.png)
sugar
the origins of sugar
Exploring the fascinating and dark history of sugar and how it became such an integral part of our world today.
Sugar is something we all know and love. Once a rare luxurious commodity, sugar is now an integral part of our diets and has been for centuries, ranging from being used as medicine to sweetener, to now being one of our most threatening killers.
However, in the Middle Ages, ‘sweetness’ was only available to our ancestors for part of the year as it was a seasonal, natural source, coming in the form of fruit or honey.
So – where did sugar as we know it come from?
Where does sugar come from?
Compared to honey and fruit, cane sugar requires extraction- a modern technology! As this extraction technology was a modern creation, cane sugar was only widely consumed by the average person from the sixteenth century onwards. However, even before this point sugar did exist, with the first written record of the existence of sugar thought to be in Sanskrit in 350 AD.
In fact, the word “sugar” is thought to have derived from Sanskrit (śarkarā), meaning a gritty, gravel-like substance, made from drying sugar cane extract in the sun.
But what do I mean by all this? Well…
There is evidence from plant remnants to suggest that sugar originated centuries before it was widely consumed, but as a giant wild grass from the Indian subcontinent and South East Asia. Here, locals would chew on the raw sugar cane to extract its sweetness, which until modern extraction technology was invented and the discovery of how to crystalise sugar by the Indians, was the only way of extracting its addictive, sweet qualities.
Sugar was also favoured by the Greeks and Romans who used it as medicine!
The Persians were also a huge fans of sugar, with Emperor Darius of Persia exclaiming his joy when he found the legendary sugar cane during his invasion of India in 510 BC:
“I’ve found the reed which gives honey without bees”.
Sugar's first appearance in Britain
By the thirteenth century, the Venetians were the great sugar controllers across the globe, bringing sugar from the Middle East, then passing it on to traders who shipped it out across Europe – although, sugar at this point in history was still an extremely unknown and expensive commodity.
In fact, sugar was considered so rare that its value equalled that of precious gems and people even locked it up in sugar safes! In the fourteenth and fifteenth century England, the price per pound of sugar was as high as the imported spices from Asia such as mace (now known as allspice), ginger, cloves, and pepper.
For a more modern understanding of how expensive and rare early sugar really was, today’s equivalent of a bag and a half of Tate Lyle or Silver Spoon might be all the sugar there was across the entire kingdom! It was not until the discovery of the New World and the growing sugar industry boom that sugar would thankfully become cheaper as the decades went on.
Types of Sugar
Crystal Sized Sugar:
This can be coarse-grain sugar, granulated sugar or a milled sugar such as caster or powdered sugar
Shapes:
Sugar cubes
Brown Sugars:
Light brown or dark brown sugar
Liquid Sugars:
Honey, Syrups, Molasses and Treacle