The rich used saffron as a disinfectant, scattering it on floors and sprinkling it in fires. Known as “red gold” in Britain, it was thought to ward off the plague, as well as adding flavour and a golden hue to food. All across medieval Europe, it was revered by aristocrats and royalty alike.
Now academics have delved into accounts of Cambridge colleges from the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries and unearthed evidence of the vast quantities of saffron consumed by medieval intellectuals in the city as a way of enjoying – and showing off – their wealth and elite status.
Saffron was so highly valued by masters of Cambridge colleges that local smallholders on land let by the colleges would pay their rent in tiny amounts of the spice, the academics discovered. Before that, to ensure they never ran out, colleges such as Peterhouse, King’s, Pembroke, Queens’ and Jesus even cultivated it in their own college gardens, the research reveals.
“Saffron was an essential part of the life of the college,” said Kasia Boddy, professor of American literature at the University of Cambridge. “They cooked with it, used it for medicinal purposes and sometimes they would settle their own bills with it. For example, Peterhouse would pay Pembroke with saffron. It actually functioned as a currency.”
At some colleges, such as King’s, it was consumed weekly, despite being a luxury only the elite could afford. “Saffron was so rare that to see it appearing weekly in these books, I got a sense they were being quite opulent and ostentatious,” said Dr Alice Wickenden of Durham University, who carried out the research with Boddy. “It’s easy to imagine it was partly an exercise in showing off wealth.”
She thinks the huge demand for saffron from colleges in Cambridge had a “substantial” impact on the local market, where saffron crocuses came to be seen as a highly profitable “cash crop” from the late 14th century onwards.
“Local smallholders stopped being just subsistence farmers who were growing crops to feed themselves and their families,” said Boddy. “Now there was this cash crop you could make some extra money on.” Along with Wickenden and Dr Bonnie Lander-Johnson, she will give a talk on Wednesday about the new research at the Cambridge Festival.
The chalky soil of south Cambridgeshire and Essex proved well-suited for growing saffron, and soon a major site of saffron production was established just 14 miles away from Cambridge in Chepyng Walden. The town was later renamed Saffron Walden by Henry VIII.
“We discovered in the archives that pretty much all the villages between Cambridge and Saffron Walden were also growing saffron, albeit on a smaller scale,” said Boddy, adding that while saffron was also sent to London or traded abroad, “the local market was very much around the colleges”.
One of the reasons saffron was so expensive in the Middle Ages – and remains so today – is because harvesting it is very labour intensive: “People would get up at dawn and work until late at night, with a very strong beer brewed expressly for that purpose,” Wickenden said.
The bottom fell out of the English market in the 17th century, partly due to the rise of puritanism during the English civil war and the changing habits of the elite. “Everything had to stop being gilded,” said Boddy. “You stopped having your porridge with saffron, you wore plain clothes and you had plain food.”
