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Introduction
- University of California Press
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Introduction It would be almost impossible for a person living today to escape the influence of nutritional science. A vast array of dietary guidelines is promulgated through every media and on every item of packaged food. Whether or not these rules are followed, the terms of the discussion are all too familiar: calories, saturated fat, vitamins and minerals, cholesterol . We all know that many of us are intensely diet and health conscious . It would probably come as a surprise, though, to learn that five hundred years ago literate Europeans were equally obsessed with eating right. Then, as now, a veritable industry of experts churned out diet books for an eager and concerned public. From the 1470s to 1650 there was an immense outpouring of dietary literature from printing presses in Italy, then issuing from France, England, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, and as far afield as Transylvania. Nutrition guides were consistent best-sellers. About one hundred titles in dozens of editions, revisions , and translations plainly attest to the topic’s popularity. Some dietary works were tiny handbooks written in the vernacular for a lay audience, others were massive Latin tomes clearly intended for practicing physicians or scholarly dilettantes. The authors of these books may have been physicians, philosophers, poets, or even politicians. Anyone with an interest in food appears to have felt qualified to pen his own nutritional guide. This book examines these dietary works in detail and offers a view of what it meant to eat well and be healthy in the Renaissance. This book also focuses on the major differences among dietary au1 2 Introduction 1. Michel de Montaigne, Essais, trans. J. M. Cohen (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1958), 371. 2. Laurent Joubert, Erreurs populaires, book 2 (Rouen: George L’oyselet, 1587), 99–100: . . . plusiers, qui ne cessent d’interroguer les medecins quand ils sont à table, ceci est-il bon, cela est-il mauvais ou mal sain? que fait ceci, que fait cela? . . . la plus part de ceux qui en demandent, ne se soucient pas d’observer ce que le Medecin en dira, mais ils prennet plaisir à ce devis, & d’estre ainsi entretenus . . . Many never cease interrogating physicians when at the table: is this good, is this bad or unhealthy? What does this do, what does that do? Most who ask have no desire to observe what the physician says, but they take pleasure in doing it, for entertainment. See also chap. 2, n. 42. thors, how the genre changed over time, and how authors of various nations disagreed. Just as today, the medical experts of the past were a contentious lot. Fads came and went, new discoveries shook the profession, academic vendettas were waged in print, and zealots proposed miracle diets. Controversy among the experts was fueled by several factors. Dependence on ancient authorities, who often disagreed, divided physicians into warring factions. Entrenched local custom or an effort to address a particular social group might outweigh loyalty to the reigning medical orthodoxy. How to assess new foods from America and Asia also sparked contention. This book also considers the impact of regimens upon the reader. With conflicting advice from every corner, the beleaguered public was probably left hopelessly confused, and many probably gave up. Montaigne, in his essay “On experience,” revealed his own failure to follow dietary rules, trusting his personal experience over the strictures of the medical profession. On the other hand, he also realized “that the art of medicine is not so rigid that we cannot find an authority for anything that we may do. . . . If your doctor does not think it good for you to sleep, to take wine or some particular meat, do not worry; I will find you another who will disagree with him.”1 Other readers persevered, trying to maintain rigorous control over every morsel consumed. The artist Pontormo was clearly manic about diet and in his autobiography made a point of recording every crumb he ate. For those who took the advice seriously, dietary literature must have generated a considerable amount of anxiety and guilt. Even apart from the truly diet-conscious, the genre appears to have enjoyed a real vogue. At the tables of many Renaissance rulers and elites, the court physician was grilled daily regarding the virtues and perils of every tidbit.2 His advice was often promptly ignored, but nonetheless diet remained an entertaining topic of conversation. [44.197.113.64] Project MUSE (2024-03-19 13:36 GMT) Introduction 3 3. François Rabelais, La vie...