A Loaf for One Day, Hunger for Two: Peasant Food in the Times of Famine (A Study of the North-Russian Dialect Vocabulary)

Abstract

The article examines the words denoting hunger, food, and products that were in use in the famine time in the vocabulary of the Russian North. Food allowance during the time consisted chiefly of thin broth and bread loaves that were baked with flour substitutes made from oilcake or various wild plants. Names given to such food provide interesting clues to the use of substitutes, simple ways of cooking, specific color of products, their low nutritional content and caloric value, as well as to the regional peculiarities of food preparation during the historical period. One of the recurring themes encountered in the folklore and various dialect vocabularies of the time is precisely that of deception/substitution (i.e. in the time of hardships, bad unsavory ingredients are substituted for real quality food).