According to the Bolognese street poet Giulio Cesare Croce, a trade secret of the silk industry was to perfume the rooms in which silkworms were bred with the ‘great fragrance’ of a grilled pork chop. Researching further into silk, I’ve recently found this same secret described in Agostino Gallo’s agronomical treatise Le venti giornate (The Twenty Days), published in 1569. Excellent producers, ‘often perfumed the places in which silkworms were raised with incense, pork lard and even sausages placed on the grill’. These odours were believed to invigorate the silkworms and protect them from disease. Diseases were spread through stench in contemporary medical theory, so Gallo stressed the importance of keeping all surfaces clean and disinfecting them by rubbing with sweet-smelling herbs. The silkworms had also to be sprinkled with good vinegar. These procedures enabled the silkworms to sense the pleasant odours of the herbs and vinegar and eliminated the danger from their foul-smelling excrement.
Gallo’s work was an important source of information for the treatises on silk by Giovan Andrea Corsuccio and Maggino Gabrielli, discussed in Renaissance Secrets . For example, Gallo reports the practice of immersing the silkworms into tepid malmsey wine (or aged vernaccia) to separate out the healthy larvae from the unhealthy. In Gallo’s imaginary dialogue, the Brescian nobleman Giulio Calzaveglia here recalls the example of the legendary Spartan Lycurgus from Plutarch’s Lives. Women washed newborn babies in wine to test their strength:
Gallo’s work was an important source of information for the treatises on silk by Giovan Andrea Corsuccio and Maggino Gabrielli, discussed in Renaissance Secrets . For example, Gallo reports the practice of immersing the silkworms into tepid malmsey wine (or aged vernaccia) to separate out the healthy larvae from the unhealthy. In Gallo’s imaginary dialogue, the Brescian nobleman Giulio Calzaveglia here recalls the example of the legendary Spartan Lycurgus from Plutarch’s Lives. Women washed newborn babies in wine to test their strength:
‘For washing those liable to sickness and seizures in undiluted wine would induce convulsions, whilst the healthy would become tougher and more vigorous’.
Also, these treatises openly acknowledge women’s role and expertise in silk-production. This opens up the whole unanswered issue of the extent to which these male authors may have appropriated female trade secrets. There are evident parallels in other domains—for example, increasing male authority in diagnosing and prescribing treatments for women's gynecological conditions (especially infertility) and in obstetrics.
The same advice regarding grilled sausages resurfaces in the expanded 1578 edition of Jean Liebault's L’Agriculture et Maison Rustique (Gallo's work was translated into French in 1572) and was repeated by Olivier de Serres and Gervase Markham, in his revised English translation of Liebault: Maison rustique or The countrey farme (1616).
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ReplyDeleteMaggino Gabrielli in 1588 recommended the use of odorous herbs such as pine, juniper or rosemary, incense, prosciutto or pork chops when silkworms became sick as a result of catching cold. In times of excessive cold, they should be sprinkled with malmsey; in times of excessive heat, with rosewater and vinegar, or water perfumed with violets. He also stipulated that to comfort and reassure silkworms and keep flies at bay a brazier should be place under their feeding trays. For the first three days, incense should be burnt; for the next three days, salted pork and then rosemary for the final three days. The whole cycle should be repeated.
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