Other Temples

[Ben C. Smith]

Of course, they didn't have tomatoes which come from the new world to make the requisite sauce, so perhaps bar-b-que is the wrong term. There were no potatoes for "french fries" either, also from the new world. But none of that seems to stop Medieval-Tymes type dinner theaters from serving bar-b-que chicken and a baked potato which you eat with your hands like the savages we Europeans were.

Even the term barbecue seems to derive from the Arawakan (Haitian) word barbakoa, imported into Spanish as barbacoa and thence into English as a loan word.

Modern fantasy writers, even those who really do know better, have found it very difficult to keep their medieval high fantasy worlds free of products that postdate Columbus. I have seen corn (in the form of maize, not as an antiquated term for grain in general, which it can sometimes be), potatoes, tomatoes, chili peppers, and even llamas appearing in what otherwise would resemble a romanticized version of Europe circa 1400.

People in general have trouble imagining Italian cuisine without the New World tomato and Irish cuisine without the New World potato. But, for that matter, people in general also have trouble imagining Old World spices as common nowadays as black pepper and nutmeg being so expensive that only the rich could afford them. Medieval peasant food must have been very bland, as a rule.

The jousting and broad-sword battles, tho, are actually very entertaining....

I enjoyed them, too, the two times I have attended such spectacles.

[Clive]

As the son of man and the final prophet never tasted chocolate, is not some doubt warranted about their abilities to faithfully transmit the meanings of life, the universe and everything?

[DCHindley]

As the son of man and the final prophet never tasted chocolate, is not some doubt warranted about their abilities to faithfully transmit the meanings of life, the universe and everything?

Hmmm.

"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrases_f ... the_Galaxy

Perhaps Jesus did express the true answer to the meaning of life, the universe and everything, and everyone disappeared, only to be immediately replaced by, in this case, an identical universe that mirrors the former one in every way, which is why we all get that sense of deja-vu from time to time. "Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways!"

But AA has contacted me via psychic channeling to reveal that Jesus, by designing his "coming" to involve 13 apostles, has confirmed that the answer is the number 42, as also stated in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, stated as ""What do you get if you multiply six by nine?" "Six by nine. Forty two." "That's it. That's all there is." But, like all of AA's theories, that doesn't add up (6 x 9 = 54), until he pointed out that 6₁₀ × 9₁₀ is actually 42₁₃ (translated, that means 4 × 13 + 2 = 54, i.e. 54 in decimal is equal to 42 expressed in base 13).

But, "I always thought something was fundamentally wrong with the universe"!

DCH

[andrewcriddle]

Of course, they didn't have tomatoes which come from the new world to make the requisite sauce, so perhaps bar-b-que is the wrong term. There were no potatoes for "french fries" either, also from the new world. But none of that seems to stop Medieval-Tymes type dinner theaters from serving bar-b-que chicken and a baked potato which you eat with your hands like the savages we Europeans were.

Even the term barbecue seems to derive from the Arawakan (Haitian) word barbakoa, imported into Spanish as barbacoa and thence into English as a loan word.

Modern fantasy writers, even those who really do know better, have found it very difficult to keep their medieval high fantasy worlds free of products that postdate Columbus. I have seen corn (in the form of maize, not as an antiquated term for grain in general, which it can sometimes be), potatoes, tomatoes, chili peppers, and even llamas appearing in what otherwise would resemble a romanticized version of Europe circa 1400.

FWIW in England/Britain the primary meaning of corn is grain in general particularly wheat. (Cornfields are wheat fields not maize fields.)

Andrew Criddle

[Ben C. Smith]

FWIW in England/Britain the primary meaning of corn is grain in general particularly wheat. (Cornfields are wheat fields not maize fields.)

Ah, I did not realize that what I called "antiquated" was still current in the UK. Thanks.

"Corn" and "grain" are, in fact, etymologically related. "Corned beef" is beef cured with grains/corns of salt.