Why I ride in Canada - the lowly potato

Gather 'round, all them as takes an interest, it's history class.

A victory at the Battle of Pavia in 1525 gave Spain a century
of military dominance in Europe, even threatening England
with the Armada of 1588. (Naturally I claim descent from
a shipwrecked Spanish sailor who married a pretty Irish colleen.)

Why were the northwestern European nations, especially France
and England so far behind Spain in becoming colonial powers? [1]

For instance, Britain's first successful American venture,
Jamestown was founded only in 1607, more than a century after
Spain's first New World colony (on Hispaniola, 1493).

One answer is population size, limited by the food supply.
The grain harvest becomes more uncertain the further north
you go. It wasn't until the introduction of potatoes and
fish from the Grand Banks that the northern European
populations began to catch up, some of them becoming world
powers. In fact, fish and chips is still a popular snack
in England.

This graph shows the UK population since 43AD:
http://chartsbin.com/view/28k

Note several sudden downward glitches. The first one, in the Late
Middle Ages is the Black Death (bubonic plague) of the mid-1300's.
The second appears to be WW1. [2]

The Irish population graph shows an even more (sadly) dramatic story:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Population_of_Ireland_since_1500.png

"Basque fishermen from Spain used potatoes as ships stores for their
voyages across Atlantic in the 16th century, and introduced the tuber
to western Ireland, where they landed to dry their cod." [wp]

However, over-dependence on one dominant strain of potato rendered
the Irish vulnerable to blight, which struck in 1845. Within mere
weeks it spread throughout the land, turning the staple crop into
inedible mush.

My great-great-to-the-Nth grandparents decided that enough was enough
and booked passage to these fair shores. And so here I be, wafted by
the Winds of Fortune and a humble tuber. I think I'll paint my bike
emerald green with Celtic artwork and a winged potato. Watch for it
if you're ever riding through these parts.

[1] The Tudors seemed to drag their feet on this issue, even
Good Queen Bess (who inherited a fairly weak nation and built it
up into a world power). If 'Enerys VII & VIII been a bit more spry,
Chile and other Latin American countries might be English-speaking
Commonwealth members today and TOG wouldn't have to order his groceries
in Spanish when he emigrates.

[2] Seen in _Punch_ magazine from late in WW1 when a food shortage
was hurting the Germans: a U-boat surfaces near the English coast.
Standing on shore is a large anthropomorphic potato, thumbing its
'nose' at the German.
U-BOAT CAPTAIN: "Gott strafe England!"
POTATO: "Tuber uber Alles!"

Sean P. Quinlan
Vancouver, BC, Canada

 

Further to my last:

July 11, 1917.

Picture at:
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/10143/10143-h/images/019.png

Gutenberg archive:
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/10143/10143-h/10143-h.htm

SQ

 

Thanks for the warning

<marks thread Ignore>

 

If I should hear sounds reminiscent of "potato-potato potato-potato";
would it be your bike approaching?

 

Heh heh. I had a Harley once, but lost it in the Fiscal Crash of '08.
And I was gonna decorate it with Celtic artwork, too.

SQ

 

I'll take this a point at a time: it was a lot less effort and a lot
less politically incorrect to plunder the returning Dagos than it was to
plunder the indigenous populations.

(Colateral observation - using a dongle to get intertubular access, I am
watching a roe deer foraging around outside in the snow.)

Britain's ships were about the size of inshore fishing-boats, whereas
the Spanish cargo ships were larger than ocean-going trawlers, hence
could carry more materials than the English ones. I use the word
'English' here, because I'm not aware of much Welsh activity unti the
time of Captain Morgan (a rum fellow), and Scotland was a separate
country until early into the seventeenth century. Ireland, IIRC, joined
the merry throng considerably later, and not entirely vuluntarily, it
should be said.

In the case of England, this was not so at the time - it was one of the
warm peaks in the cycle of the weather, and sub-tropical fruit was
cultivated outdoors. Vinyards were not uncommon, likewise peaches and
apricots. Citrus fruits were taken indoors over winter though.

AFAIK there was never any problem with grain crops due to cold weather -
wet and wind, certainly, as the shorter varieties of wheat, oats and
barley had not been bred.

Potatoes caught on: fish had never been a problem, and had (on and near
the coast) never been in short supply excpt perhaps during winter
storms, when fish from further asea than inshore waters would have faced
the same weather.

Indeed, very distant and deep-sea fishing was not developed for
centuries because refrigeration was undreamed-of, and the only way of
providing ice was to cut it - in England, from frozen lakes in the
winter, and the blocks stored in semi-underground ice-houses, which were
heavily insulated by straw (mainly). Only the very rich could afford this.

It is not beyond the realms of possibility that ice could have been cut
in Greenland on the outward journey, but, why? the Channel, the North
sea and the eastern edge of the Atlantic were teeming with fish.

Ireland's largest export has always been its population. Much of the
land is unsuitable for European agriculture, and it was only with the
advent of the potato that a larger amount of the (peaty) soil could be
exploited.

Then came the blight.

Then more exports.

Shades of the Wooller...

 

Spud-spud-spud-spud rather, with Russian overtones in the rocker-boxen
of vodka-vodka-vodka-vodka...

 

Ugly things. Armchairs with rawhide fringes, on wheels.

It is impossible to decorate one of those slouching lumps with anything
but a total makeover - implanting the engine into a proper frame with
proper cyle-parts.

Even a Featherbed would do at a pinch...

Now, an Egli(type) Harley might be fun.

 

Hi Rusty, thanks for your scholarly reply ... I just wanted
to write a spoof based on some garbled info from
the History channel on TV.

Seems to me that political correctness (as we know it today)
didn't much concern folks back in the days of the Atlantic
slave trade and other outrages.

However, I thought the very rich (in Tudor times at least)
considered sea food to be too low-class and so developed
iodine deficiencies causing goiter, the reason for those
ruffed, filly collars.

SQ

 

Ah, now that I *LIKE*