General Publications & Manuscripts

Von der Küche in den Graben – Bremens Stadtgraben und die Essgewohnheiten seiner Anwohner

Bischop, Dieter & Küchelmann, Hans Christian (2018): Von der Küche in den Graben – Bremens Stadtgraben und die Essgewohnheiten seiner Anwohner an der Wende zur Frühen Neuzeit. in: Melzer, Walter (ed.): Lebensmittel im Mittelalter und in der frühen Neuzeit. Erzeugung, Verarbeitung, Versorgung. Beiträge des 16. Kolloquiums des Arbeitskreises zur archäologischen Erforschung des mittelalterlichen Handwerks, Soester Beiträge zur Archäologie 15, 137-151, Soest

[From the kitchen to the ditch – The moat of Bremen and the food habits of its residents at the turn of the Early Modern Time]

Abstract
Sewer works in the area of the late medieval defense ditch of the city of Bremen, between the medieval gates Abbentor and Doventor, offered the possibility to investigate the archaeologically rich content of the ditch, which has been filled in the 16th century. Time pressure because of the works on a main road resulted in only superficial archaeological documentation, but the content of the eastern part of the sewer channel, dating to the 16th century has been sieved completely with a 10 mm mesh. The sieved earth comprised ca. 120-200 cubic meters (20 lorry loads, ca. 250-300 t). Apart of a large number of daily life items from metal, ceramic and glass, it contained almost 46.000 animal bones and shells (631 kg), among these next to the expected domesticates (cattle, pig, sheep, goat, dog, cat) several thousands of bird and fish bones. Inter alia evidence for stockfish trade, bone artefacts and one bone of a north Atlantic razorbill was found. The present article gives a summary of the archaeozoological analysis and relates the data to historical documents and archaeological finds shedding light on the nutrition of the 16th century inhabitants of Bremen.

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