Subject: Re: Eskimo Diet

From: [email-masked] (Henry Troup)
Date: 11 Jan 1995 20:58:01 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, J Waldrup <[email-masked]> wrote:
>	I have heard that the Eskimo diet has historically consisted of 
>nearly 100% meat.  To me, it seems as this would be nutritionally very 
>poor.  If anyone out there has information about the historic Eskimo 
>diet, I would be very interested in learning how a population could 
>survive on meat alone.

Much the same is true for some Bronze Age cultures. Meat will provide
all the vitamins and minerals needed -- as long as you eat it raw!

This exposes you to several problems: 
- gout from serious excess protein
- parasites

"Labrador tea", a herb, was made into a tea for its diuretic effect,
helping to deal with gout from too much protein. With trade with 
Europeans, Indian tea replaced this, apparently because it tastes
much better. The average Inuit or Innu (what they call themselves)
uses several kilograms of tea a year.

Parasites you just live with.

Eskimo, btw, is someone else's word - it means "Eaters of raw meat".

-- 
  Henry Troup - [email-masked] (Canada) - BNR owns but does not share my opinions
     "Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love."

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From: [email-masked] (Par Leijonhufvud labtek)
Date: Thu, 12 Jan 1995 17:40:08 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, J Waldrup <[email-masked]> wrote:
>	Thanks in advance!
>				Joni Waldrup
>				[email-masked]
In many cases (I don´t know anything specific about Inuit diet except what 
Viljamur Stefanson wrote in his books) "100% percent carnivores" also eat 
the stomach contents of herbivores; which contains - surprise! - veggies. 
A diet of actually just meat would be questionable, but might work. 
Viljamur Stefanson once reportedly tried it for one year when living in 
New York, with no ill effects.

/P{r Leijonhufvud
[email-masked]

-- 
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Name:   Paer K.G. Leijonhufvud          Oh, *practice*. I don´t mind 
Email:  [email-masked]   *practising*. So long as we
Voice:  +46-(0)8-758 8459               don´t have to do it for real...

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From: [email-masked] (J Waldrup)
Date: 11 Jan 1995 11:16:46 -0700

Thanks in advance!

				Joni Waldrup
				[email-masked]

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From: [email-masked] (Bill Stuart)
Date: Fri, 13 Jan 1995 04:05:30 GMT

> diet, I would be very interested in learning how a population could 

	There is not, and has never been, any class or race of people
called "Eskimo". 
	
--
"To do nothing is as fatal as to do evil, but it is more cowardly. The
most unpardonable of mortal sins is inertia." -Eliphas Levi
"A chain of iron is easier to break than a chain of flowers"-Eliphas Levi

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From: [email-masked] (Bill Stuart)
Date: Fri, 13 Jan 1995 04:11:30 GMT

The INUIT diet (Inuit are people who live in Canada's northern
coast, they are the people usually called eskimo) is mostly animals.
	They do eat a diet of 100 percent animals. Most plants die above
the arctic circle and they are restricted to fish and animals. There are
some plants that grow above the arctic circle, but trees aren't too
appetizing :)
	Before anyone asks what they cook with, it's animal fat. Their
bodies are extremely well adapted to this diet of flesh-only. 
	The inuit mythology is full of hunting stories and survival tales,
"Paper stays put" is a fairly good book on the subject.

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From: [email-masked] (Nick Maclaren)
Date: 12 Jan 1995 10:39:06 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] (Henry Troup) writes:
|> In article <[email-masked]>, J Waldrup <[email-masked]> wrote:
|> >	I have heard that the Eskimo diet has historically consisted of 
|> >nearly 100% meat.  To me, it seems as this would be nutritionally very 
|> >poor.  If anyone out there has information about the historic Eskimo 
|> >diet, I would be very interested in learning how a population could 
|> >survive on meat alone.
|> 
|> Much the same is true for some Bronze Age cultures. Meat will provide
|> all the vitamins and minerals needed -- as long as you eat it raw!
|> 
|> This exposes you to several problems: 
|> - gout from serious excess protein
|> - parasites

Plus diverticulisis etc., from lack of roughage.  This leads to an
interesting pre-historical food question:

Domesticated guinea pigs apparently have shorter guts than their
wild ancestors, because of adaptation to a lower (but still high)
fibre diet.  This has clearly occurred within the past few thousand
generations (i.e. 3-20,000).

Has the same happened to humans?  Is the earliest corpse with
internal organs more-or-less intact old enough to help with this?
I think that the answer to the latter is "no".

Nick Maclaren,
University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory,
New Museums Site, Pembroke Street, Cambridge CB2 3QG, England.
Email:  [email-masked]
Tel.:  +44 1223 334761    Fax:  +44 1223 334679

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From: [email-masked] (Leah C Jolovich)
Date: 13 Jan 1995 16:52:57 GMT

J. Kline ([email-masked]) wrote:
: During the winter their diet was mainly animal products, but not just "meat"-- 
: also the liver, heart, brains, marrow, etc. that provided nourishment.  A diet 
: of only meat-- e.g. porterhouse steak-- will kill you eventually.  In order to 
: obtain certain essential fatty acids we must eat plants or insects, or eat 
: other animals that have eaten plants or insects.  At any rate it is on record 
: that they suffered from metabolic disorders, e.g. Arctic hysteria (pibloktok) 
: which results from a calcium deficiency.

Organ meats are still meat...

: How does protein cause gout, and how does a diuretic solve the problem?  
: Perhaps the herb provided certain metabolic products that the body needs-- 
: especially the caffiene!  I don't understand how increased urination is 
: related to the escape of hydrolytic enzymes from lysosomes.  

Contrary to what some coffee drinkers would like to believe, the body 
does not need caffine. Yes, there are those who over a period of usage 
become addicted to it, but that can be taken care of by just stopping 
intake.

Leah Jolovich
[email-masked]

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From: [email-masked] (Daniel E. Platt)
Date: 13 Jan 1995 22:10:59 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] (Leah C Jolovich) writes:
|> J. Kline ([email-masked]) wrote:
|> 
|> Organ meats are still meat...
|> 
|> : How does protein cause gout, and how does a diuretic solve the problem?  
|> : Perhaps the herb provided certain metabolic products that the body needs-- 
|> : especially the caffiene!  I don't understand how increased urination is 
|> : related to the escape of hydrolytic enzymes from lysosomes.  
|> 
|> Contrary to what some coffee drinkers would like to believe, the body 
|> does not need caffine. Yes, there are those who over a period of usage 
|> become addicted to it, but that can be taken care of by just stopping 
|> intake.

The reason proteins cause gout is as follows.  

An amino acid looks like:

  NH2 -- CH -- COOH                    NH3+ -- CH -- COO-
          |               <--------->           |
          R                                     R

The COO- can bond to a neighboring NH3+ and form a chain.  The 'R' can
be any of a number of molecule segments (each one making an amino acid).
The chains of amino acids (peptides) is a protein.

Now, when you pull apart a protein, the NH3 has to go somewhere.  This
tends to be recycled, but some of it comes out as uric acid via
Kreb's urea cycle.  Further, purine rings tend to have nitrogens in them.
These too degrade to produce uric acid.  Uric acid is not soluble, which
tends to make it easy to excrete.  (Mammals have a harder time than birds.)
However, if it isn't getting excreted, it builds up in body fluids, showing up 
in synovial fluids in joints, and crystalizing as sodium urate causing joint 
damage.  There are a number of ways that uric acid buildup can occur, all 
of them are called gout.

However, it is most often associated with purine rings, which people get
>from  liver, pancreas (sweatbreads), anchovies, and wine (the yeast),
and had come to be associated with an excess of high living from such rich
foods.

Dan
-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Daniel E. Platt                                      [email-masked]
The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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From: [email-masked] (Rich Young)
Date: 14 Jan 1995 11:31:51 -0500

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Jayasinghe Karunaratne) writes:
>In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (J Waldrup) writes:
>I thought they used to eat mostly fish and not meat and they also consumed
>to a lesser extent various types of sea weed. Do correct me if I am
>wrong. Thanks.

[set LURKMODE false]

	There is an excellent article in the December 1994 issue of _Health_
	magazine about the "natural" diet of the Inuit people, including an
	impromptu analysis of the source of several vitamins.  Recommended
	reading for anyone interested in the subject.

[set LURKMODE true]

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>|<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Rich Young                             | Phone: (716) 781-5160
Johnson & Johnson Clinical Diagnostics | FAX:   (716) 781-5161
100 Indigo Creek Drive                 | Internet: [email-masked]
Rochester, New York, USA   14650-0890  |           [email-masked]
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>|<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

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From: J. Kline <[email-masked]>
Date: 12 Jan 1995 19:23:36 GMT

In note <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] (Henry Troup) writes: 
>In article <[email-masked]>, J Waldrup <[email-masked]> 
>>wrote:	I have heard that the Eskimo diet has historically consisted of 
Eskimos or whatever you want to call the arctic aborig's had a quite diverse 
diet.  In the summer they ate berries, roots, birds, wolverines, etc. etc. 
etc.  They would dry the berries and also bury them in snow and ice in order 
to preserve them so they could be eaten in the winter.  
During the winter their diet was mainly animal products, but not just "meat"-- 
also the liver, heart, brains, marrow, etc. that provided nourishment.  A diet 
of only meat-- e.g. porterhouse steak-- will kill you eventually.  In order to 
obtain certain essential fatty acids we must eat plants or insects, or eat 
other animals that have eaten plants or insects.  At any rate it is on record 
that they suffered from metabolic disorders, e.g. Arctic hysteria (pibloktok) 
which results from a calcium deficiency.

>uses several kilograms of tea a year.

How does protein cause gout, and how does a diuretic solve the problem?  
Perhaps the herb provided certain metabolic products that the body needs-- 
especially the caffiene!  I don't understand how increased urination is 
related to the escape of hydrolytic enzymes from lysosomes.

---

From: [email-masked] (Roots)
Date: Thu, 12 Jan 1995 14:04:36

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Henry Troup) writes:
>From: [email-masked] (Henry Troup)
>Subject: Re: Eskimo Diet
>Date: 11 Jan 1995 20:58:01 GMT

>Eskimo, btw, is someone else's word - it means "Eaters of raw meat".

FYI  I believe the preferred term is Inuit (meaning the people)   The singular 
is Inuk.

.

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From: [email-masked] (Jayasinghe Karunaratne)
Date: 14 Jan 1995 01:43:14 GMT

karu

-- 
J. A. Karunaratne
Department of Economic Geography, University of Vaasa,
P.O. Box 700, FIN-65101 Vaasa, FINLAND, Tel:+358 61 385 0727, 
Fax : +358 61 385 2227

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From: [email-masked] (Patricia Reynolds)
Date: Mon, 16 Jan 1995 00:09:37 +0000

Hugh Brody's _Living Artic: Hunters of the Canadian North_
(London: Faber and Faber in collaboration with the British
Museum and Indigeneous Survival International, 1987) has
lots on the diet of the Inuit, today and in the past.

Chapter 4, 'Meat', notes warble-fly larvae, berries, flowers, 
wild parsnip, rhododendron leaves, etc. as non-meat elements
in the traditional diet. 

> some plants that grow above the arctic circle, but trees aren't too
I have tried birch-bark tea, and it isn't as bad as camomile.  (The birch
grows further north than any other.  It grows so dwarfed, it lookes like
a bush.)

"I would like to say a few words about this land.  The only food
I like is meat." (Salluviniq Boy, Resulute Bay, quoted in Brody)
-- 
Patricia Reynolds
[email-masked]