I am a vegetarian, but don't know much about the history of vegetarianism. I'd love to find out about it.
Believe it or not, vegetarianism has roots all the way back to ancient India and Greece!
Good grief. Didn't realize it was that old! So the people in India and Greece were vegetarians - no wonder their cuisines are loaded with veggie dishes!
That's a very good point! In civilizations in Italy and Greece, they believed in the idea of nonviolence towards animals and vegetarianism was promoted by religious groups and philosphers.
I know Indian food is partly guided by Hindu beliefs, but hadn't realized that about Italy and Greece. What kind of religious groups?
Well, several orders of monks in medieval Europe were thought to have banned meat for ascetic reasons, but none of them abstained from eating fish. I wonder if that's why some vegetarians today still eat fish.
The Catholic church used to have meat free Fridays and advised people to eat fish. Maybe that's something to do with it. I believe people who eat fish but no other meat are called Pescatarians. Is that correct?
Yes, it is! I recently read that during the Roman Empire, mainly during the 4th-6th centuries, vegetarianism nearly disappeared from Europe. I'm glad it didn't!