Page 121 - Mocarelli, Luca, and Aleksander Panjek. Eds. 2020. Maize to the People! Cultivation, Consumption and Trade in the North-Eastern Mediterranean (Sixteenth-Nineteenth Century). Koper: University of Primorska Press
P. 121
innovation in the south-easter n alps: maize as a crop in car inthia ...
Wasserleonburg had already reached such an intensity that the dominion
felt compelled to secure its income by regulating the tithe with regard to the
new crop. From about 20.5 litres of seed, peasants had to deliver 15 kreutzers
as a tenth. In 1750, a total of 1,200 litres or approximately 860 kilograms
were planted in Saak, Nötsch and Förk, which corresponded to a cultivat-
ed area of approximately 15 hectares. Maize was also an important crop
for miners (Zeloth 2004, 156). This evidence corroborates the assumption
that the maize coming from northern Italy first spread to Upper Carinthia
and then to Central Carinthia. Since the middle of the eighteenth centu-
ry, there was a more intensive spread along the Drava River towards Lower
Carinthia. This is how the maize got into the Lavant Valley (Sandgruber
1982, 46). The Carinthian Agrarcultur-Societät, founded in 1764, played a
significant role in its dissemination. In an effort to introduce new crops,
the Societät also propagated maize cultivation – with success (Bäck 2005,
45). The peasants, especially on estates like Arnoldstein, focused more and
more on the cultivation of “Turkish wheat”. This was how they compensat-
ed “for the grain shortage […] to the extent that many peasants who previ-
ously had to buy grain could now sell maize themselves” (Roth 1970, 351).
The decisive factor for getting to know each other and subsequently for the
spread of the new arable crop was probably that the so-called Italienstraße
led through these areas (Roth 1970, 351). Around 1780, maize was encoun-
tered sporadically in the Upper Lavant Valley, for instance on mountain
farms near Frantschach, and in Central Carinthia near Krumpendorf or
Hohenfeld (Dinklage 1966, 175). In 1794, the Agrarcultur-Societät started a
new attempt to make maize an integral part of crop rotation in Carinthia.
For this purpose, seeds from Venetia were permitted. In the end, maize did
not succeed. A completely different development from that in Upper and
Central Carinthia occurred in south-eastern Carinthia (Lower Carinthia).
Until the early nineteenth century, there was no evidence of maize cultiva-
tion there.
In the following two decades, a selective spread began. The same ap-
plies to the south-eastern Carinthia area. For example, it is not mentioned
in the inventories of the largest dominion Bleiburg for the years before 1800
(Lackner 2014, 245). The reasons lie, on the one hand, in agricultural back-
wardness, and in the dominance of buckwheat, on the other. The inven-
tory Inventarium des Erbherzogtums Kärnten (1780), written by Vinzenz
von Rosenberg, provides a description of the status quo regarding maize.
It reads: “In Upper Carinthia, the food of the peasant mostly consists of
119
Wasserleonburg had already reached such an intensity that the dominion
felt compelled to secure its income by regulating the tithe with regard to the
new crop. From about 20.5 litres of seed, peasants had to deliver 15 kreutzers
as a tenth. In 1750, a total of 1,200 litres or approximately 860 kilograms
were planted in Saak, Nötsch and Förk, which corresponded to a cultivat-
ed area of approximately 15 hectares. Maize was also an important crop
for miners (Zeloth 2004, 156). This evidence corroborates the assumption
that the maize coming from northern Italy first spread to Upper Carinthia
and then to Central Carinthia. Since the middle of the eighteenth centu-
ry, there was a more intensive spread along the Drava River towards Lower
Carinthia. This is how the maize got into the Lavant Valley (Sandgruber
1982, 46). The Carinthian Agrarcultur-Societät, founded in 1764, played a
significant role in its dissemination. In an effort to introduce new crops,
the Societät also propagated maize cultivation – with success (Bäck 2005,
45). The peasants, especially on estates like Arnoldstein, focused more and
more on the cultivation of “Turkish wheat”. This was how they compensat-
ed “for the grain shortage […] to the extent that many peasants who previ-
ously had to buy grain could now sell maize themselves” (Roth 1970, 351).
The decisive factor for getting to know each other and subsequently for the
spread of the new arable crop was probably that the so-called Italienstraße
led through these areas (Roth 1970, 351). Around 1780, maize was encoun-
tered sporadically in the Upper Lavant Valley, for instance on mountain
farms near Frantschach, and in Central Carinthia near Krumpendorf or
Hohenfeld (Dinklage 1966, 175). In 1794, the Agrarcultur-Societät started a
new attempt to make maize an integral part of crop rotation in Carinthia.
For this purpose, seeds from Venetia were permitted. In the end, maize did
not succeed. A completely different development from that in Upper and
Central Carinthia occurred in south-eastern Carinthia (Lower Carinthia).
Until the early nineteenth century, there was no evidence of maize cultiva-
tion there.
In the following two decades, a selective spread began. The same ap-
plies to the south-eastern Carinthia area. For example, it is not mentioned
in the inventories of the largest dominion Bleiburg for the years before 1800
(Lackner 2014, 245). The reasons lie, on the one hand, in agricultural back-
wardness, and in the dominance of buckwheat, on the other. The inven-
tory Inventarium des Erbherzogtums Kärnten (1780), written by Vinzenz
von Rosenberg, provides a description of the status quo regarding maize.
It reads: “In Upper Carinthia, the food of the peasant mostly consists of
119
