DENTAL RESEARCH BY DR. WESTON A. PRICE
CONCLUSION:
There was a non-existence of vegans among primitive tribes.
All primitives in excellent health were using both plant and animal sources for food.
Nutrition and
Physical Degeneration
A Comparison of Primitive and Modern Diets
and Their Effects
by WESTON A. PRICE, MS., D.D.S., F.A.G.D., 1939
EXCERPT
During these investigations of primitive races, I have been impressed with the superior quality of the human stock developed by Nature wherever a liberal source of sea foods existed. These zones of abundant marine life were largely in the wake of the ocean currents drifting from the ice fields of the poles. The Humboldt Current is probably the most liberal carrier of marine life of any of the ocean currents. It leaves the ice field of the Antarctic and bathes the west coast of South America from its southern tip nearly to the equator, where the coast line changes direction and the Humboldt Current is deflected out into the ocean. It meets here a warm current coming down from the coast of Central America, Panama and Columbia. If the superb physiques that Nature has established among the Maori of New Zealand, the Malays of the Islands north of Australia, the Gaelics of the Outer Hebrides and the natives on several of the archipelagos of the Pacific, owe their superior physical development to sea foods, we should expect to find that the tribes which have had contact with the great Humboldt Current food would also have superb physiques. ....
In many of the primitive tribes living by the sea we found emphasis on the value of fish eggs and on some animal forms for insuring a high physical development of growing children, particularly of girls, and a high perfection of offspring through a reinforcement of the mother's nutrition. It is also important to note that in several of the primitive tribes studied there has been a consciousness that not only the mother should have special nutrition, but also the father. In this group very great value was placed upon a product obtained from a sea form known locally as the angelote or angel fish, which in classification is between a skate and a shark. The young of the angelota are born alive, ready for free swimming and capable of foraging for themselves immediately at birth. Twenty to thirty young are born in one litter. The eggs of the female before fertilization are about one inch in diameter, slightly oval but nearly spherical. They are used as food by all, but the special food product for men is a pair of glands obtained from the male. These glands weigh up to a pound each, when they are dried. They have a recognized value among the natives for treating cases of tuberculosis, especially for controlling lung hemorrhages. The sea foods were used in conjunction with the land plants and fruits raised by means of irrigation in the river valleys. Together these foods provided adequate nutrition for maintaining high physical excellence. ....
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We may divide the primitive racial stocks into groups, classified according to the physical environment in which they are living and the manner in which the environment largely controls their available foods. It is significant that I have as yet found no group that was building and maintaining good bodies exclusively on plant foods. A number of groups are endeavoring to do so with marked evidence of failure. The variety of animal foods available has varied widely in some groups, and been limited among others.
In the preceding chapter we have seen that the successful dietaries included in addition to a liberal source of minerals, carbohydrates, fats, proteins, and water-soluble vitamins, a source of fat-soluble vitamins.
Vitamin D is not found in plants, but must be sought in an animal food. The dietaries of the efficient primitive racial stocks may be divided into groups on this basis: in the first place those obtaining their fatsoluble activators, which include the known fat-soluble vitamins, from efficient dairy products. This includes the Swiss in the high Alps, the Arabs (using camel's milk), and the Asiatic races (using milk of sheep and musk ox). In the second place there are those using liberally the organs of animals, and the eggs of birds, wild and domesticated. These include the Indians of the far North, the buffalo hunting Plains Indians and the Andean tribes. In the third place there are those using liberally animal life of the sea. These include Pacific Islanders and coastal tribes throughout the world. In the fourth place there are those using small animals and insects. These include the Australian Aborigines in the interior, and the African tribes in the interior.
Many of the above groups use foods from two or more sources. Each of the groups has provided an adequate quantity of body-building material from both animal and plant tissues. It does not matter what the source of minerals and vitamins may be so long as the supply is adequate. In our modern life, the location of a group will determine the most efficient and most convenient source for obtaining the essential foods. Clearly, for those near the coast, the sea may be most convenient, while for those in the interior or in the far North, dairy products or the organs of animals may be the only available source. ....
Since the sea foods are, as a group, so valuable a source of the fatsoluble activators, they have been found to be efficient throughout the world not only for controlling tooth decay, but for producing a human stock of high vitality. Unfortunately the cost of transportation in the fresh state often constitutes a factor limiting distribution. Many of the primitive races preserved the food value, including vitamins, very efficiently by drying the fish. While our modern system of canning prevents decomposition, it does not efficiently preserve some of the fatsoluble activators, particularly vitamin A.
Since the organs, particularly the livers of animals, are storage depots of the vitamins an important source of some of the fat-soluble activators can be provided by extracting the fat of the livers and shipping it as liver oils. Modern methods of processing have greatly improved the quality of these oils. There are some factors, however, which can be provided to great advantage for humans from dairy products of high efficiency.
I have shown in the preceding chapter the quantities of several of the minerals that are essential in suitable chemical form to maintain an adult in good health and make possible tissue repair. The dietaries of the various primitive groups have all been shown to have a mineral content several times higher than that which obtains in the inadequate food eaten by modernized primitives and the people of our modernized cultures.
WESTON A. PRICE, 1939 www.westonaprice.org/
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"At first, the Gombe chimps fled whenever they saw Jane. But she persisted, watching from a distance with binoculars, and gradually the chimps allowed her closer. One day in October 1960 she saw chimps David Graybeard and Goliath strip leaves off twigs to fashion tools for fishing termites from a nest. Scientists thought humans were the only species to make tools, but here was evidence to the contrary. On hearing of Jane's observation, her mentor Louis Leakey said: "Now we must redefine tool, redefine man, or accept chimpanzees as humans."