Cow (Animal)
Hannah Velten
Language: English
Pages: 127
ISBN: B01MXJWJJG
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
From the milk we drink in the morning, to the leather shoes we slip on for the day, to the steak we savor at dinner, our daily lives are thoroughly bound up with cows. Yet there is a far more complex story behind this seemingly benign creature, which Hannah Velten explores here, plumbing the rich trove of myth, fact, and legend surrounding these familar animals.
From the plowing field to the rodeo to the temple, Velten tracks the constantly changing social relationship between man and cattle, beginning with the domestication of aurochs around 9000 BCE. From there, Cow launches into a fascinating story of religious fanaticism, scientific exploits, and the economic transformations engendered by the trade of the numerous products derived from the animal. She explores in engaging detail how despite cattle's prominence at two ends of a wide spectrum: Hinduism venerates the cow as one of the most sacred members of the animal kingdom, while beef is a prized staple of the American diet. Thought provoking and informative, Cow restores this oft-overlooked animal to the nobility it richly deserves.
weight of 500–600 kg are carefully reared for four years on ranches (ganaderias): they are deliberately bred to kill or be killed. And although it is a pedigree animal, it will only ever be in the arena once. Spectators, rather than seeing an individual animal, only remember a good, bad or indifferent type of bull – unless, of course, it manages to kill a matador: then it becomes famous.38 The popular image of the dangerous bull, with its head lowered, pawing the ground before attacking is a
heifer for preaching Christianity. The story goes that she was tossed by the heifer, but got up and helped her slave, Felicitas, who was also in the arena. Perpetua killed herself with a gladiator’s sword, rather than being despatched unwillingly. Another breed of naturally aggressive cow is the Herens breed (sometimes known as the Eringer breed), which come from the Swiss Canton of Valais. They instinctively engage in duels to determine the hierarchy for leading the herd to its Alpine summer
ox, with all the strength of the bull, but with a docile temperament, could be trained to pull the plough and also ox-carts, which made transportation of bulky goods easier and quicker. Although there is plenty of pictorial evidence for the use of oxen, there is little written evidence to explain how the oxen were trained to the yoke. The early Greek poet Hesiod (c. 700 BC) writes in his poem Works and Days that acquiring oxen is the first job for a young farmer, but there is no mention of their
like to like, and make them walk in pairs. First let them practise pulling unloaded wagons, Their light tread scarcely marking the dusty ground, Then weigh the beechen axle till it creaks and strains As they haul the bronze shaft and the wheels ride forward. You may feed them on grass and the willow’s slender leaves And marshy sedge, but while they are still unbroken Gather corn in the blade for them.5 Reatinus Varro adds that if buying-in cattle they should be unbroken, aged between
Piece of Roast-Beef on Sundays, of which they stuff till they can swallow no more, and eat the rest cold, without any other Victuals, the other six Days of the Week.1 To meet the demand for beef, particularly in London which experienced expotential population growth during the 1700s, drovers brought large herds of Scottish and Welsh cattle and cattle from northern England southwards on foot. These cattle, having lost weight on the journey, would need to be fattened up by farmers in the Midlands,