Academic literature on the topic 'Medieval orchards'

Abstract The lack of much modern writing about medieval food production in gardens and orchards, or the consumption of vegetables and fruit, is easily explained. First, these matters have been dismissed by historians as marginal and trivial; secondly, full and detailed written evidence can be rather scarce. In fact gardens and their produce, far from being small matters best left to anti- quarians, are essential to any assessment of the quantity and quality of medieval diets. In considering quantity, in a period of food shortages and potential mal- nutrition, we must enquire about the contribution that horticulture made to the total volume of food production. Quality can be measured partly in the sense of nutritional value, given the current understanding that fresh fruit and vegetables are an essential component of a healthy diet. The quality of a diet can also be judged in terms of medieval ideas about balanced eating as defined in the theory of humours, and the pleasure and satisfaction that were derived from consuming garden produce. The contribution that vegetables and fruit made to diet cannot be separated from the cultural importance of gardens, which figure prominently in medieval literature, and for which there is archaeological evidence.