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The pastoralist whose diet is dependent on the milk products from the flock or
herd is perhaps the most precariously balanced exploiter of marginal areas, since
lactation is so dependent on adequate food and water supply. Left to its own
devices, it is likely that a human population density will be established which
reflects the carrying capacity of the land and the territory in which the shepherd or
cattle herder moves. There may be occasional short-term weather changes which
cause distress to a community, but in general these effects would be local, and can
be survived because the stocking rate would originally be well below the level
supportable within that area. Unfortunately it is only in more recent times that
western agencies have recognized the significance of the low stocking rates in
terms of a safety net, and that the placing of wells, and therefore water, into areas
that had previously been without, admittedly increases the carrying capacity of the
land, but only by making the fall-back area unavailable in bad times.
The actual process of removing milk from the animal changed little from
the earliest times until well into the twentieth century. Selective breeding has
greatly increased the yield from any one animal, but while farm labour
remained relatively cheap, there was little incentive to look for alternatives to
hand milking. Although some experiments on vacuum milking machines had
been carried out in Britain and America in the 1860s, it was not until
Murchland’s patent in 1889 that a practical machine was developed (Figure
16.5). However, the continuous pressure of this machine caused damage to the
sensitive udder tissues and it needed Dr Shield’s pulsating mechanism to
realize the full potential of the idea. Even then hand milking was a continued
practice in much of Europe until the middle of the present century.
The very perishable nature of milk limited the ways in which it could be
exploited in increasingly urban societies. Town dairies allowed a certain
volume to reach a broader market, and the farms on the edges of smaller
towns were able to supply them with fresh products. Processing into cheese or
butter increased the ability of the product to travel, but it was not until the

coming of the railways that the major markets could be reached. Not long
afterwards the development of refrigeration (see p. 796) again changed the
market structures dramatically, since now countries as far away as Australia
and New Zealand were able to supply Europe with the perishable dairy
products they were so well suited to produce. These changes in transport
provided the stimulus for the development of more sophisticated mechanical
means for milk separation and churning which were to occur in the late
nineteenth century. Improvements in road transport also extended the ability
of farmers to get liquid milk to the railway, or at least to a central collecting
point, and as this occurred so the production of butter and cheese on the farm
gave way to the factory-based system of today. These outside influences,
together with the increasing decline in labour willing to work long and often
antisocial hours, has in turn created an increasingly mechanized and
automated cowshed.
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The early milking machines consisted of a bucket attached to a pump
which created the vacuum in it. From the bucket ran a length of rubber
piping to which the ‘cluster’ was attached. This cluster consisted of four
carefully designed cups which acted to simulate the calf’s sucking action so as
to stimulate the lactating animal to release her milk. The vacuum is not
intended to actually suck the milk from the animal, but rather to carry the
milk away once it has been released. For the cowshed the vacuum is supplied
by a pipeline running along the shed in such a way that the bucket could be
connected at different points along its length. As each cow was milked the
bucket was carried to the dairy where the milk was cooled and placed in
churns ready for transport. In modern machines the cluster still exists, but
the milk now passes down pipelines directly to storage tanks where it is
cooled, and from which it is directly collected.
Milk in its liquid form is the most perishable of agricultural products, and for

any economy that is dependent on it for a large part of its diet, there must exist the
ability to process it into a storable form. There are many ways in which liquid milk
may be treated to prolong its usefulness. In 1862, Louis Pasteur, realizing that
bacteria were the causative agents in the spoiling of milk, demonstrated that if it
was heated to 70°C, the bacteria it contained would be killed, and the milk would
Figure 16.5: Murchland milking machine, 1889.
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therefore keep several days longer. Later developments of pasteurization were to
improve the fitness of liquid milk for human consumption, since heating was also
shown to destroy the bacteria responsible for tuberculosis and brucellosis. Both
diseases reduce the efficiency of cattle, but more significantly can also be
transmitted to humans by the consumption of milk.
By removing a large percentage of its water content, and therefore
increasing the relative proportions of fat, milk can be turned into butter, which
has slightly better keeping properties. Butter-making was a laborious and time-
consuming task, and offered plenty of scope for contamination. The first stage
of the process is to separate the fat content of the fresh milk from the heavier
water and other solids. To achieve this, milk is traditionally allowed to stand
for several hours in shallow bowls so that the cream will form on its surface.
The cream is then either skimmed off using special ladles, or else the heavier
liquid is drained off from below. It is then placed in a churn and agitated
continuously for a considerable period, during which time the fats will
coagulate into butter, and the liquid fraction, known as buttermilk, can be
drained off. The length of time required to achieve this result will again be
dependent on factors such as temperature.
Even before the manufacture moved from farmyard to factory, methods
were employed to mechanize the arduous work of churning and the horse
wheel, already in use in other contexts, was adopted on some larger farms.
However it was not until the 1870s that mechanical means were applied to the

cream separation process. The early work on these developments occurred in
Germany and Scandinavia and were quickly adopted in the major milk
producing areas of the world. The principle commonly applied was that of the
centrifuge. Milk placed in a fast-spinning chamber will separate in such a way
that the heavier solids pass into an outer chamber and are drained off, while
the lighter cream will be collected in the inner chamber. Not only is this
method much faster, and therefore removes the need to leave standing milk
open to contamination for long periods, but it also separates the milk more
efficiently, realizing a higher percentage of the cream contained within it.
Developed in Scandinavia, hand-powered or belt driven separators had
become standard features of larger farm dairies by the late 1880s. The de
Laval was exhibited at the Royal Show in England in 1879, and although there
were numerous others involved in the development, it is this name that is most
closely associated with early cream separators.
By a different process it is possible to make soft cheeses, and by applying
physical pressure to a particular type of soft cheese, so as to squeeze even more
water from it, it is possible to make the hard cheeses which can be stored for
appreciable periods.
When milk is allowed to stand and the cream content rises to the surface, a
slow fermentation will take place which will raise its acidity. If rennet is added
to the milk at the correct temperature and acidity, then a solid curd will be
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formed containing the fats, and from which will be expelled a large percentage
of water. The liquid fraction, known as the whey, is drained off, and the curd
will be cut to allow more water to drain from it. In each of the stages a slightly
different approach will alter the physical nature of the curd, and therefore its
final texture and flavour as a cheese.
In the final stages the curd will be milled into very fine pieces, before being
placed in a mould and then pressed under heavy weights for a number of days.

This will allow further water to be squeezed out, and will result in a firm or
hard cheese, depending on the accumulation of processes up to this point. Finally
the cheeses will be left under controlled conditions to mature, during which
time they will have to be frequently turned to ensure an even treatment
throughout their mass.
Each of the stages described is fraught with difficulties. Environmental
conditions such as temperature and humidity will affect the fermentation
process, and therefore the acidity of the curd. Bacterial action may be intended at
certain stages, and for particular cheeses, but the presence of the wrong strains of
bacteria, or the introduction of desirable bacteria at the wrong time, can have
disastrous consequences on the final results. The milking of animals in the open,
the use of wooden receptacles, and the difficulty of keeping animals or
equipment clean under such conditions, leave ample opportunity for
contamination to occur. The problem was often compounded by the fact that the
milk was left uncooled, thus allowing the bacterial population to multiply.
In Europe there is little evidence for the provision of buildings specifically
set aside for milk processing until the sixteenth century. Up until that time
both the processing and the maturing is likely to have been carried out within
the domestic or the livestock areas of the holding, with all the associated
problems of contamination that this implies. By the early nineteenth century
the need to sterilize equipment had been recognized, and although it may still
have been common practice to milk cows in the field until the latter half of that
century, the new farmsteads being created at this time would invariably be
equipped with a separate area for the stalling and milking of cows.
By the mid-1800s temperature control was also recognized to be an
advantage, and the realization brought about changes in dairy design to create
a cool environment in which to process and store the dairy products. In the
USA the availability of commercial ice was utilized to the same end, and by
1843 ice was being used to facilitate the transport of this perishable
commodity. The idea was quickly extended and by 1851 refrigerated rail cars

were being used to transport butter over great distances.
Because of the high risks of contamination, and also because of the bulky
and awkward nature of the raw material, the processing of milk has to be
carried out as quickly, and therefore as close to the lactating animal, as
possible. As transport systems have improved, and as the urban market has
increased in size, so the processing has moved further and further away from
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the farmstead. The availability of refrigeration to farm scale operations has
allowed the raw material to be cooled to a temperature at which chemical
changes are minimized, and this factor, linked to improvements in road and
rail transport, has made possible the centralization of processing into factories
that can take advantage of economies of scale. Essentially the principles of
butter- and cheese-making have not altered, but a better understanding of the
processes involved and an ability to control environmental factors between the
animal being milked and the shop counter has greatly reduced the risks, and
permitted the presentation of a consistent and high quality product.
POULTRY FARMING
Poultry are another species of great significance in the history of animal domestication,
although the most widely distributed representative, the domestic fowl, would appear
to have arrived rather late on the scene. Earliest evidence from the Indus valley can
be dated to about 2500 BC, although claims are made for an earlier Chinese origin.
It had reached the Middle East at least by the first millennium BC, and the
Mediterranean by the sixth century. The ancient Egyptians incubated poultry eggs
by placing them in dung heaps, where the heat would remain constant whatever the
outside temperature, a method recorded by the Roman writer Pliny, but beyond this
example it would appear that the rearing of chickens remained a natural process
until the nineteenth century. The constant temperature was the essential feature of
the dung heap, and until a device could be invented to control heat application, an
artificial means of incubating was not feasible. In 1883, Hearson invented a device

which made possible the thermostatic control of temperature, and with this it was
possible to regulate the temperature in a water jacket surrounding a container for the
eggs. While this might have greatly facilitated the incubation process, and in doing
so improved the percentage of chickens obtained from a batch of eggs, the poultry
industry continued to be based on free range, labour-intensive methods for both egg
and meat production. Although developments did occur earlier, it is only since the
Second World War that full automation has allowed the economies of scale that have
made poultry the cheapest meat available to the consumer. Egg production has been
mechanized in the same way, and although the economic benefits are obvious, the
poultry industry more than any other represents to a number of people a disquieting
attitude by western society to the welfare of farm animals.
FOOD PRESERVATION
Refrigeration
The storage of any food materials raises problems because it is food to much
else other than man. Animals, bacteria, fungi, insects and plants can all cause
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losses to stored material. As with much of human discovery, it is likely that
methods of storage were discovered by accident and exploited from necessity.
Thus it is possible to imagine a hunter in the Arctic regions being forced by
unfortunate circumstance to sample the meat from a frozen carcase discovered
by chance. It would not be such a major step to freeze meat deliberately in
times of abundance to avert a repetition of the incident. Evidence for the
intentional freezing of food in prehistoric times has been found in several
excavations in the Ukrainian Republic of the USSR. At a site near the town of
Mezhirich, in a habitation area dated to about 15,000 years ago, storage pits
cut into the permafrost have been excavated.
For affluent groups living outside these areas of permafrost, but aware of
such storage methods from trading contacts, the idea of moving ice to permit
long-term storage may not have been such an absurd idea. In more recent

times the distances involved may have been quite considerable. There is
certainly literary evidence in classical times of the use of snow and ice to
preserve food, and the practice was still to be found in the nineteenth century,
when ice houses were a feature of the wealthier estates. Ice was certainly used
in areas in which it was comparatively accessible or could be easily
transported. As early as the sixteenth century some of the coastal
Mediterranean towns could boast of a year-round supply of ice. By the 1660s
the first ice houses were being built in Britain and other areas with similar
supply problems. In America the potential market for ice was readily exploited
for both home and overseas sales. In 1833 a shipment of ice was successfully
transferred from Boston to Calcutta, and this was to be the start of a massive
trade. One company alone required storage facilities for nearly 20,500 tonnes
of ice. Ice-making machines were to appear by the middle of the nineteenth
century, but the trade in ice continued well beyond this time.
The invention of refrigeration brought the concept into practical application
and was to have far reaching effects not only on the diets of the western world,
but also on their agricultural economies. In 1875 a small quantity of chilled
beef was successfully transported from New York to Britain. Two years later
the SS Paraguay sailed from Buenos Aires bound for France with a consignment
of frozen meat. The success of this voyage led to a flood of meat from North
America, over 32,600 tonnes being transferred in 1880 alone. Australian
exports began the same year, though the response to the idea was much more
slowly taken up, only 400 carcases of mutton and some 51 tonnes of beef
reaching the UK in that year. Initially natural ice refrigeration was used, but in
1879 the first refrigeration machine was fitted into a ship, and by 1891 this had
become the normal method used. The labour-extensive range farming possible
in these new territories allowed frozen products to be sold in Britain at a price
below that achievable by the home producers. This factor, together with the
development of steamships, which made possible the swift transfer of grain
from the prairies of America to the mills of Europe, was to have a devastating

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effect on British agriculture in particular. Recovery did not occur until the First
World War, when this trade was hindered by submarine blockade.
Once frozen, most products can be stored for appreciable periods, but the
early freezing procedures were slow, and the volume that could be handled
therefore limited. In 1924, Clarence Birdseye developed a method for quick
freezing which allowed for greater volumes of produce to be handled speedily.
Although he sold his company within a few years, the name was retained and
became for a time synonymous with the idea of convenience food. In 1930
frozen peas were first introduced, and in America it was possible to buy
precooked frozen foods as early as 1939.
Canning
Australia and America both raised huge herds of cattle and sheep, and
refrigeration was not the only attempted solution to the lack of a home market.
In 1809 the Frenchman Nicolas Appert invented a method for the long-term
storage of perishable foods, whereby the foods were sterilized by boiling and
then sealed into glass jars. An English merchant developed the idea by using
metal containers, and in 1811 the first canning factory was established in
Britain. The Australians began to export canned meat in 1847, selling mostly
to the British Admiralty. The armed forces of various countries seem to have
been the major market for these early products, but by 1867 the Australian
shipments were available for general sale in Europe, and by 1871, South
American producers were also contributing to these supplies.
Salting
Salting was also an important method of meat preservation, and although its
use continues to the present day, in the West it is most usually found as a
means of producing a distinctive type of meat, such as bacon or ham, rather
than purely as a means of achieving long-term storage. The hieroglyphic sign
for salt does not appear in the early scripts of the Middle East, and its use is

therefore likely to have developed later. Its importance is reflected in the word
‘salary’ which derives from the Roman word for salt. People do exist whose
diet is totally devoid of added salt, but it is unusual, particularly if the food
preparation involves any degree of boiling. As a preserving agent it had great
economic importance, and was used extensively before it was superseded by
refrigeration. Initially the latter increased rather than decreased the volume of
meat being salted, since the optimum temperatures for the process precluded
summer curing. With the advent of refrigeration machinery it became a year-
round occupation.
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Margarine
Long-term storage of food has become a major stage in the journey from the
farm gate to the table and chemical rather than biological processes have
become increasingly important. The production and sale of margarine is an
example of this trend. In 1869 the French chemist Mège-Mouriez patented a
process which he had devised to utilize the hard suet fat from cattle, by
processing it and adding to it other animal wastes to produce a soft butter
substitute. It was sometimes blended with butter, but increasingly vegetable oils
were used to alter the taste and texture of the product. In 1923 the first
margarine made purely from vegetable oils was put on the market by Van den
Bergh & Jurgens. Present-day anxieties over animal fats have benefited the sales
potential of a product which met with considerable market resistance in its
early development.
Cereal storage
Plant products are also susceptible to damage, and even cereal grain, which
gives such an appearance of long-term stability, can be very easily spoilt. It also
provides appetizing food to rats, mice and many other lesser pests. In
prehistory there is strong evidence for the storage of grain in pits in the
ground. These are to be found in widely varying geographical situations, and

the distribution of their use indicates that the idea was independently
discovered by several totally separate communities. It is essential that the
ground is well drained and that there is a low water table. The pits may be
lined, though this is not always the case, and once filled they are sealed with a
plug of clay. The seeds in contact with the moist walls will germinate, and may
begin to rot, but both processes use up oxygen and give off carbon dioxide:
this breakdown continues until the carbon dioxide concentration reaches such
a level that it kills off the bacteria, and any other pest which might be
contained in the pit. The contents of the pit will then remain in extremely good
condition until such time as the seal is broken. Recent experiments have shown
that corn stored in this way will be of sufficiently good quality for human
consumption, and also that a very large percentage of the seed will
subsequently germinate, and the method is therefore of value in the storage of
seed corn from one year to the next.
During the Roman period in Europe, and even earlier in China, purpose
designed buildings were being used for the storage of very large quantities of
grain. As early as 700 BC grain storage organized by the state was being
carried out in China. The motives behind the action were obviously to store in
good times the food that would be required in bad; the incentive was as much
political as humanitarian, since the idea was to stabilize prices, and therefore to
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ease public unrest. The effective running of the concept required strong
political control, and it is perhaps significant that it was not until about AD
600 that a successful scheme was brought into being, and then run for an
extended period. Biblical and other sources attest to the recognized need to
store grain against bad times, and the efficient and powerful state system that
was required to put such ambitious policies into practice. To work properly,
and to ensure that the system was not abused by those charged with its
administration, there was the need for rigorous book-keeping, and this in itself

may have been the stimulus for several societies to develop their own scripts,
and ultimately to establish the written word as a means of communication.
The storage of grain above ground leaves it highly exposed to wastage from
birds and rodents and was the cause of huge losses in antiquity, as it continues
to be today. To an extent building design can limit these losses, but it can do
little to diminish comparable losses from insect and fungal attack. Perhaps one
of the most urgent problems still to be resolved in Africa is not just the
production of food, but also its safe storage. European mediaeval records give
a consistently and depressingly low return on yields, suggesting figures for seed
harvested which are as low as only three or four times the volume sown, but it
is more likely that the amount is in fact the quantity used, and the low figures
therefore reflect not only poor yields, but also losses subsequent to harvest. In
contrast the Chinese literature of the same period, and even records as early as
200 BC, make claims to a thirty-fold return on grain sown. In part this will
reflect the higher yields possible because of very high labour input, but it is
probably no coincidence that insecticide treatment, of both seed corn and corn
stored for subsequent consumption, is a subject considered by the Chinese
chronicler but not the European counterpart.
In order for cereals to store well it is essential that the moisture content in
the grain should be below 12 per cent of total weight. This was originally
achieved by harvesting and drying the grain in stocks in the field, a method
which was simple and efficient in the right climate or season, but prone to
disaster when conditions were less favourable. Corn drying could be achieved
by spreading the grain in the sun, or artificially in specially designed buildings,
as was sometimes practised by the Romans. Up to the twentieth century these
methods were all that was available to the farmer, and the population as a
whole lived with the spectre of lean times which could be inflicted by the
vagaries of climate. The arrival of the combine harvester, particularly in the
European context, made an artificial means of drying an essential process of
harvest. Efficient drying systems, linked to the capabilities of the modern

harvester, have allowed the recovery of crops in conditions which would have
been the cause of major shortages before the war. This capacity, together with
improvements in genetic and chemical technologies of crop growth, has
allowed western agriculture to claim the ability to feed itself and provide a
reserve for poor years.
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Sugar
The use of sugar as a preserving agent has a wide and long history, and can be
applied directly as in jams and preserves, or used as a base for fermentation
processes which will produce alcohol, itself a useful preservative. Sugar can be
derived from a whole range of plants, but in its commercial form was initially
obtained from sugar cane. Grown in India as early as 1000 BC, its cultivation
was taken westwards by the Arabs. It was introduced into southern Europe in
the eighth century AD, and first introduced into the New World in 1493 when
Christopher Columbus took cane to the West Indies. This area became the
major world producer, being able to compete successfully against others because
the labour required for its production was supplied by slaves from West Africa
and elsewhere. In the 1740s the German chemist Andreas Marggraf developed a
method for the extraction of sugar from sugar beet, and although the effect was
far from immediate, the process was eventually to make Europe a major sugar
producer, with profound consequences to the Caribbean economy.
Alcohol is a product of the fermentation of the natural sugars that are to be
found in plant materials. As such it is likely that it was encountered
accidentally by prehistoric man who, attracted by its flavour and effect, later
developed its use in the production of a range of beverages. Grapes, cereals
and many other plants have been utilized to produce alcoholic drinks, the
strengths of which would depend on the method of production. Although
distillation may have occurred accidentally because of the kind of receptacle
used in some other process, it is unlikely that it was knowingly and

deliberately carried out until well into the historical period.
Whatever the motives for producing alcoholic beverages, the end result was
not only palatable, but it stored extremely well and could also be nutritious.
William Cobbett, writing in nineteenth-century Britain, condemned the
introduction of tea, since it replaced beer in the diet of the labourer, and
therefore deprived those who could least afford it of the nutritious benefit of
that beverage. Others would have viewed alcohol less charitably, but its
production in its many forms has occupied considerable acreages, and been of
concern to farmer and brewer for thousands of years. More recent
developments have seen the potential of an industry producting fuel alcohol
from agriculturally produced raw materials in the attempt to replace expensive
or diminishing supplies of oil. It is likely that agriculture will be increasingly
seen as a source of industrial raw materials.
CONCLUSION
The term ‘revolution’ has been applied to three separate transition points in
agricultural history. The change from a hunter gatherer economy to one based