Being vegan in 2023 is extremely easy, but to me that seems like a relatively new phenomena.
So if I put you in my vicious time machine and sent you until the dim past, how far back would you be vegan?
I think I could make it work for most of the 1900s. But if I was in 1500 I'd give it up.
chinese buddhist monks were vegan at least as far back as the 6th century - you can definitely go back quite far
I think there's variants of vegan cooking throughout Buddhist monasteries in Asia. China may be one of the oldest traditions of it, though.
Veganism means avoiding animal exploitation where possible and practical, so theoretically you could be vegan in any time period as long as you never ate more than the absolute minimum meat you needed to survive.
My mind went to other animal products like furs, leather, bones, and animal transport. Depends on where you live, I guess.
the main issue i can see would be cooking fat
back in ye olde times, lard was the cheapest, oil was for aristos and rich merchant typesassuming i'm transported back in time and not location of course, as things change availability depending on where you are
you'd think that would be obvious, but people seem to forget that things cost different amounts of money in different placesBake some potatoes and wait for non-stick pots to be invented.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_plant_evolution
probably the late Cretaceous after flowering plants start to dominate and diversify
that's roughly 70+ Mya
