Were the Anglo-Saxons "vegetarians"? Old bones meet cutting edge science

This talk tackles long held assumptions in both archaeology and history surrounding [elite] diets in early medieval England, i.e. that higher status people had a more meat-heavy diet and that this was especially true for men. These assumptions are challenged with new chemical data from the skeletons of early medieval people themselves and compared to medieval manuscript evidence. Data from the bones of over 2000 people shows that not only were high protein diets extremely rare in England before the Viking Age, but that dietary differences cannot be linked to gender or social status. In this lecture, we'll look at the big picture as well as 'meet' a handful of early medieval people and uncover their life stories decoded through their skeletal remains. 

Dr Sam Leggett is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow and Lecturer at the University of Edinburgh specialising in isotopic analysis, early medieval and computational archaeology. She is a University of Sydney archaeology, medieval studies and immunology alumna, and in 2020 completed her PhD at the University of Cambridge looking at diet and migration(s) in early medieval Europe. 

Header image: A feast heading: Calendar page for April in the Anglo-Saxon manuscript