What Did The Irish Eat During The Potato Famine?

Research headed up by the University of Edinburgh carried out scientific analysis of dental calculus—plaque build-up— on the teeth of 42 victims. The analysis revealed that the diet during the Irish potato famine involved corn (maize), oats, potato, wheat, and milk foodstuffs. 3 Analysis of teeth of famine victims disclosed a great deal about their diet. Surprisingly, the teeth of three of the victims showed evidence of egg protein in their diet, something that is more associated with diets of non-laboring or better-off social classes at the time.

• The results of this study is consistent with the historical accounts of the Irish laborer’s diet before and during the Famine,” said Dr.
• Jonny Geber of the University of Edinburgh’s School of History, Classics, and Archaeology, one of the lead researchers.
• It also shows how the notoriously monotonous potato diet of the poor was opportunistically supplemented by other foodstuffs, such as eggs and wheat, when made available to them.

“The Great Irish Famine was one of the worst subsistence crises in history but it was foremost a social disaster induced by the lack of access to food and not the lack of food availability.” 3 Irish famine. Image: Getty. The research analyzed the dental calculus on the teeth of 42 people, aged approximately 13 years and older who died in the Kilkenny Union Workhouse. The remains of nearly 1,000 were discovered in mass burial pits on the grounds in 2005.

• The results of the study showed clues into the diet during the Irish potato famine that included evidence that potato and milk was virtually the only source of food for a vast proportion of the population in Ireland.
• It also showed a dominance of corn, as well as evidence of oats and wheat.
• The study was a collaboration between researchers from the Universities of Edinburgh, Harvard, Otago in New Zealand, York, Zurich, and the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Germany.

H/T: Irish Examiner *Originally published in 2019. Last updated in July 2022.

What food was available during the Famine?

In his Sept.17 op-ed piece, “Ireland’s Famine Wasn’t Genocide,” Yale economics professor Timothy W. Guinnane says, “With the potato crop ruined, Ireland simply did not have enough food to feed her people.” According to economist Cormac O’ Grada, more than 26 million bushels of grain were exported from Ireland to England in 1845, a “famine” year.

1. Even greater exports are documented in the Spring 1997 issue of History Ireland by Christine Kinealy of the University of Liverpool.
2. Her research shows that nearly 4,000 vessels carrying food left Ireland for ports in England during “Black ’47” while 400,000 Irish men, women and children died of starvation.

Shipping records indicate that 9,992 Irish calves were exported to England during 1847, a 33 percent increase from the previous year. At the same time, more than 4,000 horses and ponies were exported. In fact, the export of all livestock from Ireland to England increased during the famine except for pigs.

• However, the export of ham and bacon did increase.
• Other exports from Ireland during the “famine” included peas, beans, onions, rabbits, salmon, oysters, herring, lard, honey and even potatoes. Dr.
• Inealy’s research also shows that 1,336,220 gallons of grain-derived alcohol were exported from Ireland to England during the first nine months of 1847.

In addition, a phenomenal 822,681 gallons of butter left starving Ireland for tables in England during the same period. If the figures for the other three months were comparable, more than 1 million gallons of butter were exported during the worst year of mass starvation in Ireland.

The food was shipped from ports in some of the worst famine-stricken areas of Ireland, and British regiments guarded the ports and graineries to guarantee British merchants and absentee landlords their “free-market” profits. Mr. Guinnane says that “the contrast with the Holocaust is instructive” and points out that the British did not act like Nazis who “devoted considerable resources to hunting down and murdering the Jews.” Instead, he says that “the British government’s indifference to the famine helped cause thousands of needless deaths.” Richard L.

Rubenstein, in his book, “The Age of Triage: Fear and Hope in an Overcrowded World,” says, “a government is as responsible for a genocidal policy when its officials accept mass death as the necessary cost of implementing their policies as when they pursue genocide as an end in itself.” JAMES MULLIN President Irish Famine Curriculum Committee and Education Fund, Inc.

1. Moorestown, N.J.
2. Timothy Guinnane’s question, “But does the government’s inadequate response to the famine constitute genocide?” is answered in the affirmative by the following undisputed facts: In 1846 Prime Minister Robert Peel succeeded in repealing the Corn Laws, eliminating protective tariffs on grain imports to the United Kingdom, thereby reducing the cost of grain and bread.

The compelling reason for the repeal was the crop failure in Ireland. Peel also established the Relief Commission to coordinate relief measures in Ireland.

Why didn’t the Irish eat other food during the Famine?

While it is popularly believed that Irish people were not great fish-eaters, this was not the case prior to the Famine. For instance, a traveller named Pococke, who visited West Cork in 1858 observed that the inhabitants of Dursey Island lived on fish and potatoes.

In 1810, Townsend commented on the diet of the poorer people: Along the sea coast they depend principally upon fish, which (shell fish excepted) is never eat fresh. It is, from custom, considered more palatable when salted, and, what is of more consequence, goes much further. The poorer people, who live by the sea, collect different kinds of sea weed, which, when boiled, contribute something to the humble repast.

Similarly, during his tour of the southern coast of Ireland Wakefield observed that ‘the people in the vicinity of the shore lived in a comparatively comfortable manner, in consequence of their using fish as a part of their food’ Wakefield suggested that religion played a role in fish consumption.

1. Eating fish was a necessity for the predominantly Catholic population during Lent and on fast days.
2. However, the consumption of fish was not uniform.
3. Wakefield noted that ‘in the maritime counties of Ireland fish is not uncommon; but in inland parts, such as Carlow, it is exceedingly scarce’.
4. He blamed this on the inconvenience and expense required to transport fish by land.

The question is often asked, why didn’t the Irish eat more fish during the Famine? A lot of energy is required to work as a fisherman. Because people were starving they did not have the energy that would be required to go fishing, haul up nets and drag the boats ashore.

In addition, some people may have sold their personal belongings in order to survive. This would have included their boats. In 1856 the Cork Constitution published an article on the role of fish in the diet. It suggested that ‘except in some very poor countries fish is not a primary article of food or an absolute necessary of life’.

So what had changed? In pre-Famine Ireland, fish was seen as a luxury by those who did not live by the sea. It was eaten with bread or potatoes. When the blight struck the potato crops, people stopped eating fish as well. This reduced the demand for fish to the extent that the managing director of the London and West of Ireland Fishing Company claimed that ‘the abundance or scarcity of potatoes was found to influence the demand for fish full 50 per cent’ Despite this, fish remained part of the diet for many of those living in the maritime region of West Cork.

Inhabitants of Hare Island described how they stored dried fish at the end of the nineteenth century: The space on each side of flue was called the “Cúloir”. This was planked from the cross-beam to gable, and cured dry fish was stored in the Cúloir. Every house used to have the two “Cúloir” filled with fish for the winter.

Today, fish is once again popular in West Cork, not just at home but in the restaurants. Next: Fish in Folklore Footnotes Letter dated 2 August 1758, cited in Pádraig Ó Maidín, ‘Pococke’s tour of south and south-west Ireland in 1758′ in Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society, 1958, Vol.

Did the Irish eat grass during the potato famine?

Green cupcakes may mean party time in America, but in Ireland, emerald-tinged edibles harken back to a desperate past. Ro Jo Images/iStockphoto hide caption toggle caption Ro Jo Images/iStockphoto Green cupcakes may mean party time in America, but in Ireland, emerald-tinged edibles harken back to a desperate past. Ro Jo Images/iStockphoto Green food may mean party time in America, where St. Patrick’s Day has long been an excuse to break out the food dye.

1. But historian Christine Kinealy says there’s a bitter history to eating green that harks back to Ireland’s darkest chapter.
2. During the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s, mass starvation forced many Irish to flee their homeland in search of better times in America and elsewhere.
3. Inealy says those who stayed behind turned to desperate measures.

“People were so deprived of food that they resorted to eating grass,” Kinealy tells The Salt. “In Irish folk memory, they talk about people’s mouths being green as they died.” At least 1 million Irish died in the span of six years, says Kinealy, the founding director of Ireland’s Great Hunger Institute at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut.

1. Which is why for Kinealy, an Irishwoman who hails from Dublin and County Mayo, the sight of green-tinged edibles intended as a joyous nod to Irish history can be jolting, she says.
2. Before I came to America, I’d never seen a green bagel,” she says.
3. For Irish-Americans, they think of dyeing food green, they think everything is happy.

But really, in terms of the famine, this is very sad imagery.” That’s not to say that the sight of green-dyed food is offensive to the Irish. After all, the color green is closely linked with Ireland, known as the Emerald Isle because of its strikingly verdant countryside.

1. In the 19th century, Irish nationalists and republicans adopted the color — as Ireland’s The Journal points out, this was likely to distinguish themselves from the reds and blues that were then associated with England, Scotland and Wales.
2. And Americans have long embraced St.
3. Patrick’s Day traditions that might bemuse the folks back in Ireland, where festivities in honor of the nation’s patron saint are a lot more subdued, Kinealy notes.

For instance, St. Paddy’s Day Parades? Those originated here in the late 1700s. (George Washington was known to give his Irish soldiers the day off so they could join the celebrations, she says.) And that quintessential dish of the holiday, corned beef — it may be delicious, but it’s most definitely not Irish.