Vegan History - IVU - International Vegetarian Union

510 - The Vegetus MythYou’ve all read it somewhere: “The word vegetarian has nothing to do with vegetables, it wasderived from the Latin ‘vegetus’ meaning whole, fresh, lively, vigorous” etc 11 - Will there ever be more veg*ns?For those who have been active in the veg movement for any length of time the above title mustseem almost heretical - but it is actually an interesting question 12 - Were there Vegans in the Ancient World?We seem to be getting an increase in those silly lists of ‘famous historical vegans’, nearly all justnonsense and wishful thinking.13 - The Invention of the VegansThe word 'vegan' was invented in November 1944 by Donald Watson in England. But the originsare not how many vegans today might imagine.14 - Medieval Mindsets - 'vegans' in the middleagesThere were people who didn’t eat meat in Medieval Europe, andin Asia, but mostly for very different reasons to what weassociate with veganism today.15 - Vegans are Vegetarians tooThe man who invented the word ‘vegan’ in 1944 was very clearthat this was a part of the vegetarian movement, and DonaldWatson remained clear about that up to his death in 2005, atthe grand age of 95.16 - Veg*ism in AfricaI was once asked "Why do Africans go vegetarian?" - it was anunexpected question but the reply was simple enough: "For thesame reason as everyone else, health, animals, environment orreligion, according to their personal priorities".17 - Are you a positive or a negative veg*n?If we ask meat-eaters what they think 'vegetarian' means,most would probably say 'someone who does not eat meat' but that is not at all how I see it (right: positive/negativeimages).18 - Why some restaurants don't do vegan food and why they shouldA couple of weeks ago I mentioned encouraging morerestaurants to offer vegan meals, and was asked for someideas about doing that. So here are just a few thoughts.19 - Divided by a common language“Do you have anything vegetarian?” “Yes, do you eat fish?”20 - Was Vitamin B12 a problem for 19th century 'vegans'?B12 was discovered 1948, the word ‘vitamin’ having first appeared in the early 20th century. So if19th century vegans had vitamin deficiencies they had no way of knowing it, and would havediagnosed it as something else.back to top

6Fast Food? – it’s just distorted jungle foodMay 16, 2012Whether you subscribe to Eve andAdam or Evolution, it is clear that ourdistant ancestors lived entirely onfast-food. It was growing all aroundthem in the jungle/garden – they justreached out, grabbed some fruit, nuts,berries, leaves, shoots, herbs (and afew bugs) – and ate it. Even withsome occasional peeling or cracking, itwas about as fast as it gets.I took the photo on the right on Bali,Indonesia, 2010.At some point our ancestors movedout of the jungle/garden and, with lesseasy food to hand, they dug for roots,and gradually expanded their bugeating to bigger prey, though probablyvery little of it until they discoveredhow to cook it, and even then far lessthan many flesh-eatinganthropologists just assume. The ability to eat anything is valuable when food is scarce,but humans have never actually needed to eat other animals at times of plant-foodplenty.So we went through some thousands of years of culinary complications, some of itdesigned to make the flesh look a little less erm fleshy, but most people still ate mostlyplant-foods. Until very recently it was only the rich that could afford to eat much meat,and the symbol of wealth and power became far more important than any nutritionalvalue. Meat eating became the equivalent of big houses and flash cars, hence the citydwelling Chinese wanting more of it these days, and for the same reasons.The culinary complications were fine for those with chefs to do the cooking, but it wasalways really too time consuming for most other people, only a minority really enjoycomplicated cookery (beyond watching TV chefs). And modern fast food is taking therest back to the jungle, though in a very unhealthy form.The modern equivalent of the jungle trees are the supermarket shelves, just reach outand grab whatever fatty, sugary food you feel like eating. The difference now of courseis that the humans take it back to the nest, then put it in the microwave.And if even that’s too much hassle, then the fast-food ‘restaurants’ make it easier still.You can get a beef-burger in a bun in a couple of minutes, and it is similar in size andshape to a large piece of fruit, just minus much of the nutritional value.So no knives or forks needed, and no table manners, our primeval fruit grabbing handsare fine. A hot dog is just a junk version of a banana, and a slice of meat pizza is nothingmore than a large leaf with some tasty bugs on it.All those sugary snack bars fit the banana shape too, simply peel back and eat. This alsoreflects something of a return to the continuous grazing pattern of the jungle, but withdangerous health consequences in some of these modern substitutes.

7Some people really are trying to return to the original healthy fast-food – just grab somefruit, nuts and leafy greens and eat them raw, though most of us still prefer a few beansand whole grains in the mix too, and those do need some basic cooking.In many countries all branches of Burger Kingand McDonalds do bean-burgers, and they wouldbe adequate (minus cheese, plus wholewheatbun ) – if they didn’t come from BK andMcDeath. Though personally I’m pleased they dothem anyway, not so much for the existingvegetarians, more to encourage their meateating customers to at least try somethingdifferent – and someone must be buying them Right: top - how a healthy bean burger can look,and below a rather sad BK ‘bean burger meal’.So will humans eventually evolve beyond thisprocessed imitation phase, and return to theoriginal fast food of the jungle?Back in the 1980s I remember Margaret Thatcherbeing asked if she would encourage people to eatmore fresh fruit and vegetables. She was totallyagainst it, her priority was to reduceunemployment (hence improve her electionprospects) so she was promoting ‘value-added’(i.e. processed) food, because that created jobsin the processing factories.And of course when the customers get ill fromeating all that junk, it creates even more jobs inthe medical and pharmaceutical industries. A winwin for the big businesses and their politicalpuppets (When Thatcher left office she joined theboard of British-American Tobacco . . .).But yes, we should all get back to more of the original fast food. That’s some of oursbelow, all from our own garden, but there is still plenty of it everywhere else.back to top

8Were there Vegans in the AncientWorld?January 4, 2012We seem to be getting an increase in those silly lists of ‘famoushistorical vegans’, nearly all just nonsense and wishful thinking.I’ve seen some recently claiming Pythagoras, Plato, and manyothers from ancient Greece and Rome were vegans, blindlycopied around the internet.For those of us who take history seriously it is worth trying tounderstand what people were really doing, and why they chosetheir lifestyle, even if it’s not what we now see as ideal.Some biologists say that the human body craves fat and sugarbecause those things were difficult to obtain in early humantimes, and small amounts of the right sort are beneficial. Perhapsthat’s why in the Jewish/Christian Bible (Exodus 3:8) Mosespromised a land flowing with (full cream) milk and honey.Of course that promised land of fat and sugar had to wait untilthe fast food of cheeseburgers, cheese stuffed pizzas and sugarycola. It seems that Moses didn’t anticipate obesity, diabetes andheart disease It is interesting that Moses did not promise endless quantities ofanimal flesh, maybe he knew they didn’t need that, and we dohave a lot of examples of people in the ancient world cutting outthe flesh, but keeping milk and honey. That happened in India ataround the same time the Pythagoreans and Orphic Communitiesappeared in ancient Greece, all about 600BCE.[pictures right, from the top: Pythagoras, Plato, Ovid, St.Clement, Porphyry]They were all surprisingly similar, suggesting some contact andexchange of ideas, maybe via the Zoroastrians in Persia, butthere is no clear evidence of how it came about. The basis wasmetempsychosis, the transmigration of souls. In simplistic terms,if people can come back as animals in the next life, then youcould be eating your grandmother. But that argument didn’tapply to milk (goats, sheep or cows were all used) and honey, orwool.Nothing that Pythagoras wrote or said has survived, so we onlyhave accounts from hundreds of years later. For example theRoman, Ovid (43BCE - CE17) in his ‘Metamorphoses’ said thatPythagoras “. . . was the first to forbid animals to be served up atthe table” but also claimed Pythagoras as saying: “Nor is themilky juice denied you; nor honey . . . . there is milk; and cloverhoney. Earth is generous with her provision, and hersustenance.”Porphyry (233-304 CE/AD) wrote: of Pythagoras: "As for his owndiet, he was satisfied with honey or the honeycomb, or withbread only . . . his principal dish was often kitchen herbs, cookedor uncooked. Fish he ate rarely." – by that last comment he

9wasn’t even vegetarian, though other accounts vary, but the milk and honey are alwaysthere.Plato (c.427-c.347 BC) in his ‘Republic’ seemed to point to an ideal future without flesheating, but there is no evidence that he made any attempt to put it into practice himself.Several early Christian leaders also abstained from flesh out of desire for simplicity andself denial. One example was Saint Clement of Alexandria, who died around 220AD. Inhis second treatise, the Instructor or Tutor, Clement argues against flesh-eating, andadds : “For is there not, within a temperate simplicity a wholesome variety of eatables vegetables, roots, olives, herbs, milk, cheese, fruits, all kinds of dry food? . . . . thosewho feed according to the Word are not debarred from dainties - such as honey combs.”In all these early texts there is no reference to eggs. They just seem to have beenincluded within ‘flesh’, as in the predominant tradition in India.We see something different in Porphyry (234-305CE/AD – an anti-Christian Greekphilosopher within the Roman Empire) in his three-volume ‘On Abstinence from AnimalFoods’ – quoting arguments put to him by others:“If, however, someone should think it is unjust to destroy brutes, such a oneshould neither use milk, nor wool, nor sheep, nor honey. For as you injure aman by taking from him his garments, thus also, you injure a sheep byshearing it. . . . Milk, likewise was not produced for you, but for the young ofthe animal that has it. The bee also collects honey as food for itself; whichyou, by taking away, administer to your own pleasure.”But Porphyry then rejected these arguments, stating that the animals and beesbenefitted from humans caring for them, so it was a fair exchange to use their products,whilst abstaining from their flesh. It is extraordinary to see this level of debate takingplace at all, more than 1,700 years ago, and it had moved on to an ethical discussioninstead of the earlier purely religious matters.It may have been just the meat-eaters accusing the ‘abstainers from flesh’ of hypocrisyby continuing to use other animal products. However, we do know that there were quitea lot of ‘abstainers from flesh’, and in a big enough group it is always likely that a fewwould indeed have taken things to the logical conclusion of not using any animalproducts at all, and it looks like Porphyry might have been debating with them too.There is no evidence that any of the people we know about took the ‘vegan’ route ofeliminating milk, honey and wool – but we only know about people who wrote books, orwere important enough to be written about. All the others just vanish and we will neverknow who they were.Those lists of ‘famous vegans’ from ancient history really are nonsense, they were allwhat we would now call ‘lacto-vegetarians’, but that doesn’t mean there were no‘vegans’ around, just that they weren’t famous enough .back to top

10Medieval Mindsets – ‘vegans’ in the middle agesFebruary 1, 2012There were people who didn’t eat meat in Medieval Europe, and in Asia, but mostly forvery different reasons to what we associate with veganism today.In the western world the time after the fall of the Roman Empire - ‘the dark ages’, orMiddle Ages or Medieval period, usually defined as about 500-1500CE. - was dominatedby religion in both Europe and Asia, and many of those religions demanded variouslevels of abstinence and self-denial, even self-punishment.For some this meant abstaining from eating flesh, not because they thought it was bad,but because it was good, so they would suffer by denying themselves. Inevitably sometook this further than others, trying to eat almost nothing in order to feel more holy –they abstained from sex for the same reason, and some in the West wore hair-shirtswhich were deliberately itchy, while some Asian monks whipped their own backs.It is difficult to see this as having much to do with what we now call veganism. Theykept their milk and honey and, especially in Europe there was rarely any concern foranimals, or for human health.Some monasteries demanded inverted thinkingof flesh as a ‘health food’, and ‘mercy’ that didn’textend to animals:“[in English monasteries] Meat, onceprovided only for the sick, was nowenjoyed by all in the infirmary; and whenthis was forbidden by papal statute, a‘misericorde’, ‘the chamber of mercy’,between the infirmary and the refectory,where meat was freely allowed on thetable. This, too, was prohibited by papal statute; but in 1339 the pope,recognizing that the prohibition was unenforceable, conceded that the monksmight continue to relish their meat in the ‘misericorde’ provided that only halftheir number did so at a time, the other half maintaining the vegetarian ruleelsewhere. [C. Hibbert, The English, a social history, 1989]Most of these abstainers continued to eat fish, so Mr.Hibbert was misusing the term ‘vegetarian’.We’ve also seen claims that the Japanese Samurai, fromthe 11th century, were ‘vegan’, but again all availablereferences show them as routinely eating fish.In 1655 Roger Crab published his ‘English Hermit’, anaccount of his life in a cottage near London. In theintroduction he specifically mentions not eating butter orcheese leading some to see him as ‘vegan’. But he alsomentions his only clothing as sack cloth, and before longhe is claiming to extend his self-punishment by livingentirely on dock leaves and grass . . . [the picture is fromhis book]In the USA in the 18th century there were some groupssuch as the Ephrata Cloister and Dorrelites, which have also been claimed as ‘vegan’.But these too were based entirely on self-deprivation to feel holier.

11Howard Williams, The Ethics of Diet, 1883, on Medieval Europe:. . . we look in vain for traces of anything like the humanitarian feeling ofPlutarch or Porphyry [late Greek philosophers]. . . In those terrible[medieval Europe] ages of gross ignorance, of superstition, of violence, andof injustice - in which human rights were seldom regarded - it would havebeen surprising indeed if any sort of regard had been displayed for the nonhuman slaves. . . Chrysostom [347-407CE] seems to have been one of thelast of Christian writers who manifested any sort of consciousness of theinhuman, as well as unspiritual nature of the ordinary gross foods . . . in thedays of expiring Greek philosophy, Olympiodorous [5th century] and six otherPythagoreans determined, if possible, to maintain their doctrines elsewhere;and they sought refuge with the Persian Magi . . .Their refuge didn’t work out and they returned to Greece, but it is in the Middle East thatwe find an unexpected example of humanitarian thinking. During the time many call the‘Islamic Golden Age’ (c.750CE-c.1258CE) philosophers, scientists and engineers of theIslamic world contributed enormously to technology and culture, and this was all basedin Baghdad where Greek philosophy and science survived. The Europeans re‘discovered’ it from the Arabs centuries later.An unusual poet, Al-Ma’arri (973-1057CE) arrived in Baghdad from Syria. He wrote:Thou art diseased in understanding and religion. Come to me, that thoumayst hear the tidings of sound truth.Do not unjustly eat what the water has given up, [i.e. fish] and do not desireas food the flesh of slaughtered animals,Or the white (milk) of mothers who intended its pure draught for their young,not noble ladies.And do not grieve the unsuspecting birds by taking their eggs; for injustice isthe worst of crimes.And spare the honey which the bees get betimes by their industry from theflowers of fragrant plants;For they did not store it that it might belong to others, nor did they gather itfor bounty and gifts.I washed my hands of all this; and would that I had perceived my way eremy temples grew hoar! [i.e. hair became grey – the poem continues oninjustice ]From: ‘Studies in Islamic Poetry’ by R.A. Nicholson, 1921 (on archive.org). Mr. Nicholsonsays there are ‘many passages’ of a similar nature, and discusses how Al-Ma’arri says headopted what we now call veganism at the age of 30 (early grey hair ).We have books about Al-Ma’arri, but there is some debate about where he got theseideas, and whether there were more like him. Various religious sources are suggested,but he objected to all organised religion, and left us guessing. A few more of his lines,converted into poetic English in 1904, but written almost 1,000 years ago:Hunt not the beast; O, be thou more humane,Since hunter here nor hunted long remain;The smallest grub a life has in it whichThou canst not take without inflicting pain.The wooden shoes I do like best becauseThat skin did once live, aye, and even think.back to top

12Veganism from 1806May 25, 2011 (updated November 2011)This is a brief summary of a talk I gave at theInternational Vegan Festival in Malaga, Spain, June4-12, 2011, and at the Midlands Vegan Festival,Wolverhampton UK, October 29, 20111806 – Dr. William Lambe FRCP, in London, England,changed his diet at the age of 40 – and gave us anunambiguous statement: “My reason for objecting toevery species of matter to be used as food, exceptthe direct produce of the earth, is founded on thebroad ground that no other matter is suited to theorgans of man. This applies then with the sameforce to eggs, milk, cheese, and fish, as to fleshmeat.”1811 – John Frank Newton, a patient of Dr. Lambe,in his book 'Return to Nature' expanded Lambe’s medical ideasto include ethical values towards all animals.1813 – Percy Bysshe Shelley (right), poet,joined a ‘vegan commune’ which alternatedbetween Newton family homes in Londonand Bracknell.1830s – Sylvester Graham (left), inBoston USA, had been promoting the‘vegetable diet’ – generally ‘with orwithout’ eggs/dairy. In 1837 he exchanged letters with Dr. Lambe,and his 1839 book clearly claimed that‘without’ was more effective for health.1830s – Dr John Snow (right), was ‘vegan’ since readingNewton’s book when he was 17. Moved to London in 1838 andeventually achieved fame for discovering the way in cholera wasspread. In 2003 British doctors voted him the greatest physicianof all time.1838 – James Pierrepont Greaves opened‘Alcott House Academy’, a school nearLondon run entirely consistent with theideas proposed by Lambe and Newton. It ran for the next tenyears.1842, April – the first confirmed use of the word ‘vege

15 - Dr. William Lambe - father of vegan nutrition, and his vegan biographer 17 - Dr. Lambe's Rural Roots - his childhood and retirement in Herefordshire. 19 - John Frank Newton - and the 'vegan' commune of 1813 21 - Shelley - the first celebrity vegan 23 - Lewis Gompertz - Jewish 'vegan' and co-founder of the RSPCA in 1824