Page 98 - 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. 98
maize to the people!
Table 1. Yearly alimonies (cereals only), Marina Sivic (Skopo - Križ / S. Croce), 1753
Cereals Litres Percentage
Wheat 30.8 10%
Rye 30.8 10%
Spelt 92.4 30%
Buckwheat 77.0 25%
Maize 77.0 25%
Total 308.0 100%
Source: Panjek 2008, 26.
When describing “production and trade” in his long and detailed re-
port on the Gorizia and Gradisca counties of 1775, the chief of the local ad-
ministration began thus: “The productions of the region are as follows: 1) the
various cereal crops, such as wheat, maize, rye, oats and barley” (Cavazza
et.al. 2003, 174). Maize was in second place among the cereals, signalling its
importance. The observations of two contemporary writers are complete-
ly in line with this, even accentuating the importance of maize as a popular
foodstuff. In his book Clima Goritiense (1781) the physician Anton Muznik
wrote that in the Gorizia area “great quantities” of maize were cultivated
and that besides vegetables, bread and wine, the people of the valleys pre-
dominantly ate “polenta, a thick porridge seasoned with salt, butter, ba-
con”, made of maize (Fakin Bajec 2015, 25, 28, citing Muznik). This means
that maize dominated the dishes also in the larger Vipava and Soča valleys
and in the smaller mountain valleys in the area. Balthasar Hacquet, whose
work describes the situation in the last decades of the eighteenth centu-
ry, confirms that. Writing about the Vipava Valley and Idrija, he mentions
how “the food consists of the so-called polenta of Turkish maize; they con-
sume little meat”, whereas because of the stony and Alpine landscape only
in the “narrow valleys some maize can be cultivated” (Hacquet 1801, 79, 82).
Therefore, maize had conquered even the plots in the mountain valleys, not
only the plain around Gorizia.
On the other side, east of Trieste, the cultivation of maize spread
in Istria along its western Adriatic coast towards the south (present-day
Croatia) during the second half of the eighteenth century, or after 1763 in
particular (Ivetic 1999, 81). Hacquet, who visited the area in those decades
(for the first time in 1774), confirms this also for maize consumption. From
his description, we may understand that he referred to central and north-
ern Istria, including the surroundings of Trieste, in particular the coastal
96
Table 1. Yearly alimonies (cereals only), Marina Sivic (Skopo - Križ / S. Croce), 1753
Cereals Litres Percentage
Wheat 30.8 10%
Rye 30.8 10%
Spelt 92.4 30%
Buckwheat 77.0 25%
Maize 77.0 25%
Total 308.0 100%
Source: Panjek 2008, 26.
When describing “production and trade” in his long and detailed re-
port on the Gorizia and Gradisca counties of 1775, the chief of the local ad-
ministration began thus: “The productions of the region are as follows: 1) the
various cereal crops, such as wheat, maize, rye, oats and barley” (Cavazza
et.al. 2003, 174). Maize was in second place among the cereals, signalling its
importance. The observations of two contemporary writers are complete-
ly in line with this, even accentuating the importance of maize as a popular
foodstuff. In his book Clima Goritiense (1781) the physician Anton Muznik
wrote that in the Gorizia area “great quantities” of maize were cultivated
and that besides vegetables, bread and wine, the people of the valleys pre-
dominantly ate “polenta, a thick porridge seasoned with salt, butter, ba-
con”, made of maize (Fakin Bajec 2015, 25, 28, citing Muznik). This means
that maize dominated the dishes also in the larger Vipava and Soča valleys
and in the smaller mountain valleys in the area. Balthasar Hacquet, whose
work describes the situation in the last decades of the eighteenth centu-
ry, confirms that. Writing about the Vipava Valley and Idrija, he mentions
how “the food consists of the so-called polenta of Turkish maize; they con-
sume little meat”, whereas because of the stony and Alpine landscape only
in the “narrow valleys some maize can be cultivated” (Hacquet 1801, 79, 82).
Therefore, maize had conquered even the plots in the mountain valleys, not
only the plain around Gorizia.
On the other side, east of Trieste, the cultivation of maize spread
in Istria along its western Adriatic coast towards the south (present-day
Croatia) during the second half of the eighteenth century, or after 1763 in
particular (Ivetic 1999, 81). Hacquet, who visited the area in those decades
(for the first time in 1774), confirms this also for maize consumption. From
his description, we may understand that he referred to central and north-
ern Istria, including the surroundings of Trieste, in particular the coastal
96
