Resumen de Between Frugality and Prosperity: Standard of Living and Consumption Patterns of Castle Personnel in Early 16th Century Sweden

Dag Retsö

• The article assesses the nutritional standard of early 16 the century Swedish castle personnel as a proxy for their standard of living. It draws on castle inventory lists to present the nutritional standard in terms of quantity and quality and from the standpoint of social dif- ferentiation as measured by calorie intake and monetary value. The study shows that nutritional standards of castle personnel were fairly high and class-differentiated, and interprets this as indicating a rel- atively high standard of living characterized by relative frugality within the upper class and relative prosperity among common castle per- sonnel. The figures fall well in the range of the relatively high general nutritional standards between the late Middle Ages and the late 16th century found by previous research.