THREE: Chocolate, Catholicism, Ancien Regime

Written by Wolfgang Schivelbusch

Sunday, 24 February 2013 00:00 -

Although coffee spread far and wide as the fashionable drink of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, it is still easy to determine its gravitational center: where capitalism and
middle-class values had most thoroughly penetrated society: in the northwest of Europein
England, Holland, and France. It was there that medical and literary writings were composed in
celebration of the sobering and intellectually stimulating effects of the new beverage; there that
the coffeehouse attained a social and economic significance unparalleled elsewhere; and there
that coffee became the symbolic drink of the bourgeois order.

VENETIAN CHOCOLATE HOUSE

The "promotional slip"as eighteenth-century business cards and
similar forms of advertisement were knowndepicts a cross between
a shop and a public house. The goods are sold over the counter and
also served at tables. (Cf. the coffeehouse counter in the
illustration on p. 54.)

Much the same can be said of chocolate. At first glance, it too started as a generally
fashionable beverage not limited to any particular country. Yet on closer inspection we realize
that it too had its specific center of influence, one which lay in diametric opposition to that of
coffeenamely, southern Europe, Spain, and Italy, which is to say, in the Catholic world. If we
label coffee a Protestant, northern drink, then chocolate must be designated as its Catholic,
southern counterpart.

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THREE: Chocolate, Catholicism, Ancien Regime

Written by Wolfgang Schivelbusch
Sunday, 24 February 2013 00:00 -

First, though, a word about the distinction between cocoa and chocolate. Cocoa is the name
given to the plant and its fruit. Chocolate refers to the product known since the sixteenth century
whose chief ingredient is cocoa. Like the substance itself, the name is of ancient Mexican origin.
The ingredients from which chocolate is made vary according to taste. As a rule, cocoa, sugar,
cinnamon, and vanilla are used. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries chocolate was
sold in solid form, packaged in bars and cubes. It was consumed in liquid form, dissolved in hot
water or milk, often with the addition of wine. Whenever chocolate is mentioned in the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, it refers to this hot, liquid chocolate.

Chocolate was predestined to be the counterpart of coffee on the basis of its chemical
composition. Cocoa, its main ingredient, contains no caffeine, but only a little theobromine,
which is comparable to caffeine in its effect, though much weaker. Chocolate does not have a
discernibly stimulating effect on the central nervous systemas medical writers in the
seventeenth century were quick to note.

Even though chocolate does not have the stimulating effect of coffee and tea, it makes up for
this by virtue of its great nutritional value. This is what made it so significant a commodity in the
Catholic world. On the principle that liquids do not break fasts (Liquidum non frangit jejunum),
chocolate could serve as a nutritional substitute during fasting periods, and naturally this made
it a more or less vital beverage in Catholic Spain and Italy.

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THREE: Chocolate, Catholicism, Ancien Regime

Written by Wolfgang Schivelbusch
Sunday, 24 February 2013 00:00 -

THE
ARISTOCRAT'S
CHOCOLATE
BREAKFAST
Not
atoff
the
breakfast
table,
preferably
in
bed,
or
at
least
in ancien
a
negligee
dressing
gownthis
isof
how
the
aristocracy
in
the
regime
liked
to
take
its
morning
chocolate.
Breakfast
here
does
start
aisor
workday;
rather
itbut
marks
the
start
of
ainthe
day's
carefully
cultivated
idleness.
The
famous
painting
by
Pietro
Longhi
(facing
page)
gathers
the
breakfast
participants,
among
them
the
obligatory
abbe
and
gallant,
around
the
bed
the
mistress
of
the
house.
Innotthe
Nicholas
Lancret's
painting
(above),
bed
has
disappeared
into
background,
yet
the
situation
of
the
morning
toilette,
which
the
abbe
attends,
just
as
relaxed
and
informal
as
that
bed.
The
illustration
by
Jean-Michel
Moreau
(next
page)
shows
that
master
of
the
house
includes
chocolate
drinking
at
his
morning
reception.

trend-setter
and
he
their
Spanish
New
Netherlands.)
clerical
became
courtly
Yet
consumption
homeland
World.
this
style,
fasting
officially
ain
phenomenon
was
kind
for
(Beyond
which
Itabout
only
drink
of
the
from
was
known
of
status
rest
one
in
chocolate
and
in
Mexico
Spain
the
for
this
thenthe
of
aspect
symbol.
soon
seventeenth
the
aristocratic
century
itItsociety,
at
was
next
after
were
the
of
From
its
King
known
hundred
start
that
as
quite
significance
Europe.
a
century,
there
of
itand
of
fashionable
only
acquired
Spain.
closely
the
years,
itended
sixteenth
inevitably
in
Spanish
Once
for
associated
the
thanks
its
the
secular
days
specifically
the
century,
Catholic
became
territories
to
Spaniards
before
Spain's
beverage.
with
itof
world.
a
Spanish
His
Versailles,
would
standard
within
monopoly
Most
brought
The
remain
Italy
identity,
the
Catholic
discovery,
feature
was
chocolate
court
on
and
an
trade
the
first
the
exclusively
in
Majestyas
of
Madrid
Spanish
as
trade,
with
back
a
the
itto
(having
the
had
Spanish,
European
fan.
Toward
marriage
grown
the
first
Escorial;
clerical
the
aristocracy,
up
assimilated
of
end
in
the
Madrid,
aftertaste.
instead
of
Hapsburg
the
its
seventeenth
chocolate
itmuch
major
simply
no
princess
a1820
longer
elements).
status
represented
came
century
Anna
carried
symbol
to
the
One
of
the
Rococo
associations
Austria
French
as
French
important
the
French
elegance.
to
court;
style
Louis
factor
of
and
began
language,
Jesuitical
XIII
Itchocolate
in
here
became
in
this
1615.
itAt
supplant
transitional
gloom,
managed
the
the
With
snuffbox,
drink
the
the
Anna,
to
period
Inquisition,
Spanish
of
lose
and
the
who
its
was
boudoir,
breakfast
different.
disciplined
virtually
an
this
Aristocratic
intermediary
ideal
shook
Whereas
of
coffee.
propriety,
bed
an
society
drinkers
idle
ifregime.
state
possible.
It
the
was
class's
the
preferred
between
middle-class
awake
quite
essence
morning-long
Breakfast
the
for
lying
to
opposite,
drink
the
of
family
down
the
chocolate
workday
its
chocolate
awakening
chocolate
and
sat
and
erect
sitting
that
had
not
ritual
only
lay
little
at
to
at
up.
the
ahead,
breakfast.
because
was
in
Illustrations
breakfast
common
fluid,
chocolate
the
Ideally
lazy,
studied
table,
with
drinks
of
languid
the
itbecame
was
the
with
was
leisure.
period
were
bourgeoisie's
meant
a
served
motion.
sense
intrinsically
nicely
to
in
create
of
If
portray
coffee
landscapes
spirit
nature.
aphrodisiac.
Morning
awas
prudish
According
the
chocolate
age.
and
"People
end-of-the-seventeenth-century
amorous
Yet
to
this
an
in
seek
the
old
association
bed
to
boudoir
belief
be
scenes.
fortified
that
was
of
persisted
Chocolate
chocolate
as
through
text
into
chocolate
euphemistically
evidently
and
a
motif
eroticism
nineteenth
for
in
appealed
order
Rococo
is
puts
not
century,
to
to
only
perform
painting
it.
iconographic
playful
chocolate
certain
as
pastoral
and
duties,"
was
erotic
in
an
as
itCommon
Baroque,
was
Thus
coffee's
exactly
in
wisdom
Catholic
this
opposite.
the
respect
reverse.
had
acknowledgment
The
as
itas
that
well,
latter,
It
nourished
what
chocolate
as
coffee
we
have
corporeal
one's
appeared
gave
seen,
body
to
being
the
was
and
in
mind
the
markedly
as
one's
seventeenth
against
itrigors
took
potency;
anticorporeal
from
Protestant
and
the
thus
body.
eighteenth
itdigestible.
represented
asceticism.
With
antierotic.
chocolate
centuries
the
seventeenth-century
serve
places
boheme;
The
chocolate,
dichotomy
for
an
and
any
odd
puritanical
case,
the
was
mixture
so-called
London.
reflected
they
character.
of
were
aristocracy
We
chocolate
in
thoroughly
two
have
Apparently,
types
already
and
parlors
antipuritanical,
of
demimonde,
drinking
or
though,
chocolate
a
look
establishments
other
what
at
perhaps
the
houses.
establishments
Marx
coffeehouseabove
even
would
These
late
bordello-like
later
were
were
refer
meeting
set
to
places.
all,
up
as
its
to
the
status
bourgeois
maintained
of
monarchy,
most
styles
Wherever
his
chocolate,
excessive
middle-class
and
beverage
intellect
means
lived
a
we
and
sense
look
coffee-drinkers
and
of
avoided
of
and
background
of
in
stimulationfundamentally
labored
aristocratic
the
ancien
entrepreneurial
coffee.
seventeenth
for
regime,
in
into
the
Balzac,
history.
calm
the
literary
coffee
spirit.
even
aristocracy
who,
Here
marketplace
eighteenth
Goethe,
in
as
despite
we
the
a
different
stimulant
see
and
midst
who
his
two
centuries,
who
and
psychologies
of
used
sentimental
fundamentally
for
immense
as
for
the
member
itart
alone,
ever
as
productivity,
ain
allegiance
and
more
means
of
different
a
physiologies.
appears
courtly
vigorously
to
one
to
lift
made
working
society
the
as
himself
of
the
the
stirring
athe
cult
out
with
cocoa,
process
form
which
gone
too,
a
an
cocoa
chocolate.
A
luxury
end
final
but
the
itof
their
solid
bean
and
is
which
to
primarily
ancien
in
was
word
ain
the
separate
its
powder.
solid
and
is
developed
has
own
Spanish,
extracted;
liquid
chocolate
for
been
right.
This
ways.
children.
the
chocolate
Catholic
drunk
Or
By
around
fate
process
thus
Cocoa
in
more
an
of
bar
At
in
cocoa
irony
chocolate
chocolate
were
its
the
precisely,
form,
put
now
place
of
same
becomes
an
by
identical.
became
history
Switzerland
end
the
since
in
tradition.
time,
itpopular
the
Dutchman
to
itin
less
the
a
Ever
was
nineteenth
the
favorite
Spanish
nineteenth
following
nourishing
its
Holland
chocolate
the
since
existence
Van
two
drink
the
and
tradition
became
Houten.
arch-Protestant
its
bar
century.
but
nineteenth
in
lead
twentieth
as
northern
gained
far
chocolate,
with
of
Most
the
more
chocolate
The
first
the
centuries.
a
century
and
of
new
modern
countries
the
innovation
major
central
continuing
significance
oil
drinking,
the
producer
from
It
cocoa
two
vanished
In
Europe
that
of
its
have
as
milk
in
put
new
as
of
children
women
excluded
historical
the
destroyed.
Chocolate
preferred
aristocracy.
and
as
victor
from
presents.
children.
and
breakfast
power
over
History
cocoa
The
What
and
drink
repeatedly
are
old
responsibility
former
formerly
not
common
children;
status
reveals
symbolized
made
in
drink
"adult"
chocolate
middle-class
a
how
mockery
of
luxuries
power
self-esteem
ancien
and
of
and
society.
the
candy
like
regime
glory
status
coffee
were
Bourgeois
of
was
the
had
symbols
and
given
now
class
sunk
tobacco.
in
society,
to
once
that
to
women
the
loses
hands
Cocoa
so
world
as
important
and
the
out
of
became
of
those
is
to

CHOCOLATE
AS
APHRODISIAC
The
original
that
accompanies
this
illustration
alludes
to
ablack
view
held
intext
the
seventeenth
and
eighteenth
Iwidely
bring
to
you
aand
special
drink
from
far
across
the
West,
Although
it's
loves
on
whom
it's
said
tothat's
the
best.
Good
cheer
itnearest
always
brings,
and
your
full
years
renews.
First
take
aIsweets
sip,
my
dear,
and
Iwas
shall
presently;
and
know
serve
itgood
to
you
with
all
the
warmth
due:
For
we
take
care
to
leave
descendants
for
posterity.
Before
His
burgher
again,
dress.
Other
goal,
in
1789
status
nothing
middle-class
ifmust
an
symbols
aristocrat's
was
was
more
society
of
to
the
offensive
colorful,
present
itancien
sumptuous
himself
children
and
regime
laughable
like
shared
and
costume
acenturies:
women
peacock;
than
this
an
fate
was
who
association
whereas
with
the
were
expression
chocolate:
allowed
for
with
the
simply
this
for
of
wear
social
instance,
bird.
dressed
colorful
Once
prestige.
dress.
dressed
The
physiologically
black
the
simple
What
aristocracy's
lover
garments
black
the
aristocracy.
ofanything,
peacock
garb
and
light,
was,
by
differed
bitter
was
sweet
extension
politically
for
foods.
from
costume,
chocolatejust
In
aesthetically,
and
the
this
general
chromatically,
the
sense
"sweet
as,
gourmand
coffee
abhorred
inwork
tooth"
1789
diametrically
was
was
the
or
in
both
glutton.
Versailles,
bright
in
matters
opposed
and
Middle-class
and
the
sweets,
of
bitter,
gastronomic
Third
toto
the
favoring
the
Estate
taste,
colorfully
antipode
taste.
with
somber
its
to

CHOCOLATE
AS
Aa
CHILDREN'S
DRINK
After
centuries
as an
aristocratic
beverage,
thechildren.
nineteenth
century
chocolate
became
nutritious
morning
drinkinfor
(French
advertising
poster,
early
twentieth
century.)

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