From the "Georgica curiosa" of the agronomist W.H.v.Hohberg (1612-1688)
onwards until the beginning of the 20th century, recipes for tortoises (in
most cases: Emys orbicularis) can be found in many Austrian/South German
cook books. These can be summarized as follows:
either put a piece of hot coal (in later works: hot iron) upon carapax,
whereupon the animal would stretch out head, limbs and tail; cut these off;
let it bleed out in luke warm water, or use the blood for the stew; then put
into boiling water; or throw animal directly into boiling water.
Boiling (one hour and more according to different sources) allows for a
losening of the shell from the corpus; (in the case of Emys, there is no
need for tearing apart plastron and carapax by force, as they are easily
separable after some time of boiling). Remove skin, intestines, gallbladder;
in case the animal was left entire, head, limbs and tail are removed after
boiling. Further cooking procedure usually involves addition of vegetables
(onion, carrots,...) and/or a roasting of the remains in butter and spices.
In some cases the meat may be served within the (opened) shell.
Historical/pictorial sources and archaeological findings indicate widespread
trade, import, keeping and consumption of Emys orbicularis in eastern
Austria from about 1600 until the first half of the 19th century.
Although I have worked through several hundred Emys (and some Testudo
hermanni) remains from Mauerbach/Charterhouse (Lower Austria,1st half 17th
century), I could not find any consistent burning or breakage patterns, or
it was impossible to tell them apart from accidental fractures. However,
skeletal part representation can vary considerably within different samples:
there are some assemblages containing virtually all elements (including
horny claws) and others with an overrepresentation of either shell plates or
limb and girdle parts. The latter are more likely to stay with the food
refuse in the strict sense. From the recipes above, it is evident that
processing and cooking are likely to result in a disequilibrium of skeletal
part frequency.
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