Why is cooked cow known as beef, cooked pig known as pork, cooked sheep called mutton but lamb is still lamb?

Question

Why do we bother to call animals different names when they are cooked?

Answer 1

blame the normans.the diidnt like sliced pig sandwiches, or cow and yorkshire pud.

Answer 2

It's all down to 1066 and all that. The French speaking Normans gave their words to the meat - beef from boeuf, mutton from mouton and pork from porc. The English speaking peasants who tended the live animals gave them English names - cow, sheep and pig. Can't account for lamb though - the exception proves the rule.

Answer 3

Beef, pork, and mutton are words derived from French. After the Battle of Hastings, French became the language of the nobility in England, but the peasants were still speaking English. So, nobles ate meat, therefore the names of meat are derived from French. The peasants raised the animals, and the animal names are derived from Old English.

Answer 4

It is English.. so many rules that confused us ( we learned English as second language)

To your question No. 2, ...only when I speak English, I have to be careful of what I want to refer.. the animal or the meat of that animal. In Chinese we don't change the animals names but add a word "meat" at the back.. so.. when the animal is alive, we call it pig or sheep, when they got killed or being cooked, we refer it as "pig meat" or "sheep meat".

Answer 5

Isn't lamb the cooked name for sheep? If not, isnt it another type of sheep?
Probably the English thought up the cooked names and the Welsh/Scottish/Irish thought that they prefer it to be called lamb.

Answer 6

Sheep over a year old is called mutton. Sheep under a year old is called lamb.

Answer 7

When I lived on my Granddad's Welsh farm, we had Dairy cows - which supplied the milk and a Beef herd - which were cattle reared for slaughter, i.e. beef.
Pigs being reared for meat were called Porkers.
Mutton is sheep over one year old, and a much nicer flavour than lamb, which are youngsters.
Hope this all helps.

Answer 8

Cooking has nothing to do with it. You buy raw beef, mutton, lamb, goat, pork, bacon.

I have never asked the butcher for a pound of cow, or a joint of pig for roasting.

Answer 9

I think beef and pork are really old English words for the actual animals.

Answer 10

thats why in india we just ask are you veg oe non-veg.end off it's plain and simple just that only some restaurents serve all the non-veg meat's and some don't like some dont serve pork and beef.
i hope i'm making sence to you.pork is not eaten by most in india,cow is like worshiped by many in india.so it's like a toss of a coine there.

Answer 11

I thought mutton was a 54 year old tart with a skirt up to her butt, 3 inch white stiletto's and peroxide blonde hair!

(and not offence to anyone 'young' who has peroxide blonde hair or wears 3 inch stiletto's!)