The Origins of Haggis
This one’s for Adam Balic who has a great discussion of the origins of haggis on his blog The Art and Mystery of Food (scroll up and down and you will find a couple more posts on the subject).
Now Catherine Brown, who has worked for years on the foods of Scotland, and the wonderful collection on the history of medicine at the Wellcome Library are getting into the act.
Comments, Adam? You know this story much better than I do. I have the feeling you have covered much of this ground.
- Who Thought We Were Dumb and Uncaring? Smart Words from a Farmer
- Gorgeous Photos of Frutas Cubiertas and More
I think that this is more about the Wellcome collection then food history as such. The Harlein MSS 279 recipe is very well known
Hagws of a schepe (Haggis of a sheep)
Take the ropes [entrails] with the tallow and parboil them; then hack them small; grind pepper, and Saffron, and bread, and yolks of Eggs, and Raw cream or sweet Milk: mix all together, and put in the great wombe of the Sheep, that is, the stomach; and then boil it and serve forth.
More or less in this form it appears in most recipe collections until the end of the 18th century. The earlist Scottish recipe I have located is from the cookery manuscript of Lady Castlehill (early 18th century), but at this point in its history there is nothing specifically Scottish about it. Identification of the haggis with the Scots really only occured in the latter part of the 18th century and even during and after this period people in the North of England were eating their own form of this dish.
What I suspected, Adam. You already had this wrapped up.
Given the large amount of data out there then the obviously conclusion is that the haggis has a culinary history in both England and Scotland.
What I think that is interesting is that it once again raises the question of Identity. Basically Catherine Brown has said that in the historical record there are earlier references to the haggis in England then in Scotland.
For some reason, even though haggis is now clearly identified as a Scottish dish the world over (and has been since the end of the 18th century), the idea that it has a history outhwith Scotland has made some people very cross indeed. Cross to the point that there has even been suggestion that the English are trying to “steal” the haggis.
It is something that I see again and again in food studies, when a particular food item is owned or associated with a specific community, it has to be owned in its totally. Suggestons that the dish has a wider context or history are often met with denial or tortuous and illogical explanations to justify ownership of the dish.
One interesting offshoot of this ownership is the rise of traditional foods. There is no doubt that regional foods exist (and are in fact one of my main interests), but the increasing tendency to define a dish as a specific list or ingredients is in some respects troubling. Once a dish is defined as a specific thing, then in some respects it is ended. And then there is the legal issues. In Mexico a cheese gets produced for 50 years and it becomes a regional speciality. The Bulgarians have produced feta for a similar or longer period but are perceived as interlopers.
Adam, agreed about identity and regionality, topics that really need to be unpicked. You remind me that I was going to post on regions and foods.
And your point that once you define a dish (or give it a denomination) it is finished is useful and thought provoking. Thanks.
A note or two on the manuscript mentioned by Adam Balic. It’s Harleian MS 279, now in the British Library. It was published by the Early English Text Society in 1888, edited by Thomas Austin, and dated by him c. 1430.
Thanks Vincent. Do please jump into this discussion if you have additional perspectives. The more the merrier.
I found this discussion while wondering idly about the origin of haggis from an etymological viewpoint.
Adam Balic’s postings on his blog are indeed most impressive and seem to make the clear case of a prior English origin for this dish albeit in forms somewhat remote from the dish as made today.
If it is English going back at least to the 15th century, wouldn’t this argue for a Norman French origin? According to Wikipedia, in part Liber Cure Cocorum, dating from around 1430 in Lancashire, North West England (it says), reads in part:
“For hagese’.
Þe hert of schepe, þe nere þou take,
Þo bowel noght þou shalle forsake,
On þe turbilen made, and boyled wele,
Hacke alle togeder with gode persole…”.
I can’t understand a good part of this, but “hacke alle togeder” seems reasonably clear. Surely “hacke” is cognate to “hacher” and wouldn’t this support the inference of the noun “hachis” as the self-same haggis except pronounced with a hard c? A hachis today in France and surely then was a minced affair of some kind, as haggis is (or things shredded or cut into very small pieces, same thing basically).
Wikipedia indicates other theories, such as an origin in certain Scandinavian languages although it doesn’t state what the Scandinavian words mentioned, e.g., “hag”, meant. If they meant chop again, then perhaps the origin is pre-Norman although possibly the two senses of chopped/mince, i.e., from two different language origins, overlapped and merged.
But in the light of an early English use of the dish and the not-distant Norman Conquest, would there be another theory of origin as persuasive as that of an altered pronunciation of the French “hachis”? Thanks for any thoughts.
Gray Gillman
P.S. It occurs to me that the theory of a French origin would be buttressed with evidence that any modern form of hachis in France is similar to modern or pre-modern Scots haggis. And I must say I have no idea if this is so. If no form of hachis can be traced in France which resembles the modern or older U.K. haggis, I guess this would argue against a French connection.
Gary, thanks for this interesting comment. I’ll get Adam in on the discussion.
Thanks very much and would be most interested to read any thoughts. Burn’s night isn’t far off!
Gary