“it is no man’s business to trouble himself with cooking”. Feasting and food taboo in medieval Iceland

• Published in: Studia Europaea Gnesnensia
• Main Author: Jakubczyk, Radosław
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: Polish
• Published: Uniwersytet im. Adama Mickiewicza w Poznaniu 2020
• Subjects: relig; hist; Iceland
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.14746/seg.2018.18.12; https://bibliotekanauki.pl/articles/1065741.pdf; https://bibliotekanauki.pl/articles/1065741

In this paper, I discuss various kinds of feasts in Old Norse-Icelandic literature, such as wedding, funeral, or sacrificial feasts. I discuss feasting, an important part of the culture of medieval Iceland, much more in terms of its functions (political, social, religious) than in terms of its culinary aspect. In addition, I consider how religious traditions impacted Old Icelandic food culture and how food taboo related to horse-meat consumption (declared just after the conversion of Iceland to Christianity in 1000 CE) affected social interaction.