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"When cheifest Rebell feede": food, fosterage and fear in early modern Ireland.

"When cheifest Rebell feede": food, fosterage and fear in early modern Ireland.

Authors :
Shanahan, Madeline
Source :
Food, Culture & Society. Aug2024, Vol. 27 Issue 4, p916-935. 20p.
Publication Year :
2024

Abstract

As English forces struggled to bring Ireland under Crown control during the early modern period, all aspects of Irish culture and identity were seen as potentially subversive. Irish culture posed a threat to both the regime, and to the very identity and sanctity of English bodies in a foreign and hostile land. This paper will examine the role that food played in the political discourse of sixteenth and seventeenth-century Ireland. It will investigate how aspects of food, from infant feeding, to diet, dairying and cookery became a cause of concern for English colonial commentators. It will show how descriptions of foodways were used to cast the Irish as "savages," but importantly, how they were also used to illustrate the "degeneration" of the Old English. Through the discussion of food commentators warned newcomers not to follow the fate of their predecessors; their bodies were not impenetrable, and through culinary contact, they too could be "undone." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Subjects

Subjects :
*FOREIGN bodies
*FOOD habits

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
15528014
Volume :
27
Issue :
4
Database :
Academic Search Index
Journal :
Food, Culture & Society
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
178650863
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1080/15528014.2022.2121887