Foodways unfettered: eighteenth-century food in the Sydney settlement
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Date
2007
Authors
Newling, Jacqueline Anne
Editors
Advisors
Cushing, Nancy
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Abstract
The received perception of food in eighteenth-century Sydney is that colonists survived on
meagre and monotonous rations. Having failed to engage with the local environment, or to learn
from Aboriginal people and utilise indigenous resources, the salt rations dependent newcomers
found themselves victims of hunger and starvation. This view is largely due to the predominant
historical interpretation of British penal colonisation in Australia, where New South Wales was
settled in an atmosphere of ignorance and governmental neglect. This received view is overly
narrow and simplistic. The colony developed from penal settlement to a vibrant commercial
centre by the turn of the century. Food was a vital factor in this process. Rations, which were
controlled by the authorities, underpinned the colonists’ diet, however other foods, both
introduced and indigenous, were used to supplement it. Primary sources reveal much about the
foodways of the eighteenth-century settlers, and the factors that affected availability and
distribution. Where most studies on food in early settlement focus on convicts and rations, this
thesis takes a more comprehensive approach, which encompasses rationing and the broader,
more liberated aspects of colonists’ dietary patterns. It explores contributing factors such as
established English cultural practices, governance, socio-political forces and the natural
environment, which influenced colonists’ consumption. This study provides a fresh interpretation
of eighteenth-century food in Sydney, establishing that whilst having to work within a corporate
victualling system, the early colonists were not passive victims of a food supply controlled
entirely from above, but played an active role in food procurement and consumption, exercising
individual and collective rights and preferences. The evolution of their foodways reflects the
transformation from penal colony to a prospering colonial society, as the first settlers made new
lives in New South Wales.
School/Discipline
School of History and Politics
Dissertation Note
Thesis (M.A. (Gast)) -- University of Adelaide, School of History and Politics, 2007
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