Lecture 13: Carnival in the High Middle Ages

Carnival in the High Middle Ages......................................................

Lecture 13

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fter the Dark Ages, Europe was pretty much in ruins, with the

sole exception of Spain under the rule of the Ummayad caliph of

Córdoba, which was a dazzling civilization with a sophisticated

Mediterranean cuisine linked fi rmly to the Middle East. The rest of Europe

was not only still suffering devastating famines, weak kings, and general

economic dislocation, but also a new wave of Germanic invasions in the 9th

and 10th centuries by a people from the north known as the Vikings. In this

lecture, you will learn how these invasions seriously disrupted Europe and

introduced a new foodway to the region.

Culinary Changes in Europe

 The Vikings invaded and conquered the British Isles and Normandy

in northern France, and the Normans in turn invaded England in

1066. Vikings also conquered Sicily, displacing the Arab rulers
      there. Another group called the Rus settled in Russia and traded
      as far as Constantinople and Baghdad. It is odd to think of Viking
      and Persian cultures coming in contact, but even in the earliest
      European cookbooks, there defi nitely was an infl uence.

 Returning to the Middle Ages, in the year 1000, everything

changed. The Vikings settled down, regular trade began to pick

up and intensify, and the population began to rise dramatically.

Cities began to grow again, sometimes right over the rubble of

Roman cities.

 One of the most compelling reasons for this dramatic change is a

serious shift in climate. Evidence proved that Europe was getting

signifi cantly warmer. Sudden grain surpluses suggested a longer

growing season, which led to people cultivating more land,

reclaiming it from the wild, and moving up mountainsides. This

growth in resources naturally stimulated population growth.