Le porc normand

[Duncan Head]

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/jul/06/the-1066-diet-normans-passed-on-their-love-of-pork-study-suggests

[Jim Webster]

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/jul/06/the-1066-diet-normans-passed-on-their-love-of-pork-study-suggests

The problem with this is "The research team used a range of bio-archaeological techniques to study human and animal bones recovered from sites across Oxford, along with fragments of ceramics used for cooking."

We've seen with the Romans how the proportion of various meat in the diet often varied with geography. From memory, Beef was more important on Hadrian's Wall, pork in cities.
I can well see that Oxford, not what you'd call the heart of a pastoral area, might see a shift from beef and lamb to Pork, if only because their lines of communication with the more pastoral areas were cut. It might actually be because more of the inhabitants were 'Normans' (after all they included the castle) so fetched their tastes with them
It might even be a sign of increased urbanisation within the area leading to an intensification of cereal agriculture and loss of woodland for pigs.

I'd like a more broadly based study 

[Erpingham]

I'd like a more broadly based study 

Likewise.  A limited number of sites and a small sample.  Really need to sample a few sites across the country to see if there is a pattern across the country before making sweeping statements.

[aligern]

Oxford itself might not be in a pastoral area, but it is not far from the Berkshire downs and what was certainly in medieval tines, a droving route from Wales  to London.  The advantage of cattle and sheep being that  they can walk and feed themselves as they go.  I presume pigs don't march?
Roy

[Jim Webster]

Oxford itself might not be in a pastoral area, but it is not far from the Berkshire downs and what was certainly in medieval tines, a droving route from Wales  to London.  The advantage of cattle and sheep being that  they can walk and feed themselves as they go.  I presume pigs don't march?
Roy

I've never tried to move them any distance but they're sods to handle.

you use boards to move them, here's a video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeJgo8LbZIs

[Imperial Dave]

as stated above, a much more extensive study would need to be performed before coming to conclusions...I suspect in the west and north it would be different

[RichT]

Boars Hill where I live, just outside Oxford, is clearly named for its plentiful pigs (not, as the wrong headed claim, for the bores who live here). "The earliest known record of Boars Hill (or Boreshill) is from the 12th century" says Wikipedia, thus conclusively proving the Normans-pigs link. Case closed.

[Erpingham]

Boars were different.  Medieval boars were monsters which terrorised the country until a hero could be found to defeat them, thus winning "the prize" (whatever that was).  A more homely version of wyrm-slaying.  Bradford has a nice medieval boar slaying legend.

[RichT]

A local story has it that an Oxford scholar was once walking on Boars Hill reading his Thucydides, when he was charged by a boar. With admirable calmness he shoved the book in the boar's open jaws and it choked to death. Hence the name.

Nope, Normans and their pigs, definitely.

[Imperial Dave]

Plenty of boars in Wales pre Norman and his knights

[Nick Harbud]

Oxford itself might not be in a pastoral area, but it is not far from the Berkshire downs and what was certainly in medieval tines, a droving route from Wales  to London.  The advantage of cattle and sheep being that  they can walk and feed themselves as they go.  I presume pigs don't march?
Roy

I've never tried to move them any distance but they're sods to handle.

you use boards to move them, here's a video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeJgo8LbZIs

Clearly you never put your pigs out on a lead when you go truffle hunting...

[Jim Webster]

Oxford itself might not be in a pastoral area, but it is not far from the Berkshire downs and what was certainly in medieval tines, a droving route from Wales  to London.  The advantage of cattle and sheep being that  they can walk and feed themselves as they go.  I presume pigs don't march?
Roy

I've never tried to move them any distance but they're sods to handle.

you use boards to move them, here's a video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeJgo8LbZIs

Clearly you never put your pigs out on a lead when you go truffle hunting...

That's the difference between one trained animal and the herd 

[Chuck the Grey]

A local story has it that an Oxford scholar was once walking on Boars Hill reading his Thucydides, when he was charged by a boar. With admirable calmness he shoved the book in the boar's open jaws and it choked to death. Hence the name.

Nope, Normans and their pigs, definitely.

That's a creative use of Thucydides to win an argument.

[Jim Webster]

A local story has it that an Oxford scholar was once walking on Boars Hill reading his Thucydides, when he was charged by a boar. With admirable calmness he shoved the book in the boar's open jaws and it choked to death. Hence the name.

Nope, Normans and their pigs, definitely.

That's a creative use of Thucydides to win an argument.

To be fair, even a paperback copy of Thucydides is thick enough to choke a boar 

[Imperial Dave]

I quite like Thucydides