Re: A Druid's Perspective on common things... Jenny jenny@panix.com Tue Aug 8 11:58:54 2000 A fascinating topic, Starry Night!*p*I'm not sure what an ancient Druid's advice would be. The only Celts I know of who abstained from meat were some Christian monks. For them, this was asceticism: they loved meat, and they refused to eat it in order to mortify themselves and divorce themselves from worldly concerns.*p*But the social dynamics of food have changed drastically over the centuries. We've got a lot more choice in our diet.*p*Developed countries have more food available. We may decry the harshness of enormous agro-businesses and chemical fertilizers, but they dramatically increase the land's productivity. We're also using grains which have been hybredized and crossbred for centries. Not all "wheat" is equal. The seeds used in medieval and earlier times didn't produce anywhere near as much grain as the ones we use now. I've got papers on medieval farming someplace and can look the details if people are interested. But ancient seeds were something like one-twentieth as productive as modern seeds. You had to farm 20 acres to come up with one modern acre's worth of food.*p*Moreover, one of the reasons that vegetarianism is an option today is that we are NOT tied to our land. During winter, we northerners import fruits and fresh vegetables from the south. From Mexico, or from huge irrigated farms in the California desert. It's much more challenging to survive on the crops you can grow locally, in a northern climate. *p*On the other hand, meat-eating has changed too. Today, if I want a hamburger, I go to the store and buy a pound of ground chuck. In the Middle Ages, I had to get a cow, slaughter it, and prepare my meat. And then I'd have my pound of hamburger... and about a thousand other pounds of meat. And no refridgeration to preserve it...*p*In ancient Europe, meat-eating tended to be a big social and ritual event for one simple reason: you couldn't do it alone. If you ate anything bigger than a chicken or a rabbit, you produced too much food for one person to consume. You had to share it, or prepare it... or you lost it.*p*Thus, for instance, in Ireland cattle slaughter generally occurred at great festivities. Samhain was the traditional time to do it, or St. Martin's Day in the Middle Ages. The way that the meat was divided reinforced social hierarchies. The finest piece of meat, "the Champion's Portion", went to the finest warrior. And Irish literature is full of tales of the fights that arose from trying to decide who that was.*p*In the Greco-Roman countries temples were slaughter-houses. If you wish to kill an animal for food, you took it to a nearby temple. The priest blessed the animal, killed it, burned some of the entrails as an offering to the Gods, and then you took the rest of the meat home with you. To the Greeks, the rituals surrounding meat-eating were so important that vegetarianism was considered a form of atheism. It was one of the charges for which Socrates was executed.*p*So what would an ancient Druid advise? I agree with the others -- I think they'd find it a strange question and tell you to follow your own conscience. Meat-eating is no longer a necessity. It no longer has the religious and social significance it once had. No one prays over a cow, dying in a slaughterhouse. My friends and I can go to a restaurant and we can all order the "Champion's Portion".*p*Jenny*br* Re: A Druid's Perspective on common things... Deborah 646 Mon Aug 7 13:50:45 2000