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Feast or Famine? Seventeenth-Century English Colonial Diet at Ferryland, Newfoundland

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Abstract

Documentary and faunal evidence from the 17th-century English colony at Ferryland, Newfoundland, illustrates how the settlers adapted traditional English dietary practices to suit their new situation. The role of both domestic and wild mammals in the diet changed little over the course of the century. Pigs were consistently the most important mammal, supplemented by cattle, sheep/goat, caribou, and seal. The continuity of dietary patterns at the site indicates that the colonists very quickly developed a subsistence regime to maximize fresh meat consumption, given the scheduling demands of the cod fishery and the limitations and potential of the Newfoundland environment.

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  1. Department of Anthropology, University of Western Ontario, Social Science Centre, London, ON, Canada, N6A 5C2

    Lisa M. Hodgetts

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  1. Lisa M. Hodgetts
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Hodgetts, L.M. Feast or Famine? Seventeenth-Century English Colonial Diet at Ferryland, Newfoundland. Hist Arch 40, 125–138 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03376743

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