Dumpling Atlas

Timeline

Every date below is something someone found: a dumpling dried in a tomb, a painted pot, a line in a dictionary, a court record. Each carries its grade, and legends are kept apart from the evidence.

  • AArchaeological or primary source
  • DDated text
  • SSecondary consensus
  • LLegend

Era 01 · 500 BCE – 220

Ancient

Before the record

For most of history, dumplings leave no trace. Boiled dough rots; recipes were not written down. What survives is indirect: tamale vendors painted on Maya walls, a sealed bronze vessel in a Chinese tomb whose contents can no longer be identified, and a great many legends that came later and were set in this time.

  1. Prehistory

    ContextS

    Albala: "almost without doubt, there are prehistoric dumplings". No prehistoric dumpling is securely identified

    WGBH/NPR

  2. 8000–5000 BC

    LegendL

    Popular claim that tamales are this old. It predates fully domesticated maize, so treat it as unverified

    atlas §2, §7.8

  3. c. 500 BCE

    ExcavatedS

    Triangular, filled-looking items in a sealed bronze vessel, Xue-state tomb, Tengzhou (Shandong). Filling unidentifiable. Suggestive, not proof

    atlas §2 (EastMoment, via Xinhua 2024); People's Daily

  4. 160 years
  5. c. 339–329 BCE

    ExcavatedA

    Leaf-wrapped grain bundles (Quercus dentata leaves around unhulled rice and broomcorn/foxtail millet, tied with grass cord) from Chu tombs: Chengyangcheng M8, Xinyang, Henan (c. 339–329 BCE) and Wuwangdun M1, Huainan, Anhui (King Kaolie of Chu, d. 238 BCE). The authors call them 'a possible precursor of zongzi'; unhulled grain means funerary offerings, not food.

    Wrapping grains in leaves: from tomb to table (National Science Review, doi:10.1093/nsr/nwag504), press release, Yong Ge (IVPP, CAS), Fan Yang (National Center for Archaeology); EurekAlert, 2026-08-31

  6. 440 years
  7. c. 100 CE

    PicturedA

    Tamale imagery in the San Bartolo murals (Guatemala; Taube, Saturno, Stuart). Calakmul market murals show tamale vendors

    atlas §2

  8. 150–219 CE

    LegendL

    Zhang Zhongjing's "jiao'er" (嬌耳) for frostbitten ears

    atlas §2

Era 02 · 220 – 907

Silk Road & Tang

Wheat, steam and the desert

In China the record begins. Writers name mantou, jiaozi and leaf-wrapped zongzi, and in the dry tombs of Astana, on the Silk Road, real dumplings survive for 1,400 years. This is the first era in which a dumpling can be held, not just described.

  1. 3rd c.

    Written downS

    Zhang Yi's Guangya mentions jiaozi (quoted via secondary sources)

    atlas §2

  2. Western Jin, late 3rd c.

    Written downD

    Zhou Chu (236–297), Fengtu ji (Yangxian Fengtu ji), Western Jin: people wrap glutinous millet in wild-rice (菰) leaves, boil it in strong lye until soft and eat it on 5/5 and at the summer solstice; called 粽 (稯) or 角黍. Survives as quotations (Taiping yulan; also Qimin yaoshu, 544).

    糉 entry (quotes 風土記 via 太平御覽; notes the 說文 definition is in 說文新附), 漢典 zdic.net

  3. 266–420

    Written downD

    Mantou in Jin-dynasty records, then meaning a filled bun (Shu Xi's meat-filled mantou, 266–316)

    atlas §2; Baozi

  4. 230 years
  5. 499–640

    ExcavatedA

    Astana tomb 73TAM514:5 dumplings dated 499–640; made of bread wheat and foxtail millet (Chen Tao et al., PLOS ONE 7(9): e45137, 2012)

    Tang-dynasty wonton and dumplings from the Astana Cemetery in a museum case
    Hiroooooo, CC BY-SA 4.0

    atlas §2

  6. 550–577

    Written downS

    Yan Zhitui: "the jiaozi, shaped like a crescent moon, is a common food in the world" (via secondary sources)

    atlas §2

  7. 618–907

    ExcavatedA

    Tang crescent dumplings and wontons excavated at Astana, Turpan

    atlas §2; Tianshannet

Era 03 · 900 – 1400

Islamic & Mongol world

Empires that wrote things down

A dictionary of Turkic, cookbooks in Arabic, a manual for the Mongol emperor's kitchen: the dumpling enters the written record across Eurasia. At the far end of the continent, a fresco in a castle chapel near Bolzano shows Europe's first dumpling eater, and Italian merchants start writing ravioli into their accounts.

  1. 10th–13th c.

    Written downS

    Sanbusak in Arabic cookbooks; "sambosa" at the Ghaznavid court (Beyhaqi, 11th c.)

    Samosa

  2. Song

    Written downD

    Earliest record of eating tangyuan

    atlas 6.2

  3. 1072–74

    Written downD

    Tutmāč (Turkic). Named dough food. Legend: Alexander's starving troops cried tutma ač ("don't keep us hungry"), and his sages invented a dish that "strengthens the body, reddens the face". The text also lists tutmāč čöpi (any noodle/macaroni dough), ügrä (finer noodles), and dough cut to chickpea size for the sick

    Mahmud al-Kashgari, Dīwān Lughāt al-Turk, compiled 1072–74, dedicated 1077; sole manuscript copied in Damascus, 1266

  4. c. 1112–1113

    ExcavatedA

    Two pyramid-shaped leaf-wrapped zongzi from a Northern Song tomb at Tieguai, Nanling (Anhui), excavated 2014; occupant died by 1112, buried by 1113; CT scans suggest a meat filling. Oldest surviving zongzi objects.

    中国最早的实物粽子在安徽 (Guangming Online, reporting Zhang Hui, Anhui Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology), Guangming Daily / gmw.cn

  5. c. 1180

    PicturedA

    "Knödelesserin" fresco, Hocheppan Castle chapel near Bolzano: a woman tastes a dumpling from a pot of five. Some sources say early 13th c.

    Medieval fresco of a woman tasting a dumpling from a pot
    Geisler Martin, CC BY-SA 3.0

    atlas §2, 6.17

  6. 1238

    LegendL

    St Hyacinth's pierogi at Kościelec. His 14th-c. Vita doesn't mention pierogi

    atlas 6.15, §7.12

  7. 13th c.

    Written downD

    The 13th-c. Syrian Kitab al-Wusla ila l-habib (anonymous, sometimes attributed to Ibn al-'Adim of Aleppo, d. 1262) names shushbarak and its shape but gives no recipe.

    Scents and Flavors: A Syrian Cookbook (NYU Press / Library of Arabic Literature, 2017; pb 2020), p. 161 — cited by Wikipedia 'Joshpara'; the book itself not opened, Charles Perry (ed./tr.)

  8. 1274

    ExcavatedA

    Two zongzi tied to a peach branch in the hand of Lady Zhou, Southern Song tomb at De'an, Jiangxi (found 1988); epitaph dates burial to Xianchun 10 = 1274.

    最古老的实物粽子长啥样？江西一南宋古墓出土 / search summary of Jiangxi museum reports, China News Service (chinanews.com); Jiangxi Provincial Museum

  9. 1330

    Written downD

    Manta in Hu Sihui's Yinshan Zhengyao, written for the Yuan court

    Title page of the Yinshan zhengyao
    Public domain

    atlas §2, 6.4

  10. 1330

    Written downD

    禿禿麻食 tutu mashi; 搠羅脫因 shuoluo tuoyin ("an Uighur dish"); 馬乞 maqi. Tutu mashi = "hand-pinched noodles", 6 jin flour, mutton leg fried to mince, good broth, fried onion, garlic-yoghurt and coriander. Shuoluo tuoyin = coin-shaped dough with mutton, tongue, yam, mushrooms, carrot

    Hu Sihui, Yinshan zhengyao, presented to Tugh Temür in 1330 (surviving edition 1456); translated by Buell & Anderson, A Soup for the Qan (2000; 2nd ed. 2010)

  11. c. 1345

    Written downD

    Krapfen (nos. 58–61). Fast-day fillings of nuts, apple, raisins, pike guts with almond milk; dough sheets "made for krapfen", fried or baked in a pan

    Daz buoch von guoter spise, Würzburg, c. 1345–54 (Munich UB 2° Cod. ms. 731); trans. M. W. Adamson

  12. c. 1346

    Written downD

    Piao Tongshi (朴通事), Goryeo Chinese-conversation textbook set in Yuan Dadu (Beijing), lists 素酸餡稍麥 sold in the capital; base text dated to the Yuan, commonly c. 1346. The gloss 'thin wheat sheets wrapped round meat, steamed, eaten with soup; dialect calls it shaomai' is in the later Joseon annotated editions (Piao Tongshi eonhae, 1677), not the Yuan text.

    地区文化 (shaomai history; cites 朴通事, 儒林外史 ch. 10, Qianlong bamboo-branch verse, 扬州画舫录, 桐桥倚棹录), The Paper (thepaper.cn), government account

  13. 1349

    LegendL

    Lin Jōin said to bring manjū to Nara

    atlas 6.5

  14. 14th c.

    TravelledD

    Korean mandu arrives with Yuan-Mongol contact; Ssanghwajeom ("The Dumpling Shop") song; first record in the Goryeosa

    atlas §2, 6.6

  15. 14th c.

    Written downD

    Ravioli in the papers of Francesco di Marco Datini of Prato; herb-egg-cheese ravioli in broth in the Venetian Libro per cuoco

    atlas §2, 6.17

  16. Yuan, 14th c.

    Written downD

    Dating of Piao Tongshi to the Yuan (scholarly study of its date of compilation).

    高麗時代漢語教科書『朴通事』の成立年代について, Keio University repository (KOARA)

  17. c. 1390

    Written downD

    "Rauioles" in England's Forme of Cury

    atlas §2

Era 04 · 1400 – 1700

Renaissance & print

Printed, and carried across the sea

Print fixes recipes that had lived in memory: the first Polish cookbook, Italian court manuals, an Ottoman physician's steamed mantı. Ships carry wheat and pork across the Atlantic, where they meet the Americas' own dumplings of maize, already old.

  1. 1421–51

    Written downD

    Mantı (Sanat-ı Mantı). Cut like börek or tutmaç sheets "but larger". Filling: young ram's leg, pounded chickpeas, cinnamon, kneaded with vinegar. Steamed on 2–3 stacked trays "from noon till evening". Served with garlic yoghurt and sumac

    Muhammad b. Mahmud Shirvani, Kitābü't-Tabīh (physician to Murad II, r. 1421–51); ed. Argunşah & Çakır, 15. Yüzyıl Osmanlı Mutfağı (2005), pp. 124–125

  2. 15th c.

    Written downD

    "Palt" in the Karlskrönikan chronicle

    atlas 6.21

  3. c. 1450

    Written downD

    Proto-gnocchi "zanzarelli" in Maestro Martino

    atlas 6.17

  4. 15th c.

    Written downD

    Shushbarak. "Minced meat… stuff it in dough rolled out like cut tutmaj. It is cooked in water until done… yoghurt, garlic and mint"

    Ibn al-Mubarrad, Kitab al-Tibakha, 15th c., Damascus (trans. C. Perry, Medieval Arab Cookery, p. 20)

  5. 15th c.

    Written downD

    Salma. Dough "twisted and cut in small pieces and struck like a coin with a finger", boiled; served with yoghurt and meat fried with onion, mint and garlic

    Same source, 15th c.

  6. 15th c.

    Written downD

    Earliest recipe: "You take minced meat and stuff it in dough rolled out like cut tutmaj. It is cooked in water until done. Then take it off the fire and put yoghurt, garlic and mint with it." (Ibn al-Mubarrad / Ibn al-Mibrad, Kitab al-Tibakha, Damascus, 15th c.; author lived c. 1437/40-1503)

    Kitab al-Tibakhah: A Fifteenth-Century Cookbook, tr. Charles Perry, Petits Propos Culinaires 21 (1985), p. 20; reprinted in Rodinson, Arberry & Perry, Medieval Arab Cookery (Prospect Books, 2001). Recipe text read as quoted in Cariadoc's Miscellany, Charles Perry (tr.); quoted by David Friedman & Elizabeth Cook, A Miscellany

  7. 1470

    Written downD

    Bryndza (the cheese) is first recorded in a 1470 charter (Count V. Mölstein, settlement of Ladislav Valach, rent paid in sheep and bryndza); introduced by Wallachian colonisation (14th-17th c.); first bryndza works at Detva, 1787 (Vagač family). This dates the cheese, not the dish.

    Stoličná 2002 (as above), citing Prekop 1970, Balko 1940, Rastislava Stoličná

  8. 1520

    Written downS

    Empanadas in Robert de Nola's Llibre del Coch

    Llibre del Coch

  9. 1538

    Written downD

    The word hayaca is recorded from 1538 (Juan de Villegas's declaration in the residencia of Ambrosio Alfinger, Coro: 'dos hayacas de maíz' hung from a man's neck), Fray Pedro de Aguado's Recopilación historial (1575) and Barquisimeto documents (1608 / 1687 'tres hayacas de sal'). In these the word means bundle or package, not the dish (Lovera; Rosenblat). Etymology unsettled: Ernst proposed Guaraní ayúa 'to mix'; Rosenblat noted similarity to Tupi-Guaraní ayacá.

    La hallaca, tradición y nutrición, Maritza Landaeta-Jiménez, Anales Venezolanos de Nutrición 34(2), 2021 (citing J. R. Lovera, R. Cartay, A. Rosenblat, A. Ernst)

  10. 16th c.

    TravelledS

    Maize reaches the West African coast with the Portuguese, a precondition for kenkey

    atlas 6.23

  11. 1570

    Written downD

    Scappi's Opera: ravioli recipes and "maccaroni detti gnocchi"

    atlas §2, 6.17

  12. 1586

    Written downD

    Spanish–Quechua section: 'Bollo de mayz. çara tanta, huminta' (OCR 'buminta'). A maize bun called huminta in the first printed Quechua vocabulary.

    [Arte, y vocabulario en la lengua general del Peru llamada Quichua, y en la lengua española (Los Reyes [Lima]: Antonio Ricardo, 1586)](https://archive.org/details/arteyvocabulario00unkn), Anonymous (Third Council of Lima circle); Antonio Ricardo; scan on Internet Archive

  13. 1603

    Written downD

    Historical dictionary entry: from Quechua humint'a. The Quechua word huminta is registered from 1603 (Arte y vocabulario... Quichua, Seville reprint) as 'bollicos de mayz, que se cuezen en la olla'. Inca Garcilaso explains the two maize breads zancu and huminta. The Spanish form 'humita' is first recorded in Terreros y Pando's Diccionario castellano (1787), 'in Peru, a small cake of sugar and tender maize wrapped in a delicate choclo leaf', then 1789 (J. F. Aguirre's diary, 'Vmita ... served in the plant's own leaves'), 1807 (uminta). Used in Ec., Pe., Bo., Ch., Ar., Ur.

    Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (DHLE), 'humita', Real Academia Española

  14. 1609

    Written downD

    Garcilaso de la Vega, Comentarios reales (Lisbon, 1609): maize breads zancu (sacrificial) and huminta (festive).

    Comentarios reales de los Incas (1609), as reported by RAE DHLE, Inca Garcilaso de la Vega

  15. 1611

    Written downD

    Heo Gyun, Domun daejak (in Seongso bubugo), written 1611 in exile at Hamyeol, lists 松餠 (songbyeong) as a spring seasonal food. Earliest record identified by the paper.

    추석 대표 음식으로서 송편의 발달 배경 (Inmun nonchong 75(2), 2018, pp. 185–223, doi:10.17326/jhsnu.75.2.201805.185), Table 1 and n. 21, Kim Yong-gap (김용갑), Seoul National University Institute of Humanities

  16. 1642

    Written downD

    Andreas Sparman uses "palt" for a boiled dough lump

    atlas 6.21

  17. 1643

    Written downD

    AtLiTeG historical dictionary of Italian gastronomic language, entry 'agnolotto': first attestation 'agnellotto' 1643 (Beridio Darpe = Piero de' Bardi, Avino Avolio Ottone e Berlinghier, a Florentine mock-epic poem); first recipe in its corpus 'Agnellotti macheronati' in Il cuoco reale e cittadino (Bologna, 1791, capon farce); 'agnolotti' 1814 (La nuovissima cucina economica, Rome). Etymology: DELIN/LEI from *anegliotti 'little rings' (Latin anulus); lamb and 'Angelotu' theories also listed.

    Vocabolario dinamico dell'italiano moderno – AtLiTeG, lemma 'agnolotto', Monica Alba (entry, 31 May 2024), AtLiTeG project

  18. Early 17th c.

    Written downD

    English word "dumpling" first in print

    Oxford Companion

  19. 17th c.

    Written downS

    Börek-i tutmaç. Named among dishes served to Divan members

    Ottoman palace kitchen documents, mid-17th c. (Divan lunches), per Özge Samancı

  20. 1652

    TravelledS

    Dutch settlers bring kluitjies to the Cape, the root of souskluitjies

    atlas §2, 6.23

  21. c. 1680

    Written downD

    Yorok (要錄, c. 1680): first Hangul name 송푠; white-rice-flour cake steamed in layers with pine needles, then rinsed.

    추석음식 송편과 반달을 똑 닮은 고흥 모시잎송편 (Monthly Gukga Yusan Sarang, 2015-09-01), Yun Suk-ja (윤숙자), Korean Traditional Food Research Institute; Korea Heritage Service

  22. 1682

    Written downA

    First pierogi recipes in Czerniecki's Compendium Ferculorum: sweet ones plus veal kidney, no potato

    Title page of Czerniecki's Compendium Ferculorum, 1682
    Public domain

    atlas §2, 6.15; Wilanów

  23. 1689

    Written downD

    Gyoza first appears in Japanese records: Mito-domain records of Zhu Shunsui serving gyoza to Tokugawa Mitsukuni. Not proof that Mitsukuni was the first to eat it

    atlas 6.5, §7.5; T&F 2024

Era 05 · 1700 – 1900

Empires & migration

The great spreading

Dumplings turn up in dictionaries, a mock-epic poem, court records and travel notes, from Caracas to the Urals. The potato gives Europe a new family of them; settlers take suet and flour to other continents; a soup-filled bun appears outside Shanghai. The record thickens fast.

  1. 1712

    Written downD

    Blood palt recorded in Västergötland

    atlas 6.21

  2. 1725

    Written downD

    Physician Rosinus Lentilius names "Knöpflein" and "Spazen" (spätzle) in writing

    atlas 6.18

  3. 1740

    Written downD

    Later dated records: Seongho saseol (c. 1740) 'steamed with pine needles = songbyeong'; Nongga wollyeongga (1816) 오려송편 in the 8th-month verse (first link to Chuseok); Dongguk sesigi (1849) half-disc 松餠 for the 2nd-month servants' day and early-rice songpyeon sold in the 8th month; Seungjeongwon ilgi 1784.

    추석 대표 음식으로서 송편의 발달 배경, Table 1, Kim Yong-gap, 2018

  4. 1749

    Written downD

    SAV ethnologist reports that F. E. Brückmann, Epistola itineraria (Wolfenbüttel 1749), praising Liptov bryndza as 'Liptov theriac', names bryndzové halušky as a Slovak speciality. Earliest dated mention of the combination found.

    Strava ako etnoidentifikačný znak (Studia Etnologiczne i Antropologiczne 6, 2002, pp. 251-264), citing F. E. Brückmann, Epistola itineraria, Wolfenbüttel 1749, Rastislava Stoličná (Ústav etnológie SAV); Uniwersytet Śląski, via BazHum

  5. 1750

    Written downD

    'Quenelles de poulardes' listed as a hors-d'oeuvre in a printed menu (Dîner ... à sept, premier service), vol. 1.

    Dictionnaire des alimens, vins et liqueurs ... (Paris, 1750), t. 1, [Briand]; Google scan on Internet Archive (dictionnairedes01briagoog)

  6. 1756

    Written downD

    In 1756 a woman tried for licentious conduct for receiving men at home defended herself by saying they only came to buy the hallacas she made (archival case, via Calzadilla 1994). Cartay also cites Gilij's c. 1749 Orinoco maize bread wrapped in leaves ('paratí', not named hallaca), Francisco de Miranda's 1806 nostalgic reference to hallaca, Lisboa c. 1852 (hallaca the dish of Nochebuena in Caracas), Diario de Avisos 16.12.1857 (sold at Café Español), a recipe by José Antonio Díaz in El Agricultor Venezolano (Caracas, 1861–64; t. I 1877) and Tulio Febres Cordero's Cocina criolla (Mérida, 1899).

    Breve reseña histórica de la hallaca en Venezuela, con especial referencia a la hallaca merideña, Rafael Cartay, En Prospectiva (Universidad Yacambú), 2021, peer-reviewed

  7. 1771

    Written downD

    Full gyoza recipe in a Japanese menu record

    T&F 2024

  8. 1771

    Written downS

    'Agnellotti all'italiana', lean and meat versions, in La cuciniera piemontese (Vercelli, 1771).

    web search snippet (food blog / AIFB page); primary not opened, unverified

  9. c. 1774

    Written downD

    Earliest mention of the modern filled shell of ground meat and grain is in al-Zabidi's dictionary Taj al-'Arus (compiled c. 1760-1774, Cairo), as made by the people of al-Sham; the 10th-c. Ibn Sayyar al-Warraq calls plain meatballs kubab (sing. kubba).

    Delights from the Garden of Eden: A Cookbook and History of the Iraqi Cuisine (Equinox, 2013) — via Wikipedia 'Kibbeh', Nawal Nasrallah

  10. 1775

    Written downD

    An unnamed traveller praises Öland kroppkakor (barley/wheat then; potato from the mid-1800s)

    atlas 6.21

  11. 1783

    Written downD

    First spätzle recipe, Göppinger Kochbuch (Rosina Dorothea Knör)

    atlas 6.18

  12. 1792

    Written downD

    颠不棱 dian bu leng ("即肉饺也"). A steamed meat dumpling with a filling of pork skin simmered to a jelly, eaten in Guangdong: a precursor of the soup filling

    Yuan Mei, Suiyuan shidan, 1792

  13. 1794

    Written downD

    Maultaschen recipes under that name in a Leipzig lexicon

    atlas 6.18

  14. 1798

    Written downD

    Earliest dated use of the word: Kotliarevsky's mock-epic Eneida lists 'Вареники пшенишні, білі' among the Trojans' treats (Part III, st. 118; galushky appear in Part II, st. 13). Parts I–III were first printed in St Petersburg in 1798.

    Енеїда, Частина III (Твори, т. 1, 1922 edition), Wikisource/Том_1/Енеїда/Частина_III), Іван Котляревський; Wikisource (uk)

  15. 1801

    Written downD

    Probably the first potato gnocchi: Vincenzo Corrado, Il Cuoco Galante (1801 ed.). Artusi (1891) was not first

    atlas 6.17

  16. 1825

    Written downD

    Ancestor in the oldest Austrian cookbook checked: Anna Hofbauer's Allgemeines österreichisches oder neuestes Wiener Kochbuch has 'Dampfnudeln' (no Germknödel).

    Allgemeines österreichisches oder neuestes Wiener Kochbuch (Leeds University Library copy), Anna Hofbauer; Internet Archive b21525936

  17. 1829

    Written downD

    Ján Čaplovič (first ethnographic synthesis of the Slovaks, early 19th c.) describes halušky, likened to Nockerl or macaroni, eaten by Slovaks with tvaroh or bryndza and 'needing a good stomach'.

    Stoličná 2002 (as above), fn. 16, Rastislava Stoličná, citing Ján Čaplovič

  18. c. 1830

    Written downS

    The Lyonnais pike quenelle is credited to the pastry cook Charles Morateur in the 1830s, when Dombes/Saône pike were overabundant. Charcutier Joseph Moyne refined it later in the 19th century, and the spoon-moulded shape came in the 1920s (Moyne, Rousseau).

    Histoire de la quenelle de Lyon, la vraie, celle qui se mange, Florent Deligia, Lyon Capitale, 4 Jan 2019

  19. 1830

    Written downD

    Small flour-and-butter or suet dumplings simmered in meat stews and soups (pepper pot, clam soup, soups with dumplings) and 'Paste for meat dumplins'. The technique was established in Anglo-American cookery, but these recipes do not use chicken.

    The Virginia House-wife (Washington: P. Thompson, 4th ed. 1830); Directions for Cookery (Philadelphia, 1837), Mary Randolph; Eliza Leslie; scans on Internet Archive

  20. 1833

    Written downD

    Rettigová's cookbook (German edition 'Die Haus-Köchin', Königgrätz & Prague; archive.org dates it 1833, OCR of title page reads 1853) has '24. Speckknödel': diced roll (Semmel) fried with bacon, a second diced roll soaked in cream with eggs, flour added, boiled in the meat broth. A bread-roll-and-flour dumpling ancestor, but with bacon/meat and shaped as balls; no plain Semmel-/Serviettenknödel in the index.

    Die Haus-Köchin ... von Magd. Dobr. Rettig, Zweyte vermehrte Auflage (Leeds University Library copy), Magdalena Dobromila Rettigová; Internet Archive (b21537021)

  21. 1837

    Written downS

    Avdeeva: frozen pelmeni "become stones"

    Pelmeni

  22. 1839

    Written downD

    'A Chicken Pot-Pie': fowls cut into joints, layered in a lard-and-flour-rubbed porridge-pot or oven with thin-rolled squares of paste, ham, eggs, water or veal gravy and floured butter, under a crust. 'People who are fond of pot-pies universally prefer a good deal of gravy.' 'A Chicken Pie' layers 'the chickens and dumplings' (paste squares) the same way. Kentucky; a precursor of rolled dumplings with chicken.

    The Kentucky Housewife (Cincinnati: Shepard & Stearns, 1839), Lettice Bryan; scan on Internet Archive (kentuckyhousewif0000unse)

  23. 1844

    Written downS

    Tatar böreği; "mantı" as layered dough; piruhi. 1844 Tatar böreği without garlic yoghurt; in 1880, "mantı" is a layered-dough dish, plus a cheese piruhi

    Melceü't-Tabbâhîn (1844, first printed Ottoman cookbook); an 1880 cookbook

  24. 1844

    Written downA

    Primary, opened: Berggren's French-Arabic phrasebook, article 'Cuisine', no. 19 'koubbé ... boulettes de viande creuses en dedans, mets favori des Arabes': coarse wheat (burghul) flour kneaded with minced meat into a very stiff paste, formed into balls filled with fat, pepper, salt; "le plus souvent cuites dans l'eau, et quelquefois frites ou grillées". Lists kinds: baked on a tray (bi-l-fourn), with chard and sour milk, with green broad beans, spinach, chickpeas, carrots, squash and pomegranate juice, grilled; quotes a folk verse "we would all be dead without kubbé". Collected in Syria (Berggren travelled there 1821-22).

    Guide français-arabe vulgaire des voyageurs et des Francs en Syrie et en Égypte (Upsal, 1844), cols. c. 260-262, s.v. Cuisine, Jacob Berggren

  25. 1846

    Written downD

    Early matzo-ball recipe in The Jewish Manual

    atlas 6.22

  26. 1852

    Written downD

    Lisboa (1852) on hallaca 'de rigor' at Nochebuena in Caracas, 'especie de pastel de carne con pasas'. Café Español 1857 adverts incl. 'hallacas de pato trufadas para la Nochebuena'. Hotel París 1877–81.

    La hayaca en Venezuela (from El libro de la Navidad en Venezuela), Rafael Cartay, Fundación para la Cultura Urbana

  27. 1854

    Written downD

    Giovanni Vialardi, cook to the House of Savoy, prints several recipes: 'Zuppa di agnelotti al sugo' (no. 39, pasta sheet, farce dropped in lines, covered, pressed with the fingers, cut round), 'Agnelotti alla borghese' (no. 40, farce of cooked veal, beef or fowl) and a chapter of 'Agnolotti' (truffled, di magro, alla casalinga).

    Trattato di cucina, pasticceria moderna, credenza e relativa confettureria (Torino, 1854), Giovanni Vialardi; digitised by Internet Archive

  28. 1855

    Written downD

    Pelmeni recipe in Ignati Radetsky's Gastronomes' Almanac

    atlas 6.14

  29. 1859

    Written downA

    Primary, opened: at Sidon a servant is "braying wheat with a pestle in a mortar, to make kibby, the national dish of the Arabs"; kibbet samak (fish kibbeh); usually mutton with sheep-tail fat, pounded, baked in a copper dish (vol. 1, pp. 134-135).

    The Land and the Book, vol. 1 (Harper, New York, 1859), pp. 134-135, William M. Thomson

  30. 1859

    Written downD

    Božena Němcová, 'Kraje a lesy ve Zvolensku' (first published 1859) lists 'halušky s bryndzou' among festive dishes and is the first to call them a 'national, Slavic dish'; A. Šustek, 'Bryndzové halušky a zvara', Národnie noviny 10 Oct 1903 uses the full name; T. Vansová's cookbook (1914) calls bryndzové halušky 'the most popular national dish'. Ján Babilon's first Slovak-language cookbook (Pest 1870, c. 1500 recipes) has NO bryndzové halušky.

    Stoličná 2002 (as above), fn. 18, 19, 23, 24, Rastislava Stoličná

  31. 1866

    Written downD

    Miguel María Lisboa's primary text, Relação de uma viagem a Venezuela, Nova Granada e Equador (Brussels, 1866), is on Internet Archive (DELTA53989FA). I tried to open it, but it is a 580 MB image-only PDF with no text layer and I could not search it.

    Relação de uma viagem a Venezuela, Nova Granada e Equador, Miguel Maria Lisboa (Conselheiro Lisboa)

  32. c. 1871

    LegendD / L

    Xiaolongbao at Rihuaxuan, Nanxiang (first called "Nanxiang da rou mantou"). The single inventor, Huang Mingxian, is restaurant lore

    atlas 6.2, §7.6

  33. 1871

    Written downD

    Recipe '10. Uszka do barszczu': square of egg-and-water dough folded into a 'chusteczka' and its two corners joined into an ear (uszko), filled with chopped beef/roast, boiled and served in barszcz; 'w post' (fasting days) the filling is dried mushrooms. Wikisource transcribes the 8th edition (Warsaw, 1871); the book first appeared in 1860.

    365 obiadów za 5 złotych (wyd. 8, Warszawa 1871), rozdz. II 'Uszka do barszczu', s. 40, Lucyna Ćwierczakiewiczowa; Drukarnia A. Pajewskiego; Wikisource (pl), scans on Commons

  34. 1879

    Written downS

    Germknödel descends from the Dampfnudel (first mentioned 1698; first recipe 'aufgegangene Nudel' in the Neues Salzburgisches Kochbuch 1718); the word Germknödel first appears in Prato's 1879 edition ('gesottene Germknödel' with Powidl on the side); the first Powidl-FILLED Germknödel is a 'Mohnknödel' recipe in the Wiener Hausfrauenzeitung, 1897; Bohemian cookbooks long lack the dish, so the 'Bohemian origin' may be a later myth.

    Die Suche nach dem perfekten Germknödel (Substack, paywalled; only the search-engine summary was readable), Tobias Mueller, Gruß aus der Küche

  35. 1879

    Written downD

    'Stewed Chicken': cut-up chicken boiled with slices of middling 'till nearly done. Then put in the dumplings, made like biscuit but rolled thin, and let them boil till done', with gravy thickened by butter, flour and cream. Also 'Chicken Soup ... Some dumplings made like biscuits are very nice in it.' This is the rolled 'slick' style in a dated Southern cookbook.

    Housekeeping in Old Virginia (Louisville: John P. Morton, 1879), Marion Cabell Tyree (ed.); Cornell copy on Internet Archive (cu31924003566035)

  36. 1885

    Written downD

    1885 Beirut cookbook (Khalil Khattar Sarkis, Ustadh al-Tabbakhin) describes shishbarak: small meat/onion/coriander dumpling cooked in broth and sour milk (reported in Actes du 8e Congrès int. des orientalistes, Brill 1891).

    Actes du huitième congrès international des orientalistes (1891), pp. 366, 376 — via Wikipedia 'Joshpara', Brill

  37. 1885

    Written downD

    1885 Beirut cookbook Ustadh al-Tabbakhin (Khalil Khattar Sarkis) gives 15 kibbeh recipes; al-Asadi's Aleppo encyclopedia (1971/1981) lists 58 kinds.

    Pitts & Kabalan, in Making Levantine Cuisine (UT Press, 2021) — via Wikipedia 'Kibbeh', Graham Auman Pitts & Kenza Kabalan

  38. 1890

    Written downD

    'Gesottene Germ-Knödel': fairly firm yeast dough (flour, yeast, yolks, lard, milk) shaped into large Knödel, risen again, boiled in salted water, torn open, buttered and served WITH Powidl or Zwetschkenpfeffer (not filled). Read in the 21st edition (Graz 1890; preface to 1st ed. dated Graz, August 1858).

    Die süddeutsche Küche auf ihrem gegenwärtigen Standpunkte, 21. Auflage, p. 421, Katharina Prato (Edle von Scheiger); Graz; Internet Archive / Google Books scan bub_gb_fu0qAAAAYAAJ

  39. c. 1890

    Written downS

    'Quenelle de brochet à la lyonnaise' first recorded in Joseph Favre's Dictionnaire universel de cuisine (1890s).

    search-result summary of Lyon food sites (weblyonnais.com, cecilecooks.com); Favre volume containing Q not found on IA, unverified

  40. 1893

    TravelledS

    Tilak makes Ganesh Chaturthi a public festival and modak spreads widely

    atlas 6.10

  41. 1896

    Written downA

    Primary, opened: under 'Trong' — "Bánh ― bánh lọc. Hai thứ bánh làm bằng bột lọc, trong suốt như gương." ("bánh trong, bánh lọc: two kinds of cake made of bột lọc [refined starch], transparent as a mirror"). Attests the name bánh lọc and the translucent starch wrapper; does not mention filling or Huế.

    Đại Nam quấc âm tự vị, Tome II, PDF p. 497 (Wikisource transcription), Huỳnh Tịnh Của (Paulus Của), Imprimerie Rey, Curiol & Cie, Saigon

  42. 1897

    Written downD

    'Gekochte Germ-Knödel' (apple-sized yeast dumplings boiled in salted water, buttered, with Zwetschkenröster or Powidl, or topped with grated gingerbread or poppy seed; torn with a fork, never cut) and 'Böhmische, mit Mohn gefüllte Germknödel' (filled with poppy-seed filling, topped with poppy seed and sugar and brown butter). Read in the 6th edition 1910; 1st edition Innsbruck 1897.

    Die österreichische Küche, 6. Auflage, p. 357-358 (Germspeisen), Marie von Rokitansky; Innsbruck; Internet Archive 'die-osterreichische-kuche'

Era 06 · 1900 – today

Modern & global

Dumplings follow people

Migrants carry dumplings to new cities and new ones are invented there: dim sim in Melbourne, gyoza as Japanese street food, momo on a Kathmandu roadside. In the 21st century, governments begin to protect them by name, as heritage.

  1. 1900

    Written downS

    Old-Polish encyclopedia: in Polish houses red barszcz was served 'z „uszkami i rurą”' (with uszka and marrow bone); describes custom, no date for uszka.

    Encyklopedia staropolska ilustrowana, t. I, hasło 'Barszcz', Zygmunt Gloger; Wikisource (pl)

  2. 1925

    Written downD

    Milena Jesenská's 'Dobrý knedlík ke svíčkové': milk, yolks, 27 dkg flour, two diced fried rolls (housky), butter and beaten whites, boiled in a napkin for 3/4 hour. Earliest text found and opened that is unambiguously today's flour-and-roll log dumpling served with svíčková.

    Mileniny recepty (Pražská akciová tiskárna, 1925), p. 66, Wikisource (cs), from Národní knihovna ČR scan, Milena Jesenská

  3. 1928

    SoldS

    Kiyoken (Yokohama) starts selling shūmai to station passengers (per MAFF)

    atlas 6.5

  4. 1928 / c. 1945

    SoldS

    "Dim sim" attested 1928. The modern form was developed c. 1945 by William Wing Young, Melbourne Chinatown

    atlas 6.28

  5. 1935

    Written downD

    First printed cepelinai recipes in Ką valgome?. Mass popularity came after WWII via Soviet canteens (S)

    atlas 6.15, §7.10

  6. c. 1942

    TravelledS

    Kamal Ratna Tuladhar sees his first roadside momo shop in Kathmandu

    atlas 6.8

  7. Post-1945

    TravelledD

    Gyoza popularised in Japan by Kwantung Army soldiers and settlers repatriated from Manchuria. This is popularisation, not first appearance (see 1689)

    T&F 2024

  8. 20th c.

    Written downD

    Christmas Eve 'czysty rosół grzybowy z uszkami' and 'barszcz czysty z uszkami z kaszy' explicitly labelled 'Potrawa wigilijna' (interwar cookbook); confirms the Wigilia association, which the 1871 recipe does not state.

    109 potraw (Rosół grzybowy z uszkami; Barszcz z uszkami z kaszy), Wikisource (pl)

  9. 1974 / 2008

    ProtectedD

    Tortellini filling lodged with the Bologna Chamber of Commerce (7 Dec 1974); full recipe 15 Apr 2008

    atlas 6.17

  10. 2002 / 2010

    ProtectedD

    Idrijski žlikrofi: national TSG 2002; EU TSG, Reg. (EU) No 31/2010 (14 Jan 2010), the first Slovenian TSG

    atlas 6.16

  11. 2009

    ProtectedD

    EU PGI Raviole du Dauphiné, Reg. (EC) No 964/2009 (15 Oct 2009)

    atlas 6.19

  12. 2009

    ProtectedD

    EU PGI Schwäbische Maultaschen, Reg. 991/2009 (22 Oct 2009)

    atlas 6.18

  13. 2016

    ProtectedD

    EU PGI Culurgionis d'Ogliastra (28 Sep 2016; OJ L 262, 29 Sep 2016)

    atlas 6.17

And now

The record is still being written

Many dumplings in the atlas still have no dated source. Each one that gets found moves a dish from “unverified” onto this line. How we grade the evidence ·Read it as a journey