Sausage

Sausage was invented as an economical means of preserving and transforming into more palatable forms the less desirable cuts of meat and components, such as blood and internal organs, that could not be consumed fresh at slaughter. The word “sausage” is derived from the Latin salsisium, from salsus, meaning “salted” or “preserved meat.” Although the etymology indicates that sausage can be made from any kind of salted meat, the term traditionally applies to chopped pork stuffed into a casing.

The origin of sausage making is lost in history. Sausages probably resulted when early cultivators discovered that salt could preserve easily perishable surplus meat. Sausages were reportedly produced from pigs as long ago as 5000 BCE in Egypt and the Far East. One of the earliest documentations of sausage making and consumption is Homer’s Odyssey (800 BCE). Consumed by the Romans but outlawed by Constantine the Great and forbidden by the early Christian Church because of an association with many pagan festivals, sausages became highly sought after and even gave rise to a black market for distribution.