volume: Westwood, Jennifer and Jacqueline Simpson. */The Lore of the Land/*. London: Penguin Books, 2005. It also turns up in Malcolm Jones' */The Secret Middle Ages/*. Sutton, 2002 in the section titled "The Hare Messenger"on pages 137-138. The story concerns a group of peasants that are late with the rent. They catch a hare, being fleet of foot, and attach the rent in a pouch around the hare's neck. They then tell the hare to take the pouch to the landlord. Of course the hare runs off and is never seen again. the tale dates back to Odo of Cheriton in the 13th century. Hares that can carry letters appear in other tales, and the tales always comment upon the foolishness of those that would dispatch a hare in such circumstances. Both books include a picture of a carving from the interior of Saint Mary's Church in Beverley, England. "Founded c. 1120, St Mary's was soon adopted by the Guilds. A tower was added in 1524. The tiny Chapel of St Michael, with its ingenious spiral staircase dates from the same period as the Percy tomb in the Minster. 140 carvings of medieval musical instruments decorate the Minister and St Mary's. The extraordinary chancel ceiling, painted in 1445, is a pictorial record of the kings of England." "prominent upon the arch which leads into St Michael's chapel is the carved stone figure of a rabbit dressed in human clothes and carrying a staff. This is known as the pilgrim rabbit because it is dressed in the manner of a pilgrim in bygone times. The church authorities are so proud of this rabbit that it has been adopted as St Mary's church logo." http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:St._Mary%27s_Church_-_The_Pilgrim_Rabbit.jpg Or Search under "pilgrim rabbit" in Google images to see pictures. The question here is how old is the carving. Jones uses the word "contemporary" but contemporary to what? The Middle Ages or to early Victorian England? There is an association that indicates that perhaps Charles Dodgson saw this very carving in the church when he was young and that he recycled it into his White Rabbit that leads Alice astray in Wonderland. The White Rabbit in one scene reaches into his pouch and pulls out a sandwich. The White Rabbit Chocolate Shop says the carving dates to 1325 as does the wikimedia entry. http://www.white-rabbit-chocolate.co.uk/story.html I think it looks like inspiration for those Easter Rabbit chocolate molds myself. Johnnae Edited by Mark S. Harris rabbits-msg Page 9 of 9