In Roman times, salt was highly prized and if one was said to be not "worth their salt," it was considered a high insult. It is also regarded as the first traded commodity (Salt Assocation). Salt was no less valuable in the Middle Ages and contributed to status as well as food preservation.
Domesday Book records of the salt industry in England are more in-depth than those of any other type of production, demonstrating just how valuable it was (Hull). Worcestershire and Cheshire were two of the largest saltworks cities, followed by Sussex on the southern coast. Middlewich, Nantwich, and Northwich were the major saltworks of Cheshire. Salt was a local affair and the cost of importing it to other cities was great. London later formed its Fraternity of Salters to produce it themselves as only the wealthy could afford it when brought in from other towns.
These saltworks received support from the king and in return were to pay shares of their product to him. Droitwich, a saltworks in Worcestershire, had 300 measures of salt paid to the king by three salt-workers according to the Domesday account. Henry II's marriage to Eleanor of Aquitaine also opened trade between England and France, providing a new market for Biscay salt from the Continent, although it probably did little to reduce the prices attached to it.
The famine that struck Europe in 1315 saw the amount of salt available to the population drop because of a reduced amount of sunlight. Intense rain decreased crop populations and blotted out the sun, making it difficult to dry out salt from seawater. As availability decreased, it made it harder to preserve meats which resulted in even greater food shortage.
Works Cited
"Lead Salt Pans." Salt Association. https://www.saltassociation.co.uk/education/salt-history/roman-times/lead-salt-pans/.
"Life in Towns and Villages." National Archives. http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/domesday/world-of-domesday/towns.htm.
Newman, Paul. Daily Life in the Middle Ages. McFarland and Company, 2001.
"Roman Times." Salt Association. https://www.saltassociation.co.uk/education/salt-history/roman-times/.
"Normans and Late Medieval." Salt Association. https://www.saltassociation.co.uk/education/salt-history/normans-late-medieval/.
"Salt-works." Hull Domesday Project. http://www.domesdaybook.net/domesday-book/structure-of-domesday-book/salt-works.
"Using Salt in the Middle Ages." Medievalists.net. http://www.medievalists.net/2016/01/using-salt-in-the-middle-ages/.
This is interesting to me because even now I struggle to find salt in Walmart (but that’s probably more because they move everything around the store so much). On a more serious note, would they salt the meat before they put in in the ground to keep it fresh? Or would the salt be for when the meat came out of the ground? (I remember we were discussing how when it started to get cold outside they would dig holes in the ground to keep their meat in something like a little refrigerator)
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting to see how important salt was. It is incredible see that how a shortage of salt could have such adverse effects and cause a greater food shortage.It's crazy to think something that is so common today could be so life and death back then.
ReplyDeleteIt's crazy to think that so much of the food production at this time relied on the maintenance of salt, and how if there was no salt essentially there was no preservation of food. Today, we have so many ways of storing and stocking food, it's scary to think of what would happen if all of a sudden all of the fridges in our house disappeared all at once. Without this preservation, the food would spoil and not be able to be eaten.
ReplyDeleteGreat reference to the Domesday book! Has anyone every seen salt production at the ocean? I have seen it several places (Sicily, Slovenia), and it's relatively simple and startling! Re Kat's remark, we use what we have. But if we didn't have it, I think we would make do. In many places in Europe refrigerators are quite small, and people buy their groceries daily. That would explain how we would manage! Of course, in many places, esp. Asia, everyone in the big cities just eats street food multiple times a day. That's another way to gain food without major storage.
ReplyDeleteSugar was also viewed as an expensive and prized product, but it is interesting about how much more influential salt was compared to sugar! Even the Domesday Book has it listed higher than other production which is awesome!
ReplyDeleteWeather is an underappreciated aspect of history. Before this class, the weather was rarely, if ever, used to discuss events in history. Sure, there's Pompeii and other major disasters, but the importance of decent weather for prosperous times is often lost on modern audiences -- who seem to ignore its significance in the present, too.
ReplyDeleteSalt is an interesting thing from my understanding and there was many uses for it. Salt was created many different ways and each has a different value. For example, there were farms where the sea water would come up in high tide when the tide would go out during the day with the sun the water would dry up and then be harvested.
ReplyDeleteI never knew that the got salt from drying it out instead of mining it, that is pretty interesting. I also think the fact that the saying "worth their salt" is funny, as I have never heard of it before. I also didn't realize salt was such a high commodity, which is something we never think of today as salt is on nearly every table at restaurants and so readily available to us.
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