Experience and Science: A Brief History of Food Safety. The Role of Empirical Knowledge in the Development of Food Safety Part I: Prehistory and Antiquity

Abstract

How did our ancestors know not to eat raw pork? Why have the Japanese been wary of eating fugu fish for centuries? Why are certain plants, such as yew berries, prevented from being eaten by both children and horses? How did the Ancient Greeks know that they were deliberately poisoning the fruit of the hemlock tree, for example by executing Socrates? Epidemic diseases caused by mouldy cereals have been a part of history for centuries. They are and have been frequently caused by mycotoxins produced by cereal fungi. Why was it only at the end of the 20th century that the continued presence of mycotoxins was discovered? Fire, the most important food safety discovery of prehistory? It is safe to say yes! The prehistoric heat treatment of foods, especially meat, as a result of increased protein consumption also fundamentally changed the pace of human evolution. The knowledge gained through observation played a decisive role in enabling mankind to avoid death by poisonous plants and other toxins, pathogenic bacteria, and viruses, which caused fatal diseases, before the development of scientific methods and tools. Empirical knowledge has played an enormous role in the development of food safety. In the course of human evolution, empirical observations first and then conscious, experiment-based findings have provided the basis for the establishment of food safety rules. However, empirical knowledge, supported by targeted scientific experiments, is still of great importance today.