The Trooper

Posted on 22 May 2017 by Megan Hickey

Ceramics have been decorated to commemorate a range of events, people and places since long before the 19th century. The practice is particularly tied to British royalty, with some rather intense results. While tankards, jugs, plaques, mugs and miniature wares are most commonly decorated for commemorative purposes, a number of different ceramic types could be used in this manner (Perry 2011). The subject of the blog today is inspired by two mustard jars from Christchurch that commemorate events from the Crimean War. The Crimean War occurred from 1853 to 1856. Caused by the failing Ottoman Empire and power struggles between countries over religious rights of access to the Holy Land, two key parts of the war are depicted on these household artefacts, the Siege of Sevastopol (also known as Sebastopol) and the Battle of Balaklava (or Balaclava; Goldi Productions Ltd 1996 & 2000; Wikipedia 2017).

Source caption: “Episode of the Siege of Sebastopol During the Crimean War in 1855”, dated 19th century and credited to Adolphe Yvon. Image: Wikipedia 2015.

The first of these came from the large Justice Precinct site in the city centre. It was decorated with polychrome transfer print in a style often identified as ‘prattware’. Prattware refers to polychrome underglaze transfer printed scenes that were associated with the manufacturers F. & R. Pratt & Co. Ltd (Perry 2010). This particular jar featured a scene known as the ‘The Fall of Sebastopol 8th Sept. 1855’ (Transferware Collector’s Club 2005-2017). This scene refers to one of the classic sieges of the Crimean War, which aimed to capture the significant Russian naval base in the port of Sevastopol, on the Black Sea (Bunting 2017).

Mustard jar decorated with the Fall of Sevastopol.

The print depicts and names Sir Harry Jones, the famous British military man who served in the Crimean War as commander of the British forces at the battle of Bomarsund and of the Royal Engineer forces at the Siege of Sevastopol (Transferware Collector’s Club 2005-2017). Most descriptions of this pattern presume that Sir Harry Jones is the figure on the stretcher in the scene, although there is no record of his being wounded during the battle. The full title of the pattern includes the date 8th September 1855, when the Battle of Malakoff occurred and the Russian forces began to withdraw (Atkinson 1911: 451-453; Transferware Collector’s Club 2005-2017).

The second mustard jar base was found on a residential site just outside the city centre. The whiteware jar had a polychrome transfer printed design depicting a battle and the words “The/…OON/CHAR…” around the base. This would have formed the full phrase: “THE DRAGOON CHARGE” (Transferware Collector’s Club 2005-2017). This print depicts the Battle of Balaklava fought on 25 October 1854 as a part of the Siege of Sevastopol during the Crimean War. The Battle of Balaklava was a Russian assault on the British allied supply base that involved the famous Thin Red Line military tactic and the infamously deadly Charge of the Light Brigade (Wikipedia 2017).

‘The Dragoon Charge’ underglaze print on the Prattware mustard jar.

Source caption: “The Russian camp at the Genoese Castle, Balaklava.” Image: Roger Fenton/Getty Images, The Telegraph.

Although no maker’s marks were evident on the base of either jar, examples of the same printed Prattware are attributed to the manufacturers John Thomas and Joseph Mayer. Thomas and Mayer manufactured pottery in Longport, Burslem, Staffordshire between 1842 and 1855 (Kowalsky & Kowalsky 1999: 274). The date range for the operation of the Thomas and Mayer company and the commemorative nature of the prints suggests a manufacturing date in the 1850s, possibly as early as late 1854 to 1855. This would have taken place while the Crimean war was still ongoing.

Although little remembered today, the Crimean War is often described as the “first truly modern war” (Groll and Frankel 2014). With the advent of new technology, industry and weaponry, the resulting high casualty rate marked this event as a significant moment in the mid-19th century. In addition to this, the perceptions of the war were shaped by real-time journalistic coverage and photographic documentation by Roger Fenton. Due to the process involved in setting up and taking photography at the time, Fenton was limited to producing images of still (sometimes staged) moments in between the carnage. Depictions of the fighting seem to be limited to paintings and prints made during the war by artist-correspondents or after the war.

Source caption: “Roger Fenton himself dressed in a Zouave uniform holding rifle. Zouaves were crack infantry units, originally composed of Algerians. During the Crimean War, Zouaves served with the French Army, allies of the British. Fenton’s self-portrait in the costume indicates the high regard the British felt for the Zouaves.” Image: Roger Fenton/Getty Images, The Telegraph.

Source caption: “Two versions of the widely-acknowledged ‘first iconic war photograph’ entitled The Valley of the Shadow of Death. The lower one shows cannonballs on the road whereas above shows the road clear of ammunition. Historians have concluded that Fenton may have moved the cannonballs into the road to enhance the image. An alternative view is that soldiers were gathering the missiles for re-use and had thrown them onto the road to make them easier to collect.” Image: Roger Fenton/Getty Images, The Telegraph.

Source caption: “British soldiers pose for a photographs during a break.” Image: Roger Fenton/Getty Images, The Telegraph.

Polychrome transfer printed scenes like this were used on ceramic food containers throughout the latter half of the 19th century, although they are not common on Christchurch archaeological sites. The jars are an example of commemorative objects available for consumption in the wake of significant events. The participation of British soldiers in the Battle of Balaklava in particular was seen as an example of some of the finest heroic fighting of the war and many depictions of this heroism were created in art and literature (Bunting 2017). These kinds of physical reminders of formative events in national identity have been noted elsewhere in discussions of commemorative products depicting the 1899 South African War, particularly with regards to the connections between colonial and national ideologies (Lucas 2004). Although New Zealand was not directly involved in this conflict, British soldiers who fought in the war later emigrated to New Zealand (New Zealand Crimean War Veterans 2017). Such an event was part of the collective memory of 19th century British national identity, as evident in other depictions of the battle such as paintings and in the poem “Charge of the Light Brigade” by the English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson. As such, the presence of objects commemorating the Crimean War in 19th century New Zealand archaeological sites demonstrate these links to important historical events.

The Thin Red Line by Robert Gibb, 1881. Image: Wikipedia 2017.

The remembrance of aspects of the Crimean War continued through to the modern era. Lord Tennyson’s poem in particular formed the platform for later adaptations of and references to the event. The Charge of the Light Brigade was immortalised on screen in 1912, 1936 and 1968. Each version varies greatly in how it depicts the events of the war, in line with the time period and popular movie styles of the period. The poem has echoes in modern pop culture as Lord Tennyson’s poem formed the basis of the 1983 Iron Maiden song ‘The Trooper’ and references in movies and TV shows from Saving Private Ryan to Top Gear to The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

Megan Hickey

References

Atkinson, C. F., 1911. Crimean War. In Chisholm, H. (Ed). Encyopaedia Brittanica 7 (11th Edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Kowalsky, A and Kowalsky, D. 1999. Encyclopaedia of Marks On American, and European Earthernware, Ironstone and Stoneware 1780-1980. Schiffer Publishing Ltd. Atglen.

Transferware Collector’s Club, 2005-2017. The Dragoon Charge – Balaklava [online] Available at: http://www.transcollectorsclub.org/tcc2/data/patterns/d/the-dragoon-charge-balaklava/ [Accessed 05 May 2017].

Odds and ends

Posted on 3 June 2016 by Jessie Garland

A selection of recent discoveries for your perusal, complete with flippant commentary (as per usual). Enjoy!

This rather dramatic pattern is called Andalusia and, as the name might suggest, features a Spanish scene with figures praying in the foreground and vignettes around the border. Someone has even helpfully coloured in the highlights with paint (a technique known as ‘clobbering’, an excellent term) to add to the drama of the whole thing. Image: C. Dickson.

The glass reservoir from an oil lamp, we think, made from bright cobalt blue glass. Quite the unusual artefact, this one. Image: G. Jackson.

There are many possible captions to this image decorating the inside of a teacup. I’d like to think that they’re dancing, two people flitting their way across the room without a care in the world. Then again, she could also be about to faint (there is a slight sense of imbalance to her body language), as he prepares to catch her (there is also a sense of concern in his body language). You be the judge. Image: G. Jackson.

A majolica decorated dinner plate, a style that needs dark wood panelling and candle-lit interiors to properly appreciate the aesthetic, I think. Think great dark Gothic rooms with taxidermied decoration, high ceilings and undercurrents of tragedy. Image: G. Jackson.

This pattern, known as ‘Grecian’, depicts what seems to be a floating building in the background and a temple precariously perched on a rocky precipice. European scenes like this one (and the Andalusia one above) were particularly popular during the mid-19th century, playing a ‘slightly exotic’ European counterpoint to the similarly popular scenes of British landscapes and architecture. Image: C. Dickson.

In which a person in a hat seems to have fallen over. Image: J. Garland.

This seemingly dull and utilitarian bit of ceramic is, in fact, the filter from a ceramic water filter, made by the firm of J. Lipscombe and Co., London. Ceramic water filters were an ingenious invention created in the 1830s in England to combat the water contamination problem they were facing. It worked by filtering water through a porous ceramic disc or filter, which removed the worst of the dirt and contaminants contained within. Incredibly, such filters are still used in some parts of the world today. Image: G. Jackson.

Just a cool stoneware jar made by Hill and Jones, of Jewry Street, London. Image: J. Garland.

Curtis and Co. were Lyttelton based soda water manufacturers, in business from the mid-1890s until the early 20th century. We excavated the site of their aerated water factory recently, and found a number of their bottles in a variety of shapes and sizes. Image: J. Garland.

A chamber pot decorated with interesting architecture. Check out those crenellations. Image: J. Garland.

A brass belt buckle found in the central city. We’re unsure whether or not the 1866 impressed on the top line is an indication of date or simply a batch or manufacturer’s number. It would be great if it was the former. Image: C. Dickson.

And, lastly, tubes and pipettes and ampules and other instruments of scientific discovery. These are pretty cool and very rare, part of a much larger assemblage of similar objects that we’re looking forward to investigating. Image: J. Garland.

The world is your oyster – a tale of talking molluscs, bar brawls and Victorian vice…

Posted on 20 May 2016 by Chelsea Dickson

I don’t know about you, but I don’t like oysters – they’re slimy, they look weird and they taste like the sea. So perhaps I was affected more than your average person when I recently had the task of analysing an assemblage of artefacts that provided an abundance of similarly decorated stoneware jars. These jars were all the same form, one which I had never come across before. A quick internet search determined that some collectors refer to these as ‘oyster jars’ – this was an unfamiliar term for me, and it piqued my curiosity. Further research revealed that the canning and pickling of oysters was a common enterprise in 19^th century Canterbury and around the world!

The stone ware jars. Image: C. Dickson.

Now, not being a fan of them, the idea of other people not only eating oysters, but eating old oysters, wasn’t appetising. But I looked at a few recipes online and, actually, the concept didn’t seem so bad – vinegar and cayenne pepper form a part of my regular diet…

Pickled Oysters recipe from 1884 – Mrs Lincoln’s Boston Cookbook.

Normally, it is difficult to determine the original contents of a vessel without manufacturer labels. In fact, jars and bottles with wide mouths like the ones from my assemblage may have been used to store or pickle any number of food or condiment varieties, or even viscous household items like glue or shoe polish. This being said, the large number of oyster shells that were found in the rubbish pit alongside the jars did suggest that these two items were related in this instance – and it is possible that the 19th century family that lived in the associated Rangiora house pickled their own oysters.

A more common 19th century oyster jar shape.

The canning and preserving of oysters has taken place since 1850 (Hunt 2010), and oysters have been a commonly consumed fresh food resource here and around the world since ancient times – their consumption can be traced to the ancient Greeks and Chinese, and they are commonly found in early Māori rubbish deposits (referred to by Māori as tio). European industrialisation in the 18^th and 19^th centuries made these slippery morsels readily available to everyone and saw them become the great unifier – enjoyed by the wealthy and the poor. It was during this period that New York became the oyster capital of the world and it is said that in any day during this late 19^th century, six million oysters could be found on barges tied up along the New York harbour waterfront (Happillion 2016). The catch was sold to New Yorkers everywhere from street corners to high class restaurants and in every way imaginable – in the half shell, roasted and in stews.

So ingrained were oysters in 19^th century popular culture they can be seen everywhere – we witness the lure of an oyster meal for both the working class and the upper class alike in Lewis Carroll’s 1871 The Walrus and the Carpenter poem, from Through the Looking Glass. In this classic children’s story, we see the overweight and well-dressed walrus swindle the hardworking carpenter out of his oyster meal, while tricking the unlucky and naïve oysters into taking part in a buffet where they’re on the menu. Perhaps not all of Alice’s adventures in Wonderland were based on nonsense?

An oyster buffet – before and after. Image: Wikia and Classics Illustrated.

From the 1860s oysters were increasingly popular among European settlers in the colonies, and by the 1880s New Zealand joined the oyster craze with the emergence of the oyster saloon – otherwise known as the ‘oyster bar’, the ‘oyster house’ or the ‘raw bar’. Such establishments sought to offer the freshest and tastiest oysters available – generally claiming to provide fresh stock daily (New Zealand Tablet 7/8/1896: 14). Now this may not always have been the case – oysters were available locally in Christchurch and Lyttelton, but the ever popular Stewart Island beds were also supplying to Canterbury during this period (Star 17/4/1875: 1). It was during this time that Christchurch saw the emergence of several fine dining oyster options – Cashel Street’s Café De Paris provided not only the finest oysters night or day, but also quality beverages, operatic entertainment and a separate section for ladies. The establishment claimed to be ‘the best in the colony’ and its success lasted well into the 20^th century.

Fresh! Press 10/3/1896: 1.

Press 15/09/1889: 8.

At the opposite end of the etiquette scale, the more typical oyster saloon quickly became synonymous with drinking – being one of the only places to purchase cheap food late at night, as an accompaniment to beer. The phrase ‘red light’ district’ was derived from New York oyster bars, which put up red balloons to indicate that the oysters had arrived, and in London, the lighthouse building at King’s Cross flashed a beam from its turret (Smith 2015). Unsurprisingly, these establishments also developed a reputation as houses of vice – news reports from this era are frequently linked to crime –anything from publicans supplying liquor without licences (Press 2/11/1901: 7) and the use of obscene language (Star 27/7/1885: 3) to violent encounters between patrons – male and female (Press 15/7/1881: 2). There are even reports of violence between patrons and establishment owners – take this report for example: three individuals named Maloney, Larsen and Creasey (these names reminded us of some sort of gangster pantomime), got into an altercation with an oyster bar proprietor, who stabbed Maloney in the side and wounded his side-kick (Grey River Argus 26/5/1898: 4). Such reports are accompanied by letters from concerned Cantabrians, who write into the paper questioning the appropriateness of such establishments being located “under the shadow of the cathedral spire” (Star 14/3/1882: 2).

Oyster bar associated with gluttony? (New Zealand Herald 1/4/1939: 5).

Further connections were made between the oyster’s aphrodisiac qualities and Victorian vice in the popular 19^th century erotic magazine The Oyster, which was printed and distributed privately in London from 1883. This publication and its predecessor, The Pearl, were banned, and its author was prosecuted for the risqué content – which you can see for yourself did not consist of mere pictures of ladies’ ankles (reproductions of the issues are still available on Amazon. This is interesting stuff from before the times when science made the link between oysters being a food source high in zinc (which raises testosterone levels), as well as a source of rare amino acids that increase levels of sex hormones in men and women. Such nutritional values were also possibly known to 18^th century Casanova – who reputedly consumed 50 oysters for breakfast daily, and claimed to have seduced 122 women. Or perhaps he was part of the tradition that saw oysters as an aphrodisiac due to their visual similarities with their form and that of the female anatomy…? (Schulman 2008).

Looking back further – Aphrodite (goddess of love and sex) was born from a mollusc shell and the ancient Roman physician, Galen of Pergamon, described oysters as aphrodisiacs because they were a food that was moist and warm… This being said, Galen said the same for all ‘windy’ foods (those which produce gas – if that’s what you’re into), and going even further back, Babylonians looking to increase sexual appetites bit the heads off partridges, ate their hearts and drank their blood, while the ancient Greeks dined on sparrow brains to produce a similar effect (Thring 2011; Camphausen 1999; Hoppe 2015). But I digress…

Aphrodite and her mollusk shell. Attic Red Figure, ca 370 - 360 BC, Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Salonica, Italy.

Aphrodite and her mollusc shell. Attic Red Figure, ca 370 – 360 BC, Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Salonica, Italy.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, the reign of the humble yet hazardous oyster saloon was not to last. One can still frequent bars that specialise exclusively in oyster delicacies in cities larger than Christchurch, but over-consumption and the subsequent depletion of our local marine resources saw the end of the oyster as an abundant, ‘cheap and cheerful’ food source. Our government began to intervene as early as 1866, with the Oyster Fisheries Act, which introduced licencing, a fishing season and the creation of artificial beds (New Zealand Parliamentary Debates 18/8/1865).

As a result, oysters eventually claimed their modern status as a luxury item, to be afforded and consumed by the wealthy, or saved for special occasions. The basic idea of the oyster saloon itself evolved into what we now think of as the fish and chip shop, where we are provided with a bevy of convenient and inexpensive (and fried) seafood options. So the tradition isn’t completely dead… But maybe don’t start a bar fight on your next visit your local fish n’ chippy.

Chelsea Dickson

References

Anonymous 2016. The Oyster Vol. 1: The Victorian Underground Magazine of Erotica (online) Available at: https://www.amazon.com/Oyster-Vol-Victorian-Underground-Magazine-ebook/dp/B000MAH5H4.

Camphausen, R. C. 1999. The Encyclopaedia of Sacred Sexuality. Inner Traditions International, Rochester.

Grey River Argus. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz. [Accessed May 2016].

Happillion, C. 2016. The History of Oysters. [online] available at: http://theoystergourmet.com/the-story-of-oysters.

Hoppe, D. Aphrodisiacs in History. Diana Hope, M.D., INCS. [online] Available at: http://www.drdianahoppe.com/aphrodisiacs-in-history-part-1/

Hunt A., L. 2010. Fruits and Vegetables, Fish, and Oysters, Canning and Preserving. Nabu Press, Charleston.

Lincoln, M., J., B. 1884. Mrs. Lincoln’s Boston Cook Book. Roberts Brothers. [online] Available at: http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/cookbooks/books/mrslincoln/linc.pdf

New Zealand Parliamentary Debates 18 August 1865 P326

New Zealand Herald. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz. [Accessed May 2016]

New Zealand Tablet. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz. [Accessed May 2016]

Press. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz. [Accessed May 2016]

Shulman M., 2008. The Science of Aphrodisiacs In U.S News & World Report 19/05/2008. [online] available at: http://health.usnews.com/health-news/family-health/sexual-and-reproductive-health/articles/2008/08/19/the-science-of-aphrodisiacs [Accessed May 2016]

Smith, D. 2015. Oyster: A Gastronomic History (with Recipes). Abrams, New York.

Star. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz. [Accessed May 2016]

Thring, O., 2011. Aphrodisiacs: the food of love? In The Guardian. [online] Available at: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2011/feb/11/aphrodisiacs-food-of-love. [Accessed May 2016]

A changing world

Posted on 24 January 2014 by Katharine

Last week, Jessie’s post mentioned MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese, an early 20^th century foodstuff we found in Christchurch. This cheese pot, which looked so insignificant and sounded so odd, represents one of the steps en route to our modern culinary world. Even finding it on a site in Christchurch is representative of much that was changing in the 19^th century. Today we think nothing of eating food from all over the world, some of which arrives on boats and some on planes. In fact, for many of us, much of what we eat probably isn’t produced in New Zealand, in spite of the importance of farming and horticulture in our current economy – and historically.

MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese: then and now. Images: J. Garland & Clockwork Lemon.

What was this MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese? Modern descriptions – yep, you can still buy it – describe it as grated cheddar, but it looks like anything but. Sure, the cheddar might have been grated, but then a few other things are no doubt mixed in. Today, a range of preservatives have probably been added. In the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries, who knows what it was. But even then, it’s unlikely just to have been grated cheese, as that probably wouldn’t have survived the journey from Canada to New Zealand in good condition.

There are a range of things that are interesting about MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese turning up in early 20^th century Christchurch. Firstly, it’s an ‘added value’ product, and those weren’t nearly so common in the 19^th century as they are now. It represents a divergence from the sale of plain old ordinary cheese (or not so ordinary in some cases ) to something that has led to the plastic cheese slices that many of us probably had in our school lunches – or, if you’re American, to Kraft cheese, which was possibly quite closely related to MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese.

Secondly, even in the late 19^th and early 20^th century, New Zealand was producing a lot of dairy products. Not quite on the scale we do now, and we couldn’t export it then. So why on earth would we need to import Canadian cheese? (No offence to Canadians.) And how could it compete on the New Zealand market when it had been shipped that distance? And what on earth had been added to it to make it last that long? These aren’t questions we necessarily think about much these days – the speed of travel often means that nothing needs to be added to a food product to make it last the journey half way around the globe. And then there are other products with a shelf life of five years. Five years. Unimaginable in 19^th century Christchurch.

A 1902 article discussing the sale of MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese (albeit with a spelling mistake). Image: Evening Post 10/7/1902: 4.

An early 20th century grocer’s advertisement. Image: Poverty Bay Herald 13/6/1902: 2.

Which brings me to the third point that makes MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese in turn of the century Christchurch so interesting. People mostly bought fresh produce in the 19^th century. There was no such thing as a supermarket, although grocers did sell a range of products. You might have kept a dairy cow, pigs and/or chooks to supply some products (yes, even in the city); meat would have come from the butcher (or maybe from one of those pigs); and you might have grown your own vegetables, or bought them from the greengrocer, who probably only sold locally grown vegetables. Now, let’s not get too rose-tinted spectacles about this: it would’ve meant no – or very few or very expensive – bananas, oranges, blueberries, aubergines or any of those other things we love so much.

As mentioned last week, Kraft now own and produce MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese. And MacLaren’s may not have been that dissimilar to the original Kraft cheese, which was first manufactured in 1915, by one James Kraft. James was a cheese seller, peddling his cheddar from his cart around the city of Chicago. His business wasn’t doing too badly but the problem was that his cheese went off pretty quickly in the Chicago heat. But then he discovered that if he melted his cheese, while stirring it constantly, the fats didn’t ‘bleed out’ and he could pour the resulting mixture into a can and sell it. And it didn’t spoil in the heat (Moss 2013: 162-163). Voila! A revolution that changed the world. Think I’m overstating the case? Maybe. But look at Kraft’s position in the world today. And think about our current obesity epidemic, and all the causes that have been cited for that.

That seemingly innocuous jar of MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese, then, represents change. Change from a relatively local diet – and yes, to use modern parlance, a relatively low impact diet – to one where, in theory at least, anything in the world can be eaten anywhere at anytime, processed food can have a shelf life of five years, and all the change that has wrought.

Katharine Watson

References

Clockwork Lemon, 2012. Savory cheddar chive shortbread. [online] Available at: http://www.clockworklemon.com/2012/12/cheddar-chive-shortbread.html.

Evening Post. [online] Available at: http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz.

Moss, M., 2013. Salt Sugar Fat: How the food giants hooked us. W. H. Allen, London.

Poverty Bay Herald. [online] Available at: http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz.

Food, glorious food!

Posted on 17 January 2014 by Jessie Garland

Food, in all its myriad forms, can be one of the most intrinsic and expressive aspects of culture and society – throughout time and across the world. From the customs surrounding the preparation and consumption of food to the ingredients themselves, we are, as they say, what (and how) we eat. Looking at the nature of food in past societies and cultures can be a rewarding exercise in finding both the strange and the familiar in the lives of those who’ve gone before us. After all, what is more universal yet more varied than food?

From a purely archaeological perspective, our impressions of past meals and culinary traditions are limited by what survives in the archaeological record. In the case of 19^th European century sites, this usually consists of animal remains and glass, metal or ceramic food containers: the only physical remnants of a much broader, much more varied array of food and drink. Ceramic or glass serving dishes and table wares can also provide information, usually on the how, rather than the what, of food consumption, but often prove difficult to interpret. Animal remains – the butchered bones of cattle, sheep, pig and poultry – are the most common evidence of food itself that we find, but I’m going to leave them for another post and focus here on what we can learn from the food containers we’ve found in Christchurch.

Unfortunately, because we’re limited to food containers, as the durable remnants of 19^th century culinary habits, our understanding of food types is skewed towards long-life items (i.e. preserves), condiments, and packaged foods rather than fresh ingredients. As a result, we see a lot of foods that are additives to meals (like condiments) rather than meals or major ingredients themselves. Even more than that, we’re restricted by what we can identify: distinctive containers used for specific food types or those labelled with the identity of their contents.

Examples of commonly found food containers from 19th century Christchurch sites. Left: A salad oil bottle. Middle: Embossed base from jar of W & W’s table salt. Right: Still labelled bottle of Mellor & Co’s Worcestershire sauce, a competing product to Lea & Perrins. Images: J. Garland.

19th century Lea & Perrins bottle found in Christchurch. Image: J. Garland.

Many of these are products that wouldn’t be unusual to find in the modern pantry and, in fact, some of them are still made today. Commonly found items like salad oil, table salt, pickles, sauces or flavoured essences are all familiar additions to modern cuisine, albeit in slightly different packaging than their Victorian counterparts. Other products, like Lea and Perrin’s Worcestershire sauce have persisted in popularity under the same brand for over a century: in the case of Lea and Perrins, it’s been over 170 years since its introduction. Similarly, foodstuffs like anchovy paste continue to appeal to the same subset of people who like really salty fish puree as they did in the 1800s. As a side note, my favourite 19^th century use for anchovy paste involves spreading it on fried bread and topping with a generous helping of whipped cream (Otago Witness 17/08/1904: 67). Takers, anyone?

An anchovy paste jar found in Christchurch and accompanying recipe from 1904. Image: J. Garland, Otago Witness 17/08/1904: 67.

As well as the more ordinary foods, however, we do come across a few weird and wonderful items during our investigations. Some of these only seem unusual at first glance, but wow, is it a strange first glance. Crosse & Blackwell’s calves’ foot jelly, for example, sounds less than appetising until you remember that gelatine (even modern gelatine) is derived from the bones, tendons and skin of various animals. Unlike modern gelatine products, though, calves’ foot jelly has no compunctions about promoting its ingredients: recipes for the jelly involved boiling calves feet in a stewing pan, removing the fat and straining before flavouring the mixture, usually with citrus (Auckland Star 26/10/1929: 4). In this sense, the jelly is an interesting reminder of how our attitudes towards the consumption of animal products have changed since the 19th century. We now produce and consume animal products on a colossal scale, yet are, thanks to the packaged nature of the food industry, more removed from the origins and preparation of those products than we’ve ever been. As the calves foot jelly reminds us, this was far less true of the 19^th century.

Left: Labelled bottle of Crosse & Blackwell’s calves foot jelly found in Christchurch. Right Advertisement from 1898. Calves’ foot jelly was frequently listed as a flavour of jelly in its own right by retailers in 19th century newspaper advertisements, right alongside raspberry, blackcurrant and orange. Images: J. Garland and Feilding Star 9/04/1898: 2.

In contrast to the honest marketing of the calves’ foot jelly, products like Virol bone marrow paste elicit our revulsion (well, for me they do) thanks to the use of ingredients that have long since been replaced with more palatable alternatives. Virol contained a mixture of bone marrow, malt extract, eggs, lemon syrup, lime salts and iron salts. Bone marrow is still eaten today (it’s something of a delicacy in some places), but it’s the combination of the fatty, spongy marrow with the lemon syrup and malt extract that makes my taste buds shrivel in horror. It was advertised as a health food for infants and invalids, in order to “build sturdy limbs, good teeth and a strong constitution”, so maybe it wasn’t really about the taste (Auckland Star 25/06/1925: 9). Nowadays, of course, such results would more often be obtained from calcium rich, often dairy-based, foods rather than bone marrow.

Stoneware bottle of Virol bone marrow paste found in Christchurch and a modern bone marrow dish. Yum? Images: J. Garland and Flavour Boulevard

Stoneware bottle of Virol bone marrow paste found in Christchurch (left) and a modern dish of roasted bone marrow (right). Erm, yum? Images: J. Garland and Flavour Boulevard.

Other unusual foodstuffs stand out as much for their innovation and unexpectedly early existence as for their probable bad taste. We tend to think of processed foods as being something of a recent invention, yet the 19^thcentury had its fair-share of such products (Wood 1974: 20). One such example found in Christchurch was Maclaren’s Imperial Cheese, a Canadian-manufactured ‘spreadable cheese’ from the early 1900s (next week’s post is going to look at this product in more detail; Badgely 1998). Maclaren’s, which is still produced by the Kraft Foods Group, was initially made from ground cheddar, and enjoyed immense popularity. It’s described in turn of the century advertisements as the “cheese of the hour” (Hawera & Normanby Star 16/12/1904: 3) and “one of the most appetising luxuries [that] the world produces” (Press 5/01/1907: 10). That last one may have been a slight exaggeration…

Maclaren’s Imperial Cheese: then and now. Images: J. Garland & Clockwork Lemon blog.

Although they provide an incomplete picture of Victorian tastes, the types of food-related artefacts I’ve mentioned here can still offer us fascinating insights into the lives of 19^th century people and the relevance of those lives – and eating habits – to the modern world. Despite their ability to make us (well, me) recoil in disgust, these products can still challenge our preconceptions of food in society and culture, our own included. Most of all, though, these artefacts offer us an almost tangible taste connection between our own experiences and those of our forebears in this city, and the rest of the world. It may be a foul tasting connection, but it’s a connection nonetheless.

Jessie Garland

References

Auckand Star. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz

Badgely, K. 1998. Maclaren, Alexander Ferguson. Dictionary of Canadian Biography. [online] Available at www.biographi.ca

Feilding Star. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz

Hawera and Normanby Star. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz

Otago Witness. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz

Press. [online] Available at www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz

Wood, J. A. 1974. Victorian New Zealanders. A. H. & A. W. Reed Ltd, Wellington.

Christchurch uncovered

Exploring Christchurch's past through archaeology

Tag Archives: jars

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