Research Catalog

Avoiding the dire straits : an inquiry into food provisions and scurvy in the maritime and military history of China and wider East Asia

Title
Avoiding the dire straits : an inquiry into food provisions and scurvy in the maritime and military history of China and wider East Asia / Mathieu Torck.
Author
Torck, Mathieu.
Publication
Wiesbaden : Harrassowitz, 2009.

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StatusFormatAccessCall NumberItem Location
TextUse in library HD9016.C52 T67 2009Off-site

Details

Description
vi, 280 pages : illustrations; 25 cm.
Series Statement
East Asian economic and socio-cultural studies. East Asian maritime history, 1860-1812 ; 5
Uniform Title
East Asian economic and socio-cultural studies. East Asian maritime history ; 5.
Subject
  • Food supply > China > History
  • Food supply > East Asia > History
  • Scurvy > China > History
  • Sailors > Nutrition > History. > China
  • Nutrition > Requirements
  • Scurvy > history
  • Food Supply > history
  • History, Early Modern 1451-1600
  • History, Modern 1601-
  • Military Personnel > history
  • Nutritional Requirements
  • Scurvy > prevention & control
  • Nutrition > Requirements
  • Food supply
  • Scurvy
  • Seeschifffahrt
  • Lebensmittelversorgung
  • Seemann
  • Skorbut
  • China > History, Naval
  • East Asia
  • China
  • Asia, Eastern
  • East Asia
Genre/Form
  • History
  • Naval history
Bibliography (note)
  • Includes bibliographical references (p. 251-268) and index.
Contents
Scurvy is known to be one of the most gruesome pathological phenomena that, in the course of centuries, has made innumerable victims. Long distance seafaring operations, war zones, prisons and crop failures all created breeding grounds for the vitamin C deficiency disease, which was commonly characterized by swelling and bleeding gums and internal haemorraghes in the limbs. While the history of scurvy is rather well-known from a Western perspective, the higher proneness to scurvy of Asian peoples in comparison to Europeans, Polynesians and other peoples, as proven in recent biochemical studies, compelled to broaden that horizon and look for scurvy in China and beyond. The purpose of this book is to trace the history of the disease in China, Japan and Southeast Asia and to highlight the ways in which peoples from these regions in pre-modern and early modern times dealt with provisioning in their seafaring and military enterprises. This cross-cultural quest for scurvy and food supplies, involving such areas as maritime and military history and the medical traditions from East and West, is ultimately meant as an attempt to elucidate whether historical sources can confirm the biochemical findings. -- Publ. descr.
ISBN
  • 9783447058728
  • 3447058722
LCCN
2010286333
OCLC
  • ocn316003026
  • 316003026
  • SCSB-1508754
Owning Institutions
Princeton University Library