Archaeologists found saffron, as well as peppercorns, almonds, raspberries and other foods.Marco Verch Professional Photographer via Flickr under CC BY 2.0
Posted on 02/21/2023 4:12:19 PM PST by SunkenCiv
In the summer of 1495, King Hans of Denmark and Norway anchored his warship off the southern coast of Sweden. While Hans was on land, his vessel—known as Gribshunden or Griffen—mysteriously caught fire and sank to the bottom of the Baltic Sea.
Hans was on his way to Kalmar, where he hoped to be elected king of Sweden and reunite the broader Nordic region under a single ruler. As such, Hans brought many opulent status symbols, including luxurious foods and spices, to help persuade the Swedish leadership to agree to his plan.
Remarkably, many of those foods and spices have survived underwater for the last five centuries, archaeologists revealed last month in the journal PLOS One. During a recent excavation, they found 40 different types of fruits, vegetables, spices, nuts, cereals and other plants.
The discovery of a "substantially complete royal medieval pantry" offers new insights into how nobility in the Baltic region lived and what they ate, study co-authors Mikael Larsson and Brendan Foley, archaeologists at Lund University in Sweden, write in the paper...
The researchers found spices from far-flung locales, including ginger, clove, peppercorns, dill, mustard and caraway, as well as the remains of fruits and vegetables like cucumbers, grapes, raspberries and blackberries. They also found almonds and hazelnuts.
Notably, they unearthed more than 13 ounces (400 milliliters) of saffron, an amount of the rare spice that would have been—and still is—quite expensive, Foley tells Newsweek's Aristos Georgiou.
The finds are rare, because plant remains don't typically survive in such good condition for so many years. The Baltic Sea, however, is very cold and has low salinity, which helps preserve archaeological materials.
(Excerpt) Read more at smithsonianmag.com ...
Archaeologists found saffron, as well as peppercorns, almonds, raspberries and other foods.Marco Verch Professional Photographer via Flickr under CC BY 2.0
“...caraway...”
In Scandinavia?
Who knew?
Past their date ?
I’m just crazy about Saffron...
Any Old Bay?
Wow, now that’s double extra cool.
Hans but no mention of Franz?
My raspberries and blackberries rot within a week of me buying them.
Saffron’s crazy about me!
Donovan Mellow Yellow {Stereo) Remastered
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bb3WpOJvsug
Donovan - Remember The Alamo (1965)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-GadMSuQVg
Some king.
"Ground spices lose their freshness the quickest and typically don't last past six months. The best freshness test for ground spices is to give them a whiff — if they smell like nothing, then it's time to say goodbye. Whole spices, on the other hand, can be fine for up to five years."
~ The Food Network
Cooking saffron is about $45 per ounce. Very precious natural flavoring and coloring spice.
That looks exactly like a bag of Safflower (Azafran), that I bought in NM a few years ago.
Safflower is very light weight.
I thought you were mad
In both senses...
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