When I was at university it was common for students to take milk with nutmeg on the understanding that it gave some sort of high. I don't suppose I ever tried it, not liking milk. But I do often think of it when I use nutmeg on anything uncooked.

nordmann wrote:

In the end it was to be the post-Napoleonic War settlement that ended the issue. Britain acquired titular ownership of Dutch holdings in the East Indies for long enough to "legally" transplant nutmeg to its Asian an African colonies before relinquishing control of Dutch territories back to Holland. Overnight nutmeg lost its previously inflated economic stature and became what it is now - just another food flavouring.

In the 1840s the nutmeg tree was successfully established in Grenada which would later become the major producer in the British Empire. Nutmeg and its membrane (mace) is still the most important produce of the island and a nutmeg features on the island's flag:



The Grenada Nutmeg Festival was held last autumn to much international acclaim and the Channel 4 series Spice Trip visited the island at that time. The program mentions the hallucinogenic properties of nutmeg and also that ingesting too much nutmeg is in fact dangerously poisonous.

Oh dear Caro I bet the students wondered why their guts were tied up a couple of days later.

Quote :

the war for control of the Maluccans between Britain and Holland was won quite emphatically by the Dutch and British history tends traditionally to downplay or spin such setbacks in a manner that places the country in as good a light as possible. In this conflict there was little good light at all so it became a footnote, rather than the enormous blow to capitalist expansion in Britain's favour that it was at the time.

It cannot be said that control of the Maluccans by the Dutch in the 18th C AD either held back the increase of British power or prevented the decline of Dutch power in that century.

Quote :

One attribute of spice, and this goes back to the word "specie" in Latin (as in trading commodity of notable worth), was its use as a preservative. In an age before refrigeration, controlling the manufacture and distribution of anything that helped prolong meat's shelf life meant that such control lent the product in question a value which was more than its weight in gold, much much more. Saffron was probably the world's first "super commodity", though by Roman times experimentation had broadened the field.

Saffron, unlike many other spices was grown in Europe. It is also still fairly expensive. I presume that the cost is related to the difficulty in producing it in quatity rather than due to reasons why, for example, nutmeg was so expensive.

Was a spice such as coriander, that also grew in Europe that expensive to qualify as specie? Were 'spices' such as paprika that originated in the Americas but could be grown in Europe, as they are notably done in Hungary, ever of sufficient 'notable worth' to be considered specie?

I can't find where and how "specie" evolved from a word for any commodity to specifically the four main spices, though the OED says that the latter was a terminology already in use in France at the time of the conquest, and that it was a reference to the above-named four (which were prized for their medicinal application at the time). France, unlike Britain, had linguistically a much smoother ride from late Latin into early French and on into more modern forms, so the usage could be very ancient indeed. This is where input from someone with a better knowledge of French etymology could help.

Your comment about Britain's and Holland's conflicting interests in the East Indies in the 18th century is superfluous to the point made earlier, which is that the Treaty of Breda in the 1660s ended a war between the two in which control of Run Island played a huge role, and that this was solely down to the island's status as the exclusive source of nutmeg at the time. However Dutch ownership of this monopoly as dictated by the treaty was regularly tested by subsequent British attempts through bribery, piracy and even full scale assaults throughout the 18th century, all designed to transplant this product to areas controlled by Britain - and this situation prevailed right up to the Napoleonic settlement after his final defeat. So the point, as you can see, is not about whether or not each side waxed or waned in general authority in the region during this century but of how each side honoured or dishonoured their own mutually agreed treaty designed to keep nutmeg exploitation and exportation solely in Dutch hands.

Quote :

Your comment about Britain's and Holland's conflicting interests in the East Indies in the 18th century is superfluous to the point made earlier, which is that the Treaty of Breda in the 1660s ended a war between the two in which control of Run Island played a huge role, and that this was solely down to the island's status as the exclusive source of nutmeg at the time.

I do not agree that my comment was superfluous because despite "the enormous blow to capitalist expansion in Britain's favour" Britain continued to expand and the Netherlands continued to decline.

Yes, but nothing to do with nutmegs, which once had been at the heart of it.

Read the story of Robert Kidd. In fact, read several stories about him, not just the traditionally British one.

I'm doing some experimental mediaeval/Tudor cooking this weekend, and I didn't want to start a new thread for what is just a simple request for ideas, and this thread seems quite a suitable place .....

So, can anyone suggest any ingredient(s) that I can use to colour a short-crust type pastry, green? Preferably using something that would have been available to a 15th century/early 16th century cook ... and also something not toxic, so no soluble copper salts please!

I think I can get a passable purple just using red wine, bright red/scarlet using cocchineal (that's almost authentic for the time period since I can't get alkerms in the supermarket), and I think egg yolks with a bit of saffron to boost it should give a satisfactory golden orange colour ... but I can't think of, or find in the texts, anything suitable to get a nice apple green. Any suggestions anyone?

Anything high in chlorophyll should do the trick. Spinach would definitely work and wouldn't affect the taste much. Parsley probably also but you'd have to use a lot of it so the flavour would definitely be affected. Cabbage makes a very deep green dye but would also definitely taint the pastry's taste.

To make a spinach dye you simply boil it in water and let it simmer for ages (overnight if you want a really deep green). Add a drop of vinegar when it gets to the shade you want - that will arrest the process. You can then either mix it into your pastry or paint it onto the pastry before baking, though I imagine mixing is best to avoid colour change due to evaporation.

I agree with Nordmann MM, spinach would be the best for a green dye and there wouldn't be a stong taste to the colouring unlike other greens that could be usable.

Not sure if this will be any help, but the traditional way to make a red food dye (for say dying Easter eggs) here in Greece is by boiling onion skins. The red Spanish onion skins make a reddish brown colouring and the yellow onion skins make a deep red colour, although the water will look a brownish colour, the finished product will actually turn out to be a lovely red.

And a dollop of vinegar (as suggested for the green dye) to set the colour when it gets to the correct shade.

PS And boiling red cabbage leaves and then soaking overnight will make a robins egg blue. Blueberries for lavender colouring, tumeric for yellow/green, paprika for brick red and beetroot for pink. Although I'm not sure whether blueberries, tumeric or paprika were available in Tudor England.

I've seen green extraction done in cooking programmes, this is pretty much the recipe that was used. http://chris.shenton.org/recipes/Italian/chlorophyll_for_pasta_and_sauces.txt

What about beetroot for red?

Good luck and report back please.

Thanks for the suggestions guys.

I should have added that my brown/purple (it's to colour mock figs) was indeed onion skins boiled with red wine and that seems to be ok.

For the green ... I don't have any spinach in the house but I'm now boiling up my stock of fresh parsley augmented with some young nettle shoots, which usually seem to pass quite well for spinach. Thanks for the tip about adding the vinegar ... yes of course the acid will work as a mordant (I think I've got that right - maybe not) but anyway it's on the go so we'll see. I'm not too worried about a veggy flavour .... it's to colour fake green apples which are actually apple-shaped pastries, complete with stalk, filled with chopped pork/apple/raisins/cinnamon... and other spices ... so any herby/veggy taste on the pastry crust will almost certainly be lost in the overall taste of the filling.

Now beetroot ... but of course!... I had completely forgotten about that, and another useful adition to the colour (and flavour) palate. Some more experimentation is in order methinks!

PS 1 : Thanks ID for those suggestions ... interested that you an get a blue colour ... that's of interest for something else.

PS 2 : I'm going to try that method for extraction of, if not pure then at least fairly concentrated, chlorophyll ... it doesn't sound to difficult, and it should certainly give a strong green dye.

Mint was used too! Here's a paragraph from my "Food and Feast in Medieval England" book by P. W. Hammond. Apologies for the mention of Richard III - there's no avoiding the man, I'm afraid.

I found the method used to "endore" food - make it golden - rather interesting too.

"... there was considerable use of exotic colouring, and one dish was specifically described as "purpill". This was probably a red colour, perhaps from "saundres" (a variety of sandalwood much used for colouring), "dragon's blood" (a bright red dye obtained from various plants) or even alkanet from the plant of that name. The appearance of food was very important, and probably the majority of dishes were coloured in some way, often with saundres, or with saffron to give a very bright yellow, as in frumenty or mawmenny*. A popular way to colour a dish was to "endore" it, that is paint it with egg yolks (or a mixture of egg, ginger and saffron) and cook it to a deep golden crust. Green was used by using mint or parsley juice, and black or brown from blood or burnt breadcrumbs. Blood was much used in sauces. With roast swan, for example, the entrails, ginger, pepper, cloves, wine and salt were used together with the blood, which would have coloured it black. Some dishes were given several colours, perhaps quartered white, yellow, green and black, as in one complex fish dish. Another practice, similar to colouring food, was to cover a dish in gold or silver foil. One dish was described as "pety chek in bolyen" (that is small chicks in bullion, or gold foil). A dish in the second course of Richard III's coronation banquet was described as "gret carpe and breme in foil."

The writer then goes on to talk about coloured "gely". Fancy jellies, often fashioned to look like a heraldic device - were very popular. Such "heraldic foods" - especially the brightly coloured pastry used to make "heraldic pies" - must have needed many different colours.

I had people turn up unexpectedly Saturday night and so had to cook regular meals over the weekend (the French are VERY conservative when it comes to food, nothing spicey, nothing exotic, nothing unusual, and certainly nothing remotely 'experimental') ... but my chlorophyll extraction is continuing and I'm free to play in the kitchen tonight.

Thanks Temp for that quote ... part of my reason for posting here was because I cannot find my copy of 'Food and Feast in Medieval England', nor 'Food and Feast in Tudor England', nor 'The Forme of Cury', nor many others of my historic foody/recipe books. Nearly all my library is still, yes STILL, in cardboard boxes stacked in the spareroom, just how they were placed after we moved here in 2007 (and the other half is still in a friend's South London attic ... I hope). I miss all my books terribly. I really must get around to clearing some space, getting some new bookcases built (all the original bookcases are now being used to hold my stock of sheets and towels etc.) and get all my lovely books accessible again.

So where is my trusty, well-thumbed copy of Howard McGee's, 'The Science of Cooking', when one needs it? He's just what you need for things like extracting and using plant dyes for food.

But as I say unfortunatly he's languishing in some box somewhere, under a ton of dictionaries, atlases, encyclopedias ... Dickens', Hardy's, Bronte's, Attenborough's, several Bibles, Joyce, Jerome, Graves, Peake, Milne and Chaucer ... metallurgical textbooks and books on anatomy, geology, palaeontology, biology, astronomy ... garden encyclopedias, as well as field guides to identify mushrooms, or fossils, or birds, or trees ... complete runs of the periodicals, 'Caves & Caving' and 'Spelunca', ... plus my grandfather's 1902 edition of 'The Principles of Euclid', an 1880 first edition (illustrated with hand-tinted prints) of 'The Ferns of Europe', an 1815 first edition of 'Walkingame's Mathematical Assistant', and granny's 1900-odd edition of the ubiquitous Victorian home and household guide to everything: 'Enquire Within'.

Yes, I admit it, I'm a serious bibliophile. And I'm not ready to give it up.

Handily available online, Meles, is this medieval cookbook;

http://www.godecookery.com/goderec/goderec.htm

Just an update and to say that my attempt at extracting chlorophyll for a green food colouring wasn't a success. But I now know why:

1 - Chlorophyll breaks down at temperatures above about 65°C,
2 - It is insoluble in water (but is soluble in alcohol, acetone etc).

I'm going to try again shortly, but now armed with a thermometer and a better filter. And I think I might also try extraction using vodka as the solvent and then crystallise out the chlorophyll. Distilled spirits would have been quite expensive but were by no means unobtainable by a mediaeval chef. Acetone apparently gives a better extraction and higher yield than ethyl alcohol, but it would not have been available in 15/16th century Europe, and it is of course toxic too!

And I've realised that mulberries (in season at the moment) also give a very strong red/purple dye. I have a mulberry tree just outside the back door .... and so I currently have purple foot and paw prints throughout the house. And the stains are very, very hard to remove.

The first direct evidence for the use of spice in European prehistoric cuisine.

http://www.pasthorizonspr.com/index.php/archives/08/2013/first-direct-evidence-for-spice-in-european-prehistoric-cuisine

Meles meles wrote:

Just an update and to say that my attempt at extracting chlorophyll for a green food colouring wasn't a success. But I now know why:

1 - Chlorophyll breaks down at temperatures above about 65°C,
2 - It is insoluble in water (but is soluble in alcohol, acetone etc).

I'm going to try again shortly, but now armed with a thermometer and a better filter. And I think I might also try extraction using vodka as the solvent and then crystallise out the chlorophyll. Distilled spirits would have been quite expensive but were by no means unobtainable by a mediaeval chef. Acetone apparently gives a better extraction and higher yield than ethyl alcohol, but it would not have been available in 15/16th century Europe, and it is of course toxic too!

Not sure if you ever succeeded in the end Meles with the chemical approach. I just use spinach juice. Either shred the spinach thru a juicer, or (if you haven't got a juicer) then just whiz up the spinach with a little water in a blender and then strain. And that's it. Perfect green food colouring. And the flavour is so mild that it really doesn't taste of anything when added to other foods. If you need a dry dye then I'd imagine spinach, kitchen roll, a baking tray and an airing cupboard would do the trick.

By all accounts spinach (spinnadge?) only arrived in north-western Europe in the 14th century. It was introduced to southern Europe by the Moors about 500 years before that. It's strange to think that the Romans didn't know of spinach or at least didn't eat it. I, for one, couldn't imagine a world without spinach.

Viz, thanks for your continued interest in this rather arcane subject of surely limited interest. Your suggestion actually agrees with my own research, although I'll admit I took rather a long road to get to the same result. In short I had been approaching the problem from the wrong angle.

Encouraged by my success in dying fake pastry plums purple using mulberry juice, I had originally tried to do the same for fake apples by using a suitable green vegetable dye. Chlorophyll is certainly a suitably green dye, but even once I'd managed to successfully extract it (eventually into an alcoholic solution) I then had trouble getting it to satisfactorily bond to oil/water pastry. Grass (and parsely, spinach etc) may well stain football shirts .. but getting the colour to bond to pastry and then not turn brown with oxidation and or subsequent cooking, was much more difficult.

But I then realised I'd been going about this the wrong way around. My good mentor Robert May ('The Accomplisht Cook', 1660) finally showed me the error of my ways. He describes the making of green-coloured pastries by including finely chopped/ground parsely or spinach (ie whizzed in the food processor) into the pastry mix before cooking. Duh, of course, that's exactly how lasagna verde is made. And of course it works and remains green through subsequent cooking.

I have yet to make my entire renaissaince subtletie, of a pastry cornucopia spilling out faux fruits ... but now that I've sorted all the basic steps, it could well be a little project for this coming Christmas.

PS : I'm with you and Pop-eye ... spinach is good! It's easy to grow, easy to cook, versatile and tasty. Can't see what anyone would have against it.

To return to red cabbage - it works as an indicator like litmus, so bicarb might well be sufficiently alkaline to turn it blue - the bright red when you pickle it is the acetic acid in the vinegar.

Spinach is all right, but here in NZ we grow far more (and more easily) silver beet. You might call it Swiss chard, I think.  I like it a lot more than spinach though it is similar.  Very dark green (except when people make it orange or purple) leaves, which must surely be very good for us.  (And counteract the butter and salt that improves it when cooked.)  We do grow an everlasting spinach but it's not all that great. 

MM, have you read a book called The Debt to Pleasure by John Lanchester?  A novel from the point of view of a very pretentious self-absorbed and egotistical man, mostly talking about food and his travels in France.  (Though I think there is a darker side, there - a lot of people he had been involved seem to die unusual deaths, and there are hints of less savoury things than herbs and spices.)  It's hard to find a short extract to give his flavour, since everything is written in detail and with a meandering style.  But here he is making a bouillabaisse. 



"There must be at least five different kinds of fish, including, of course, the indispensable rascasse, an astonishingly ugly fish whose appearance always reminds me of our Norwegian cook, Mitthaug. Also necessary are gurnard, monkfish, anglerfish, lotte, baudroie (the same thing, baudroie being the French word and lotte the Provencal; and another child-frightener it is too), and a wrasse or two, either the girelle or the wonderfully named vieille coquette, which I first ate in the company of my mother. Clean the fish and chop the big ones into chunks.  Organize two glasses of Provencal olive oil and a tin of tomatoes; alternately you can peel, seed and chop your own tomatoes. Personally, canned tomatoes seem to me to be one of the few unequivocal benefits of modern life. (Dentistry, the compact disc.)...Note the bouillabaisse is one of the only fish dishes to be boiled quickly. This is to compet the emulsification of the oil and water; it is in keep with the Marseillaise origin of the dish that in it oil is not poured over troubled water but violently forced to amalgamate eeith it. Notice also that bouillabaisse is a controversial dish, a dish which provokes argum,ent and dissent, canonical and non-canonical versions, focusing on issues such as the aforementioned geographically conditioned possibility of making the dish at all, the desirability or otherwise of adding a glass of white wine to the oil-and-water liaison, the importance or unthinkability of including in the dish fennel or orance peel or thyme or cuttlefish ink or severed horses' head. (on which my personal verdicts are respectively 'yes', 'no', 'yes', 'no', 'why not?', 'yes, if you wish to make the bouillabaisse noir of Martiques', and 'only joking'.  Then he goes to talk about all the different kinds of fish soup he has made.



As regards actual spices, he talks of them as being something the English have always been fond of.  "One might go so far as to say that a taste for spices is an ingredient (!) of the national character, an instinct comparable with the Welsh talent for singing, the German liking for forests, the Swiss knack for hotel-keeping, the Italian passion for motor-cars. Spiced bacon, Barbados ham, pepper steak, spiced meat loaf, paprika cabbage - the English infatuation with spices runs through our history like a melodic undercurrent or like the percussive backbone against which the daily music of time and the kitchjen soars and switters. This the records of English spice consumption show a heroic commitment to (especially) overrated cinnamon, the even more overrated, not-far-short-of-actively-nasty cloves, tasty soporific nutmeg and its sibling, mace; aromatic allspice; slashy paprika; historic mustard seed; popular ginger; chilli (which, it muct never be forgotten, arrived in Europe some time before the Portuguese carried it to India, where the fiery fruit was to have some of its most culinarily notable effects; warm-tasting, personal-favourite, beds-i'-the-east-are-soft cumin; evpocatively Middle Eastern coriander (its Greek Etymology, from koris, commemorating the fact that it smells identical to the humble bedbug); risky cardamom; unmistakeable caraway;lurid tumeric - I could go on."

So could I, but this book is quite hard work, and I have taken a while to read it, despite it not being long.  Sorry for any typos.

That must be the book from which Damien Trench the principal character in the Radio 4 sit. com. In and Out of the Kitchen was lifted by Miles Jupp, I'm sure. It can't be coincidental, I can hear him saying it in my head as I read it.

I've just chanced planting a last crop of rainbow chard but I'm still working my through 1001 things to do with a courgette.

We never get these 1000s of courgettes.  They grow for us but not in those unusable numbers.  Enough for us to have a meal every second or third day, I suppose.  I did make some into bread and butter pickle.  Is that what you call it? cucumber pickle really.

Caro , thanks for the tip about the book, The Debt to Pleasure by John Lanchester, I'll have to search it out via Amazon, it looks like my sort of book .. though I trust you don't think of me as a pretensious, arrogant, gallophilic, foody pseud!

Ferval, ... how about courgette gratin with a hint of blue cheese? I made several individual ones last week just to use up the surplus of older courgettes, and the one that I ate straight away, just as a tester, was yummy (the others I froze for winter).  And I'm still puréeing, freezing, and stuffing tomatoes like mad just to keep on top of them ... but I shoudn't really complain as it's been a bumper year and I will certainly miss having them fresh in a month or so.

As I type I'm making quince jelly and then next on the list is rosehip and crab-apple jelly, and then it'll be mulberry jam (from the mulberries I froze in July) ... it's been a good year for berries and fruits generally, although my peppers, both the capsicums and chillis, were a bit of a disappointment. And after last night's heavy rain we should start to get some ceps and other mushrooms popping up everywhere too. I love Autumn.

Thanks MM, I'll try that although I've had every other kind of gratin except blue cheese, even Cretan boureki, as well as various types of fritters and marinated in salads. It was creme de courgettes tonight and I've realised that I haven't stuffed any yet.... I've still got a couple of jars of last year's chutney left but I can make more and foist it on anyone who will have it.

I don't seem to have a very good crop of crab apples this year, I blame the warm weather in April followed by cold and wet which must have scunnered the bees just as much as it scunnered me.

Quote :

though I trust you don't think of me as a pretensious, arrogant, gallophilic, foody pseud!

Certainly not, MM!  But this is a book full of detail about food and quite fascinating for that.  The author has been a food critic for the Observer.  It is quite an old book - 1996.  (I was interested to see he used the word 'frenemy' which I put as modern than that.)  I don't know whether all of the food 'advice' and information is fully correct or not, or just an example of the main character's obsessions and snobbery.  The blurb in the book said Tarquin was refreshingly free of false modesty.  Actually he was free of any modesty or vision of how others saw him.  When I call him the 'main' character, I really mean he is the only character.  He mentions other people, but really just in passing or to show off his wondrous conversational skills etc.

But some of what he talks about makes me feel that perhaps my food and cooking knowledge is rather low. One parts salt and 11 parts water will check for floury or waxy potatoes, for instance.  "Initial cooking does not 'seal in the juices' or anything of the srot - science has shown us that no such action takes place."  And then lots more detail about searing the meat first and adding bits, or putting it altogether.  And full of food language too. And different names for food items in other cultures and countries.  It's been very interesting, but I think we can assume Tarquin is an unreliable narrator.

Now that we know that I have a great-grandmother who is Hungarian, I recalled some Hungarian ladies who used a lot of paprika when they cooked. Paprika is a spice, is it not?

I was not aware we had discovered any such thing about your great-grandmother, FL.

Paprika, or "bell pepper", "sweet pepper" or simply "pepper" also in English, is the mildest variant of hot pepper and is classed - believe it or not - as a flowering plant, specifically of the capsicum family which includes the equally familiar chili pepper, and less specifically simply as a flowering plant related to the potato, tomato, and even belladonna - so strictly speaking we're talking variants of nightshade type plants here, not necessarily edible stuff at all.

It is nevertheless edible and therefore sold as a vegetable. It is however not a spice (to answer your question), though it may be used to add flavour to a meal. The notion that it should be classed as one may simply be its misnomenclature - "pepper" is a whole other thing entirely and is most definitely a spice, though any new plant with a hot taste tended to be classed as one by Europeans at the time who hitherto knew only of one particular variant of the "piper" genus from India as a plant with such properties.

Hungarians, like all Europeans, have the Spanish to thank for introducing it from its original Central American cultivation in the early 16th century. It is a popular addition to many countries' meals as a result and I am not aware that Hungarians have any extra claim to this propensity. However the discovery that the capsicum (as we should really be calling it) is rich in Vitamin-C is indeed down to a Hungarian, Albert Szent-György, who won the Nobel Prize in 1937 for isolating this vitamin, and in fact for also discovering that the humble capsicum was full of it. (I'll let that last bit hang ...)

Temperance wrote:

I have just started a re-reading of Ann Wroe's superb book about Perkin Warbeck ("The Perfect Prince") and by sheer coincidence have come across this in chapter one. Wroe is talking about a globe made in Nuremberg in 1492 by one Martin Behaim (Martin the Bohemian), a protégé of the Emperor Maximilian. This globe showed the world as far as it was known and, Wroe tells us, "In the islands near Java and Sumatra, instead of John Mandeville's yellow-striped snakes and dog-headed men, there were neat notes on cinnamon and nutmeg."

I don't suppose anyone knows what these "neat notes" said? Wroe gives no further information.

The University of Milwaukee has an online copy of the globe which can be viewed here:

Behaim Globe 1492

Using the zoom facility (and a magnifying glass) I’ve transcribed the notes on Java as follows:

'Item alsz man ausz des groszen konigs in Cathay landt von dem konigreich Ciamba gegen orient genant fahrt 1500 welsche meiln so kumpt man in dise insell gefahren genant Java major die hat umbfangen/ambfangen 3600 welsche meiln der konig diser insell ist niemands unterworfen und peth abgotter an man findt in diser insell allerley specerey als pfeffer muscat muskat pluet spienart galgan cubeben gariofilla negel zimeth und allerley rourz vast diejenigen die man der verkauft darnach austheilt in alle welt darum gewonlich vil kaufleuth daselbst ligen'

I’d transliterate that as:

'Item as man from the great kings in Cathay of the kingdom of Champa going east called travel 1500 welsh miles so kumpt (comes?) man in this island travelers call Java major which has umbfangen/ambfangen (covered?) 3600 welsh miles the king of this island is subject to nobody and peth (?) to an idol/deity one finds in this island all sorts of spices such as pepper nutmeg mace spienart (?) galangal cubeb gariofilla (?) negel (?) cinnamon and all sorts of roots vast (?) those the man trades there still austheilt (from whence?) to all the world usually will merchants there be located'

And translate it as:

'So – as one leaves the great land of China going east from the kingdom called Vietnam and travel 1500 miles, one comes to the island travelers call Java which has a circumference of 3600 miles. The king of this island is subject to no-one and is a demi-god. One finds on this island all sorts of spices such as pepper, nutmeg, mace, (spienart?), galangal, cubeb, (gariofilla?), (negel?), cinnamon and all sorts of roots which are traded there and which attract merchants from across the world.'

Here's wondering if anyone proficient in German (or even 15th century High Dutch) could help with the translations of ‘spienart’, ‘gariofilla’ and ‘negel’. Please note that those are my spellings and some of the letters could be archaic so I may have misspelt them.

I think "gariofilla" is what would be called girofle in French, ie cloves in English, with the English word deriving from the French, un clou, meaning a nail from the shape of the hard dry flower head, le clou de girofle. (Une giroflée is a wallflower, the blooms of which have a clove-like scent/taste and, together with similar clove-smelling flowers, particularly some of the carnation family, were often used as a cheap alternative to cloves in cooking: the English gillyflower is a corruption of this French floral meaning. The English 'clove of garlic' however has a different origin deriving from something cleaved or cloven, ie split, often from a larger whole). The "negel" referred to above would also mean clove: it's kruidnagel in modern Dutch, kruid meaning spice and nagel again meaning a nail.

"Spienart" might mean what is called spikenard in English - a plant, usually from the Himalayas, whose rhizomes when crushed produce an aromatic oil, called nard oil or nardus oil, which is mentioned in the Bible as used by Mary of Bethany to anoint Jesus's feet but was also used as a flavouring in Roman and medieval cuisine. True spikenard does not grow in the Spice Islands (the Moluccas) but the writer probably just meant rhizomatous spices generally, such as ginger, galangal and tumeric/curcuma.

An interesting topic and impressive follow up; I venture the nagel might mean nigeila....known  in the East as Kasonji.... known here as a flower Love-in-the- Mist and sometimes called black onion seed....... and of course  also, what are those black bits in the rice, mum?

I understand your reasoning but I don't think that 'negel' can refer to nigella. As a spice nigella was not really that exotic, rare, unusual nor noteworthy enough - at least not at the end of the 15th century - to "... attract merchants from across the world". Accordingiy I think it would be unlikely for it to be specifically mentioned amongst much more valuable spices in the detailed annotation on a ground-breaking whole-world globe. Nigella has been widely grown and used as a spice around the Mediterranean, North Africa and the Near East since antiquity - as well as further afield in Asia, as you rightly say. But by the time the Behaim Globe was constructed (1492) it was already being grown in cottage gardens throughout England, France, Flanders and Germany - largely because it has a similar taste, albeit very much milder when compared to proper black pepper, piper nigrum - but then the real thing did still have to be imported, at very great expense, from such exotic Far Eastern locations as were indicated on this new spherical world-map.

Priscilla wrote:

impressive follow up

Indeed. A very informative post from Meles. Ginger, cloves and turmeric are obvious candidates on the list when one thinks about it. All we need to do now is to translate the notes on Sumatra (Java minor).

I can't find any corroborative texts to confirm it, but I imagine "negel" is simply the direct Middle German translation of "clavus" from Latin (English - "nail") from which "clove" derives. Modern German spells it as "nagel" but the cited spelling is still used in Norwegian "negel/negler" to indicate long nails used in masonry - rather than "spiker/spikre" to indicate normal carpentry nails.

"Spikre", incidentally, is still used colloquially to mean "cloves" here in Norway, though "nellik" is the official term, itself derived from "negelken", the diminutive version of "negel" in Middle German.

EDIT: A little Googling later and I did find this on Sotheby's website from a sale some years ago -

"A Netherlandish parcel-gilt silver pomander, circa 1620 - of globe form, engraved with alterning panels of roses and Pâris & The Three Graces, opening to reveal silver-gilt spice compartments, each engraved with name of spice, 'Muskat, Schlag, Bernstein, Rosmarin, Canel, Negelken', and scrollwork ornament, with traces of enamelling, screw-in suspension loop."

Now I'm wondering what a Bernstein tastes like!

nordmann wrote:

Now I'm wondering what a Bernstein tastes like!

Resinous probably, since bernstein is German for amber, ie fossilized tree resin such as is found on beaches around the Baltic, the German word deriving from etymological roots "burn" and "stone". Amber doesn't really burn but it will char and break down to leave a black residue.

Meanwhile "schlag" meaning blown with air, ie frothed up, is a Viennese term for whipped cream, such as on cakes or coffee, but I'm not sure that's what is meant on that pomander.

Schlag is one that is still available in Norway. It's made from dessicated primrose petals and violet leaves and lends a menthol type flavour to cooked meats when sprinkled over them on the plate. Schlagsvann (or Schlagswasser in German) is probably even more popular these days, being the same condiment mixed in brandy and which will blow your head off, while also relieving one's congested nasal cavities of course.

EDIT: Ah, so Bernstein is Amber Spice! Makes sense. A very christmassy spice here in Norway ("Ravekrydder") made up by blending tumeric, cinnamon, cardamon and ginger. The colour is a distinctive sienna bordering on orangey red, which I suppose is the reason for its name.

Ah ha ... that makes sense. I doubted it could mean ground up amber and rather supposed it was perhaps  powdered pine resin, although real amber has been historically used for a wide variety of medical treatments.

So it seems that there are 2 references to cloves in Behaim’s notes - gariofilla and negel. Mmm. To further confuse the matter, I’ve found this 1842 transcription from Nuremberg Polytechnic which gives ‘negel’ as ‘Regel’ with a letter ‘R’ but that must surely be a typo:

Der Erdglobus Nurnberg 1842

(see page 9)

The Gothic typeface doesn’t help much, particularly with regard to the umbfangen/ambfangen word. I'm still not sure what that first letter is. In the passage on Java minor (Sumatra), however, (on both Behaim’s globe and in the Nuremberg transcription) the word is clearly ‘umbfangen’ with a ‘u’. What the word actually means, though, is another matter. I’m guessing ‘surrounds’ or ‘covers’ as in ‘covers an area of’. 

Behaim’s reckoning also seems off. If one were to travel 1500 miles east of Vietnam then one would end up in the Pacific Ocean beyond the Philippines. To get from Vietnam to Java one would really need to head due south. The distance of 1500 miles is about right though but one wonders what exactly he means by ‘welsche meiln’. They can’t be actual Welsh miles which are enormous (more than 3 times as long as English miles) so they’re probably nautical miles or Roman miles or some such. Java’s coastline is about 1500 nautical miles long so Behaim's figure of 3600 ‘welsche meiln’ is more than double that. And that's also another typo in the Nuremberg transcription which gives the figure as 3000 for some reason.

Vizzer wrote:

So it seems that there are 2 references to cloves in Behaim’s notes - gariofilla and negel. Mmm.

Not really - As Meles meles said, gariofilla means "clove pink" plants, all varieties of carnation, that were used as alternatives to cloves in flavouring. Trade with the East Indies saw new varieties arrive in Europe with even stronger scents and flavours than more native flowers, which is why they probably got a mention in that context on the globe. Negel, however, refers to the real deal.

Umbfangen means "has surrounded", and "welsche Meiln" refers to the mile distance as used by "welsch" people, at the time referring to speakers of romance languages. I have found it used frequently in topographical and nautical descriptions from the period, so it seems to have been used as some kind of professional standard by Germans (who had more than a dozen regional variations of the "mile" distance in their own language with huge disparities between them). However I cannot find any reference from which I can deduce a modern equivalent.

Indeed ... gariofille (and as I read it, the Behaim Globe spells it with a final e, not an a), or girofle in French, essentially refers to the clove smell/taste rather than the specific plant (although of course that can become a bit of a circular chicken-and-egg argument). In modern French the spice itself (the hard nail-like flower heads) are called clous de girofle (nails of clove); the whole clove tree is un giroflier; while a clove-smelling flower, whether a 'clove-pink', a classic wallflower (Erysimum sp. which is a native plant of the Mediterranean), or any Shakespearean 'gillyflower', are all - but of course dependant on context - generally known as giroflées, ie a clovey-smelling plants/flowers.



Then there's the modern Dutch, kruidnadel: meaning 'nail-spice', 'nails of spice' or 'spicey nails', depending on how you exactly prefer to translate it and within the specific context, nevertheless: kruid=spice; nagel=a carpenter's nail; but together, kruidnagel=cloves (ie the spice):



But whatever one chooses to call them, they are all the same thing.

Moreover there was unlikely to have been very much variation, in either the type or quality, of cloves available in the 15th century as at that time they only grew in the Moluccas, nowhere else. So whatever they might have been called, whether gariofille, girofle, nagels, clous, cloves, or even syzygium (the old Roman name, although they didn't encounter it until the 1st century) there were all referring to exactly the same product.

Even more limited in geographical range at that time were mace and nutmeg, both of which only grew on the Banda Islands. The Bandas are a group of about half a dozen very small islands at the extreme south of the Moluccas and separated from the others by 150 kms of open sea. The largest, Great Banda, is only five kms long and barely one km wide, while the most productive for mace and nutmeg was the island or Run, just two kms long and only a few hundred metres wide. Until the beginning of the nineteenth century these tiny specks of land produced the entire world supply of these two spices.

Following in the steps of the Portuguese it was the Dutch that gained control of the Banda Islands and thus the incredibly valuable world monopoly in nutmeg and mace. But almost inevitably the English followed in the form of Captain Nathaniel Courthope of the English East India company who arrived at the island of Run in 1616. He won over the local inhabitants who (willingly it seems because they didn't like the Dutch) signed a contract accepting James I of England as sovereign of the island. The Dutch were outraged over this threat to their monopoly on the extremely profitable spice trade. Courthope fortified the island by erecting several forts but unfortunately lost two ships to mutiny and sinking by the Dutch when they laid siege to the island. Courthope and 39 European defenders, with their staunch native allies, managed to hold off the Dutch for over four years, however after Courthope's death in a Dutch attack in 1620, the English eventually gave up departed the island. Finally in full possession of Run again, the Dutch proceeded to kill, enslave or exile the entire population and chop down every nutmeg tree on the island to prevent the English from retaking it or at least making it not worth doing so. According to the Treaty of Westminster ending the First Anglo-Dutch War (1652-1654), Run should have been returned to England, but Dutch forces were still firmly installed on the neighbouring Banda Islands and the English had no suitable forces available in the Far East to enforce their rightful claim.

After the Second Anglo-Dutch War (1665-1667) England and the United Provinces of the Netherlands agreed the Treaty of Breda. By this treaty England reluctantly gave up its claim to Run but, almost as a consolation, was formally given another small Dutch island, half a world away, that the British had been illegally occupying since 1664. The Dutch got the Island of Run but the British got the Island of Manhattan. Thus the small settlement of New Amsterdam was renamed New York and so in place of nutmeg Britain got the Big Apple. In the long run Manhattan was the bigger prize, especially when the Dutch monopoly in nutmeg was completely destroyed when nutmeg seedlings were covertly transferred to Ceylon, Grenada, Singapore and other British colonies in 1817, and where they still happily grow.

The Breda Treaty wasn't the one in which the Dutch lost their New Netherlands colony in America. Breda actually encouraged an increasingly isolated England, in terms of allies, to exploit the one provision that worked to its benefit - an agreement between the French, Swedish, Danish and Dutch to mutually cease competition for naval dominance - and press its own naval advantage that resulted, almost immediately, in the outbreak of the Third Anglo-Dutch War in its aftermath. This war, undertaken by armies against the better judgement of their own generals on both sides, risked affording France greater opportunity to accelerate its own expansionist ambitions at the expense of both warring parties, and was therefore concluded bilaterally in what is called the Peace of Westminster.

It was this final treaty, often regarded as the first international treaty almost exclusively devoted to trade (back in the day when the British actually knew how to negotiate such a thing and stick to its agreed terms, to boot), that saw both sides surrender certain territories to the other, including the New Netherlands colony and its town of New Amsterdam. Surinam, by the same token, was officially dropped from English expansionist plans. In fact the treaty names over a hundred colonial settlements, contested targets, and even more future targets that would be guaranteed to be exploited by one side or the other. It effectively emulated the infamous Treaty of Tordesillas between Portugal and Spain in its ambition to divide the globe into two commercial hemispheres, each to be exploited by one of two signatories. Like Tordesillas also it resulted in one signatory initially gaining the more immediately lucrative colonies which in turn encouraged that country to concentrate naval development in securing those specific routes, while the other side was encouraged to develop their own naval capability towards exploration, acquisition and potential exploitation of almost everything else on the planet. The rest, as they say, is a rather spicy history indeed ....

nordmann wrote:

As Meles meles said, gariofilla means "clove pink" plants, all varieties of carnation, that were used as alternatives to cloves in flavouring. Trade with the East Indies saw new varieties arrive in Europe with even stronger scents and flavours than more native flowers, which is why they probably got a mention in that context on the globe. Negel, however, refers to the real deal.

So ‘gariofilli’ refers to any clove-scented flower or petal regardless of whether or not it comes from Syzygium aromaticum, while ‘negel’ refers specifically to the dried flower buds of Syzygium aromaticum. That’s a lot clearer now thanks. I’ve also had another look at the Nuremberg transcription and it’s definitely a letter ‘n’ in negel. It uses a Gothic typeface whose upper-case Ns and Rs are very similar-looking.

I've re-thought my comment on Behaim's reckoning too. His use of the word 'orient' is probably used in the modern sense of being 'in the direction of' rather than the ancient sense of 'eastwards'. So someone travelling from China in the direction of Vietnam (rather than 'east from Vietnam') would indeed be heading south - i.e. towards Java.  

Now for Sumatra. The transcription is as follows:

'Java minor dise insel hat umfangen 2000 welsch meil und hat in ir acht konigreich und haben ein besundere sprach und betten abgotter an, do wechst auch allerley sperzerey in der konigreich Boszmann genant findt man vil ainhorner helfanten und affen. Die menschen angesicht und glidtmasz haben. Item wechst kain Korn da, si machen aber prot aus Reis. An weinstadt trinken sy safft der aus baumen tropft, den man findt rot und Weisz. Und ist ain Redlich guet getrand von geschmacht desz haben sy nach notturst genug in dem konigreich Samara. Uber in konigreich genant Dageram ist gewonheit so ir abgott sagt das ein krancker mensch sterben soll, so ersticket man dem krancken bey zeit, und die freundt kochen das flaisch irs krancken freundt und essen ine mit einander mit grosen freudten auf dasz er den Wurmen nit zuthail werdte, uber in konigreich Jambri haben die Leutt man und frewen hinden schwenz gelich die hundt. Do wecht uber trefflich vil speceren und allerlei thier als ainhorner und anderere. Im andern konigreich Fanfur so wecht der best Camphor in der welt den man mit Golt abwigt. Daselbst findt gross gewachsen Baumen da zwischen holz und Rinden auf dem Safft Mehl wurdt, das guet zu essen ist, und Marco Polo schreibt in seinem dritten buch an dem 16 Capittel. Er sen funf monath in diser insel gewest.'      

I’d transliterate that as:

'Java minor – this island covers 2000 welsh miles and has in it eight kingdoms and has sundry languages and (betten?) idols grows also all sorts of spices in the kingdom of Boszmann called finds man many unicorns elephants and apes. The people (angesicht?) and (glidtmas?) have. Item grows no corn there they make but bread out of rice. A type of wine drink they sap from the trees drips then man finds red and white. And is an honest, good (getrand?) of (geschmacht?) that have they from (notturst?) enough in the kingdom Samara. Over in kingdom called Dageram is habit so their idol says that a sick person should die, so strangle man then sick by time and the friends cook the flesh of their sick friend and eat in with each other with great friends from of them the worms (nit?) health would over in the kingdom Jambri have the people men and women hind tails as a dog. There grows over excellent many spices and all sorts of animals such as unicorns and others. In another kingdom Fanfur so grows the best camphor in the world then man with gold weighs. There find great growing trees that between wood and rind from the sap flour made that good to eat is and Marco Polo wrote in his third book on the 16 chapter. There are five months in this island known.'
     
And translate it as:

'Sumatra – this island covers 2000 miles, has eight kingdoms and several languages and deities. All sorts of spices grow there. In the kingdom called Bozman one will find many rhinoceroses, elephants and apes. The people have (angesicht?) and (glidtmas?). No wheat is grown there, rather they make bread out of rice. They make a type of wine drink from the sap which drips from trees and which comes in either red or white. And it’s an honest, good (getrand?) of (geschmacht?) of had they to (notturst?) enough in the kingdom of Samara. Over in the kingdom called Dageram it is customary according to their belief for sick folk to be killed, so they suffocate the sick from time to time and their friends then cook the flesh and eat it. (The worms from a close friend are believed to be beneficial to health?) Over in the kingdom of Jambri the people both men and women have hind tails the same as dogs. Many excellent spices grow there along with all sorts of animals such as unicorns. The kingdom of Fanfur produces the best camphor in the world which is worth its weight in gold. Great trees grow there the sap from between the wood and bark of which is made into flour which is good to eat. Marco Polo wrote of this in chapter 16 of his third book. There are five months marked in this island.'

The words not yet translated are ‘angesicht’, ‘glidtmasz’, ‘getrand’, ‘geschmacht’ and ‘notturst’. The 2 relevant sentences are:

'Die menschen angesicht und glidtmasz haben.'

and

'Und ist ain Redlich guet getrand von geschmacht desz haben sy nach notturst genug in dem konigreich Samara.'

I’ll also question the bit about the worms because I'm not quite sure of my translation of it:

'ine mit einander mit grosen freudten auf dasz er den Wurmen nit zuthail werdte'

The notes on Sumatra are somewhat trickier than those on Java.

My German is not very good but I translate the first part as something along the lines of:

Sumatra. This island has an area/encompasses/or has a circumference,  of 2,000 miles, and within it are eight kingdoms. They have a language all of their own (ein besundere sprach) and worship false gods/idols (betten abgotter). Various kinds of spices grow there. In the kingdom of Bozman are found many unicorns (ie rhinoceras), elephants and monkeys who have human faces and limbs (menschen angesicht und gliedmaß). No corn grows there, but they make bread of rice, and instead of wine they drink the sap which trickles from trees, it is found as red and white and furnishes a really good drink (ain redlich guet getranck), of which they have as much as they need (dess haben sy nach nottursst genug ... [or is it notturßt, or perhaps notturft) but however you translate it, apparently the kingdom of Samara had genug ie enough or sufficient for all its needs].

In the kingdom of Dageran it is the custom that when their idol (ein abgott means a false god, hence my translation as an idol) says that a sick person  is about to die (ist gewonheit fo ir abgott sagt dass ein krancker mensch sterben foll) they suffocate/smother (ersticken) the dying person just before their final time, and so their friends then cook the flesh of their sick friend, and eat it with much rejoicing in order that the worms may not have it (und essen jne mit einander mit grossen freudten aus dafs er den Wurmen nit zuthail werde).

I agree with your translation, MM.

It's a funny use of "notturft" - nowadays more commonly pronounced "notdurft" - which in the context meant "to meet necessity". In some dialects it is still used but only in one particular context - to have an urgent piddle.

Thanks for the interesting information in the comments above, knowledgeable posters.  I suppose even a person as unskilled in gardening as myself could manage a small herb garden.  As a vegetarian I sometimes use spices to give dishes a bit of piquancy because vegetarian dishes can be somewhat bland.  I remember once having a painful tooth and following the old wives' remedy of putting a cotton bud soaked in oil of cloves against the tooth.  I was daft enough to tell the dentist what I'd done - who rolled his eyes and said "If you were taking an aspirin for an achy finger you wouldn't hold it against your finger, would you?".  That's a long time ago.  I read a historical novel some years ago "Scent of Cloves" by Norah Lofts.  There was a love story in it but that wasn't the main story but one character was growing clove trees illegally on what was virtually his own island for the smuggling trade.  I'd rate Norah Lofts as better than PG - I think she did try to be faithful to what sources she could find though in her book about Ann Boleyn she relied on Agnes Strickland's book about the lady which has been found inaccurate more recently. I'm low on spices other than curry powder and garam marsala now though having read the above I am intrigued to read more about those two spices.

Incidentally my own interpretation of "Er sen fünf monath in diser insel geweft" would be "He spent five months on this island". Given that much of Marco Polo's claimed itinerary was almost certainly fictional, and that his use of the term "Java Major" (which he described as the largest island in the world) is so ambiguous that it has been successfully applied to all the land masses from Sumatra to Australia, I reckon the author of the globe's legend can be forgiven for associating one of Polo's claims with what was becoming a clearer picture of the region and identifying this island in particular as the location in which Polo claimed to have wintered his vessel.

It doesn't help of course that Polo had identified another Sumatra.

You made me smile Meles when you offered a disclaimer on your ability at German and the proceeded to deliver a flawless translation (in comparison to my amateurish effort). It makes sense that ‘die menschen angesicht und glidtmasz haben’ refers to the apes – presumably orangutans. Unlike with the notes on Java, this time on Sumatra I was guided by the punctuation provided by the Nuremberg transcription which placed a full stop after the word ‘affen’. Now I see that it's another typo in that document – it should be a comma. That transcription is proving to be a veritable faux ami here.

And ‘ein besundere sprach’ is clearly singular. Not ‘sundry languages’ as I had it but a separate language or ‘language of their own’ as you well translate it. And thank you for clearing up the business regarding the worms. I had all sorts of ghastly images running through my mind regarding intestines, maggots and threadworms etc. But a joyous cannibal wake in order to spite the earthworms seems much more civilized by comparison.
 
I couldn’t decide whether to use unicorns or rhinoceroses for ‘ainhorner’ so decided to use both. Rhinoceroses at first when Behaim was talking about the fauna of Bozman but unicorns later after he mentioned the people of Jambri having tails like dogs. In the original quote from Ann Wroe, the writer held Behaim’s notes up as a mirror to those of John de Mandeville (who wrote over 150 years before Behaim) and suggested that the former was only interested in ‘yellow-striped snakes and dog-headed men’ while the latter wrote ‘neat notes on cinnamon and nutmeg’. Yet, Mandeville’s writing on Java is not that dissimilar to Behaim’s. This is from The Voiage and Travayle of Sir John Maundeville Knight which Treateth of the Way toward Hierusalem and of the Marvayle of Inde with other Ilands and Countreys:

'And there is also a great yle that men call Java & the kinge of that countrey hath under hym seven kinges, for he is a full mightie prince. In this yle groweth all maner of spyces more plenteously than in any other place, as ginger, clowes, canell, nutmyge and other, and ye shall understande that the nutmyge beareth the maces, & of all thing therein is plenty savinge wine. The King of this lande hath a riche palace and the best that is in the worlde, for all the greces of his hall and chambres are all made one of gold & another of silver, & all the walls are plated with fine gold and silver, & on those plates are written stories of knightes, and batayles, and the pavimente of the hall and chambres is of golde and silver, and there is no man that woulde beleve this riches that is there except hee had sene it, and the Kynge of this yle is so mightie, that he hath many times overcom the great Caane of Cathay which is the myghtiest Emperour that is in all the worlde, for there is often warre amonge them, for the great Caane would make hym hold his land of him.'
     
Writing about Macumeran (Nicobar), Mandeville says that ‘the men and women of the countrey haue heads like houndes’ which is similar to Behaim’s notes on Sumatra’s Jambri people having dogs’ tails. Meanwhile Mandeville writing about Dodyn (Sumatra) relates the euthanasia-by-suffocation-followed-by-cannibal-feast story:

'And if it so be that the father be sicke, or the mother, or any frend, the sonne goeth soone to the priest of the law & prayeth him that he will aske of the ydoll if his father shall dye of that sicknesse or not. And then the priest and the son kneele downe before the ydole devoutly & asketh him, and he aunswereth to them, and if he say that he shall lyve, then they kepe him wel, and if he say that he shall dye, then commeth the priest with the son or with the wyfe or what frende that it be unto him yt is sicke, and they lay their hands over his mouth to stop his breath, and so they sley him & then they smite all the body into peces & praieth all his frendes for to come and eate of him that is dead, and they make a great feste thereof and haue many minstrels there, and eate him with great melody. And so when they haue eaten al ye flesh, then they take the bones and bury them all singing with great worship, and all those that are of his friendes that were not there at the eating of him haue great shame and vylany, so that they shall never more be taken as frends.'

In other words it seems that Wroe is setting up a false opposition between Mandeville’s writings and those of Behaim. As for Mandeville’s sources, however, than that’s another matter - nordmann you may, perhaps, need to elaborate on your intriguing comment about Marco Polo’s ‘other Sumatra’.

Vizzer wrote:

As for Mandeville’s sources, however, than that’s another matter - nordmann you may, perhaps, need to elaborate on your intriguing comment about Marco Polo’s ‘other Sumatra’.

Of course, and it's all to do with vicarious reporting of what is in all probability a mendacious account.

We don't have any extant written or published version of Polo's own account of his so-called travels, and neither it seems did Mandeville or Behaim, even though they were near contemporaries. Instead they, and we, are indebted to a lad called Rustichello da Pisa who - and this is equally as dubious - claimed to have met Polo while both were in prison following Marco's return from his adventures and taken it upon himself to write the stuff down.

Rustichello was of local notoriety as a writer of very bad romances in equally bad French (a fad at the time in northern Italy for peddlers of such tripe), injudicious sexual liaisons with merchants' spouses, and running up debts. It was his "Le Devisement du Monde" which formed the basis of further manuscripts, several versions of which exist by often anonymous hand, and which collectively made it into other languages, "The Travels of Marco Polo" being the oldest English language version we know of.

If you trace references to Java back through these versions you are immediately struck by its peripatetic nature - it varies from a singular land mass to one of a pair (Major and Minor), to an archipelago, and even to near continental status. The problem of course was that, as each edition was revised and published, more information regarding the true geographic nature of the islands was entering other European accounts and the authors were visibly attempting to square the Rustichello original with new facts as they emerged.

In Rustichello's account Polo mentions Java and Sago, which he claims to be a smaller island belonging to Java, and in later accounts based on Rustichello "Java" is cited with "Major" and "Minor" suffixes apparently at the whim of individual authors. However even contemporary knowledge within European maritime geography in Rustichello's time knew that Java was better described using the Minor and Major epithets anyway, and if Sago therefore was indeed smaller than Java, however it was suffixed, then this logically had to be Java Minor. To complicate matters more Rustichello said that Polo had said that Java (presumably Major) was not only big, but the largest island in the world stretching south to a latitude not yet explored. This places it south of Java Minor even if, as apologists for Polo at the time claimed, he had confused an archipelago with a minor continent. Throughout all these permutations the question already had cropped up as to which of these approximated to Sumatra, an island whose name had already entered public knowledge via more reputable and dependable maritime accounts. The problem was that Polo's description of Sago matched most closely to others' descriptions of Sumatra, so somehow this had to be accounted for.

The solution, at least by the time Polo's account made it into other main European languages, was to go with the archipelago theory regarding what the hell Polo's garbled account might actually mean (there was still huge trust in the veracity of his alleged travelogue), in which one ended up with an acknowledgement that Polo had made a simple error with his terminology - his Java Minor was actually Java, His Sago was Sumatra, and his Java Major simply didn't exist except as a collection of smaller islands he had confused with a land mass. This however flew in the face of what mariners already well knew - that there was indeed a Java Major and Minor at the latitudes where we now find Sumatra and Java, and that his account of having lived in Sago meant that he either didn't know north from south (something of a handicap for long distance mariners) or that Rustichello had messed it all up (which meant that everything else attributed to Polo was now undependable too). In the end academia settled on the inadequate compromise that Polo had found another "Sumatra" very close in nature to the known one and that this was as yet to be "rediscovered", and that Rustichello had confused Polo's reporting of what Chinese merchants had told him with Polo claiming to have seen something with his own eyes.

However, given that any such rediscovery meant also that there was a potential gold-mine out there for speculators, this inadequate solution gained remarkable traction and persisted, even long after the geographical evidence arrived back in Europe that it was all baloney (or "bolognaise" as Rustichello would have pretentiously said).

LIR above mentioned curry powder and garam masala, which are of course both pre-prepared spice mixes rather than individual spices. Garam masala is hindi meaning hot (garam) spice mix (masala), and is typical of cuisine in the northern parts of the sub-continent. There are of course numerous regional variations but a typical garam masala might contain fennel seed, clove, cinnamon, mace, cardamon, cumin, coriander seed, mustard seed and chilli powder.

Curry powder is an Anglo-Indian invention but the word comes from the Tamil word, kari, meaning 'spiced sauce' or 'relish' and was originally a thin, soup-like, spiced dressing served in southern India, amongst many other stew-like dressings for meat and vegetables. The Portuguese are credited with introducing kari to Europe after they colonised parts of India and there is a recipe for making kari in a 17th Century Portuguese cook book. The first "curry" recipe in English using the Anglicised form of the word was written by Hannah Glasse in 'The Complete Art of Cookery, Exhibited in a Plain and Easy Manner', first published in 1747; what had originally been an Indian sauce to go with rice had now become almost an spiced English stew with a little rice in it.



The first edition of her book (above) used only black pepper and coriander seeds for seasoning but by the fourth edition of the book (1758) additional ingredients such as turmeric and ginger were called for:



The use of hot spices is not mentioned which reflects the limited use of chili in India at that time - chili plants had only been introduced into India (from Central and South America) around the late 16th century and initially were only popular in southern India.

The idea of a pre-prepared spice blend, called kari podi or curry powder, with even more spices and increasingly chili to impart heat, seems to have been introduced to Britain in the late 18th century by the British East India Company who were then trading with Tamil merchants along the Coromandel Coast of southeast India. Anglo-Indian style curry, usually made with commercially available curry powder rather than individually ground spices, was first served in coffee houses in Britain from 1809, while the first Indian restaurant the 'Hindoostanee Coffee House' in London was opened the following year by the Bengali entrepreneur Sake Dean Mahomed. Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, curry grew increasingly popular in Britain owing to the large number of British civil servants and military personnel associated with the British Raj.

There is now something of a stigma about curry powder amongst curry aficionadoes who often insist that a proper curry can only be made from the individual spices being freshly ground and prepared to order. However a pre-prepared spice mix does make life a lot easier, whether one is the chef of a London curry house, a cook in a Maharaja's palace kitchen, or just an ordinary Indian housewife, and commercial spice mixes go back a long way, well before the East India Company brought curry powder to Britain.

The 14th century cookbook, the 'Forme of Cury' which was "...compyled of þe mayster cokes of kyng Richard þe secund" in about 1390, mentions several types of spice mixes (and note that here the word cury in the tirle is unrelated to curry being the Middle English for 'cooking' ie the book's title means 'the way of cooking', or simply 'how to cook'). Several of the book's recipes make reference to a poudre forte, others to a poudre douce. Unfortunately exactly what there were is unclear - presumably all professional cooks of the time were so familiar with them that no one wrote down an exact recipe. Nevertheless poudre forte (ie strong powder) was likely based on hot spices like pepper, ginger and perhaps mustard (no chili of course yet being available), while poudre douce (sweet powder) was based on sugar (then very expensive and only available as an imported 'spice'). There are also a couple of mentions of a poudre marchand - again with no clear indication of what it might be, but being called merchant's powder it was presumably a commercially-available, ready-made spice mix.

However, since we are talking 'standard spice mixes', as well as garam masala there is of course the classic Chinese five-spice powder, 五香粉 ...  a spice mixture of five (sometimes more) spices used predominantly in almost all branches of Chinese cuisines and Vietnamese cuisine. The five flavours of the spices (sweet, bitter, sour, salty, and pungent) refer to the five traditional Chinese elements of classic cuisine, and so while there are variants, a common mix might be: star anise; cloves; Chinese cinnamon; Sichuan pepper; and fennel seeds. I can easily obtain a version of Chinese Five-Spice powder in local supermarkets here in France - but Indian garam masala rather less so (reflecting history, of course). Although 'curry powder' and 'curry sauce', although both made rather mild to suit French palates, are increasingly available.