You are what you eat  You are what you eat… Food, Hierarchy and
the Social Order  Miriam Müller  I have developed an interest in
cultural patterns of consumption and what these can tell us
about the social order. The hierarchical nature of medieval
society also translated into the types of food consumed by the
different social classes. In part this was due to economic
necessity, but much of it was due to class delineations.
Peasants were not allowed to hunt game and kill certain animals,
like hares, rabbits and deer for food, as these were the
preserves of the rich. Peasants were often amerced (punished) in
manorial courts for poaching animals from their lord’s warren
and even pigeons were out of bounds for peasants. Peasants
generally lived on a largely vegetarian diet made up of
different types of grain and pulses, brown, coarser bread,
vegetables and fruit, which the nobility often tended to scorn
as ‘peasant food’. Instead the rich ate vast quantities of meat,
and the prestigious white, wheaten bread, bot