Fróðskaparrit

						KANNUBJØLLUVISA TIL MATNA

51

mussen (1946: 14) mentioned the tubers

among the edible native plants. He tells us

how in older times, when Faroese men

where spade cultivating, they often un-

earthed tubers. The tubers were as big as

peas, sweet and always eaten on the spot.

Skylv Hansen (1967: 95) made the interest-

ing observation that the tubers were eaten

mainly by children. The older sources nev-

er mentions that. Landt specifícally talks

about the »inhabitants« and Rasmussen

about the »men« who where working the

fields.

E. arvense as a food plant is also de-

scribed from other Scandinavian countries.

The Faroese-born botanist Nicolai Mohr

(1786), writes from Iceland that the tubers

were called surtar-eple (apples) by the Ice-

landers, and according to him they tasted

very good. Finsterwalder (1865: 348) has

also recorded goubitill, gvondarber,

sultarepli from Iceland, and he is obvious-

ly referring to the tubers. According to

Olafsen (1772: 434) the roots had a sweet

taste.

The Norwegian author Wille (1786: 111)

mentions in his description of Sillefjord

that the stems of E. arvense were eaten dur-

ing the spring and the tubers were dried and

ground into flour. He appears to refer to E.

arvense as a food plant consumed by the

whole population. According to more re-

cent information recorded in Norway, E.

arvense has been eaten mainly by children

and the practice seem to have been restric-

ted to Trøndelag and Setesdal. Evidences of

its use are few from outside these regions

(Høeg, 1974: 342-343). As in the Faroe Is-

lands, the Norwegian children ate the tu-

bers, called jordnøtter (ground nuts) or

steinbær (stone berries), which were found

while tilling the soil during springtime. Ac-

cording to Norwegian informants they tast-

ed like hazelnuts. Also the spikes were eat-

en, sometimes fried in butter.

Our ethnobotanical information from

Denmark and Sweden are scarce on reports

of using field horsetail as food. Brønde-

gaard (1978: 50) does not give any evi-

dence from Denmark though, other than the

Faroese case. However, the fresh green

shots of both E. arvense and E. pratense

have been eaten in Sweden during spring-

time. As in Norway, it seems to have been

the children who ate them. The records

originate from the descendants of the

Finnish-speaking people in Vármland, cen-

tral Sweden (Keyland, 1919: 55, 61, 121). I

have not been able to trace any further evi-

dence in the recorded material of folk tradi-

tions from the middle and northern Swe-

den. However, in a modern handbook of na-

tive edible plants, Ingmansson (1996: 248-

249) recommend fresh shots of E. arvense

in salads and the yellow spikes boiled as as-

paragus.

In northern Central Europe we have evi-

dence from 19th century Prussia that peas-

ant children use to eat the tubers, called

Erdnusse (ground nuts) by the locals (Trei-

chel, 1894: 318-319). In the days of Pietro

Andrea Matthioli, i e. mid-16th century, the

fresh spring shoots were eaten in northern

Italy fried in oil (Lieutaghi, 1996: 369).

Equisetum arvense has been utilized as a

food plant also further eastwards. The en-

tire straws were eaten raw or boiled during

the spring season by poor people in Russia