This post is heavily inspired by the ideas here: Trollsmyth's Theoretical Framework for OSR (2010)
“Garlic, bud 5.”
-Gary Gygax & Dave Arneson, Dungeons & Dragons Book I Men & Magic, p.14
Some things in our fantasy games don’t make sense and our initial impulse is to fix them or ignore them. However, sometimes I find it more enjoyable to take those things at face value. Accept them, lean into them. They do make sense, it is our job to understand how and why. This adventure started with the price of garlic, why was it so expensive? To create the veneer of plausibility I needed to do the following exercise to truly understand the economics of garlic in our fantasy games. Nothing that follows is remotely scientific, it’s lazy research and preposterous assumptions applied to a fantastical problem.
Price
A single bud of garlic, a clove, costs 5 gold pieces. On average, a head of garlic contains 10 cloves and weighs 2.5 oz. A head of garlic costs 50 gold. A pound of garlic costs 320 gold.
Production
In 2022 a single acre of land can produce 15,000 pounds of garlic. Historical garlic production is not well documented, but historical wheat production (at least from a western perspective) is relatively accessible. In the last 850 years wheat yields have improved 7.5x from 6 bushels per acre to 45. Assuming similar improvements in garlic farming have been achieved, a fantasy acre of land can produce 2,000 pounds of garlic per year.
However, garlic has a 9 month growing season and is hard on the soil. After harvest, a field would be left fallow for the next 2 seasons to allow it to recover. Therefore, consistent production requires a 3 field rotation which decreases actual yield to closer to 667 pounds per acre. 133 pounds (20%) would be required to plant the next crop leaving 534 pounds per acre being produced for the market.
Consumption
In 2018 Europe consumed 124 metric tons (273,373 pounds) of caviar. Europe’s population in 2018 was 750 million people. That is less than .006 oz per person. Following the Black Death, Europe’s population was 50 million people. To emulate the scarcity of caviar, total garlic production in our fantasy world would be 18,225 pounds. That is the equivalent of 35 acres of production. A single large farm.
Supply Chain & Profit
As established, 320 gold per pound is the final retail price of garlic. Assuming 50% markup, the retailer is paying 160 gold per pound. The wholesaler’s markup is 30% and pays 112 gold per pound. The distributor’s markup is 25% and pays 84 gold per pound. Therefore, the farm is pulling in 1,530,900 gold annually from its 18,225 pounds of production.
To put this into perspective, a non-fighter can be hired for 12 gold per year, a heavy horseman for 240 gold per year, an engineer for 9,000 gold per year, and a sage for 24,000 gold per year. The garlic farmer is the richest person in the known world, a kingmaker capable of bankrolling entire wars with gold to spare.
Who Controls the Garlic?
Nestled in the Kolono Mountains, east of the Sangon Dunes and west of the Turkiso Wood, is the elven Duchy of Ajlo. Its wealth is unparalleled for it is the source of all the world’s garlic. It is ruled by the God-Duke Maslen Theobault.
Maslen Theobault lives in the Garlic Palace, a 178 acre complex (the size of the Forbidden City in China) that completely encompasses the 35 acres of garlic fields that are the source of the Duchy’s wealth.
Within the premises the garlic is either cured and powdered, roasted, pickled, or crushed and jarred prior to export to ensure a viable bulb never leaves the compound.
Secrets of Garlic
The consumption of a single clove of fresh garlic extends one’s natural life by 1 day. The unusually long lifespans of elves is actually directly tied to their garlic heavy diet. Elven adventurers tend to age much quicker than normal elves because maintaining a diet high in fresh garlic is difficult outside of the confines of the Duchy of Ajilo.
Where to go from here?
This is my favorite type of world building, spiraling out from what already exists in the text. I have always wanted to write a high level dungeon, my belief being that if I have something I want to play at the high levels then I will be motivated to run a campaign sufficiently long enough for my players to see it. This is the birth of that adventure...
The Great Garlic Gambit! A 178 acre Forbidden City like compound where no expense has been spared to protect the only living garlic plants in the world. Escaping with just one viable bulb could change the course of the world!
Wish me luck!
Edit: So you can find it on the map. Thank you to Rob Conley for this great Outdoor Survival Map that made these hexes possible.
https://batintheattic.blogspot.com/2009/11/original-southlands-map.html
