HEBREW LIFE AND CUSTOM
cultivated and were evidently regarded as luxuries. The
popular taste inclined to strongly flavoured vegetables
such as onions, garlic, and leek.1
Before the publication of the Deuteronomic law,2 animal
food scarcely entered into the diet of the poorer section of
the population, except on the occasion of an obligatory
sacrificial feast. Various sorts of game could be eaten
when it was available ; ɜ but even when account is taken
of the absence of game laws, and of pretty general skill in
the use of the bow and the sling and in the setting of
snares, as well as of the fact that Palestine in the days of
the Hebrew monarchy afforded more cover for game than
at the present time, the poor man’s larder, or that which
served as such, could not often have contained flesh or fowl.
When flesh was eaten it seems to have been originally
boiled in water or milk.4 At a later period it was roasted.5
The legislation in regard to that which had been killed by
a beast of prey, or has died a natural death, suggests a
growing fastidiousness in the matter. The earliest legisla-
tion, which deals only with that killed by a wild beast,
forbids the eating of it by man and directs that it should
be thrown to the dogs.6 The Deuteronomic legislation
prohibits the eating of that which dies a natural death,7
but allows it to be eaten by the stranger that is ‘ within
the gates ’ or to be sold to foreigners who may eat it. The
later legislation on the subject8 puts that which dies a
natural death and that which is killed by a beast of prey
on the same level. The eating of such flesh, strange to say,
is not prohibited as stringently as the eating of blood ; only
any one who is guilty of it, whether Israelite or stranger,
must wash himself and his clothes and be unclean till the
evening.
ɪ Num. xi. 5. * Deut. xii. 15. 3 Deut. xii. ɪʒ, 22.
4 Exod. xxiii. 19, xxxiv. 26; Deut. xiv. 21 ; ɪ Sam. ii. ɪɜ, 14;
Ezek. xlvi. 23, 24 ; cf. Exod. xii. 9.
5 Exod. xii. 9 ; Isa. xliv. ι6.
6 Exod. xxii. ɜɪ. 7 Deut. xiv. 21. 8 Lev. xvii. 15 ; cf. xxii. 8.
ANIMAL FOOD 39
A considerable variety of game existed in Palestine, such
as gazelles,1 deer,2 roebuck,3 various kinds of wild goat4
and antelope,5 and possibly moufflon.6 Of the flesh of
domestic animals the most commonly eaten was probably
mutton,7 of which the fat tail 8 was esteemed a great
delicacy, and goat’s flesh.’ Beef, when eaten by the rich,
was the flesh of stall-fed fattened animals.10 The beef
more ordinarily eaten would be the flesh of oxen which
might have been used for ploughing.11 The term ‘ fatling ’
seems to denote beef.12
It is somewhat strange that although doves and pigeons
are never mentioned among the ordinary food in ancient
Palestine, they could be sacrificed,13 and were apparently
kept in dovecots.14 Turtle doves are mentioned as migra-
ting,15 and therefore it is the more surprising to find them
specified as sacrificial victims.16
Of domestic poultry there is no mention, unless certain
fatted creatures called barbûrîm17 were birds. Of wild birds
partridges,18 quails,1’ and small birds other than beasts of
prey were eaten.20 The eggs which were eaten must have
been those of wild birds.21
Fish is not mentioned in Solomon’s bill of fare,22 although
’ Deut. xiv. 5, xii. 15, 22.
’ ɪ Kings v. 3 ; Deut. xii. 15, 22 ; Cant. ii. 9, 17.
3 Deut. xiv. 5 ; ɪ Kings v. 3 (E.V. iv. 23). 4 Deut. xiv. 5.
s Deut. xiv. 5 ; Isa. li. 20. 6 Deut. xiv. 5.
7 ɪ Sam. xiv. 34, xv. 4 ; Gen. xxxi. 38.
8 Exod. xxix. 22 and probably ɪ Sam. ix. 24.
, Gen. xxvii. 9, 17 ff.
” Amos vi. 4 ; Mal. iii. 20 (iv. 2, E.V.) ; Jer. xlvi. 2i ; ɪ Sam.
xxviii. 24.
n Isa. xxxiv. 7 ; Jer. 1. 27 ; Ezek. xxxix. 18.
“ 2 Sam. vi. 13 ; Isa. i. ɪɪ, xi. 6 ; Amos v. 22 ; Ezek. xxxix. t8.
4 Lev. i. 14, v. 7 ; Gen. xv. 9. ɪ4 Isa. lx. 8.
,5 Jer. viii. 7 ; cf. Cant. ii. 12.
'6 Cf. W. Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, 2nd ed., p. 219.
,7 ɪ Kings iv. 23 (Heb. v. 3). ɪ8 ɪ Sam. xxvi. 20.
’’ Exod. xvι. 13. " Deut. xiv. n-20, xxii. 6.
“ Deut. xxii. 6, 7. ” ɪ Kings iv. 22, 23.