The North Atlantic Fisheries, 1100-1976 - University of Hull

eating of fish at stipulated times were given up. When fasting regulations
were abolished, the wealthy turned to a meat diet even on traditional ‘fish
days’. This is a general factor which helps to explain the development of
North Atlantic fisheries. Of course, demand remained for the provision
of cheap protein for the labouring poor, especially the expanding
numbers of seafarers who needed nutritious and well-preserved food for
long voyages, but the demand for well-preserved, high-quality fish
contracted. Unfortunately, very little work has been done on Danish food
consumption patterns; the indication is, however, that the change in diet
did not follow immediately upon the reformation but rather occurred
during the first half of the seventeenth century. 338
The fact that Danish fisheries crumbled while the Dutch succeeded
reminds us that the Danes concentrated on inshore, lightly salted
products (and in the case of the Sound for the top end of the market),
while the Dutch went deep-sea for large quantities of heavily-salted fish.
The superiority of the Dutch made them corner the remaining up-market
in good-quality herring. The result of Dutch dominance was the
abandonment of the Danish-Norwegian coasts by people in their
thousands, and the loss of a valuable export to the Danish-Norwegian
realm. The Dutch had returned to supply the Baltic and in the face of
their plentiful, high-quality supplies, the Danish-Norwegian fishing
industry succumbed. Dutch fisheries peaked in the first half of the
seventeenth century when 5-600 busses, each of 50 to 60 tons burthen,
worked with a total labour force of 7,000 fishermen, brought home a
total of 20,000 lasts or 240,000 barrels per year. 339
To sum up, by the beginning of the seventeenth century, Danish
fisheries were in serious decline and remained depressed after 1620. The
decline may have been triggered by ecological changes, but economic
factors must explain the long-term stagnation. The underlying factor
throughout Northern Europe was the change in consumption habits when
‘catholic practices’ such as the eating of fish at stipulated times were
given up and the wealthy turned to meat courses. But the fact that the
Danish fisheries crumbled may be explained by powerful Dutch
competition. Most seriously, merchants and noblemen withdrew capital
338 Lilli Friis, ‘Æde og drikke’, 419-23.
339 See Jaap Bruijn’s paper in this volume. Also Jan de Vries & Ad van der Woude,
Nederland 1500-1815. De eerste ronde van moderne economische groei (Amsterdam,
1995) 301-2.
192