Technical Difficulties

I've studied european food history, and particularly medieval, so I can't really comment on other cultures, but most people have a very mistaken idea what pre-industrial people actually ate. sugar was well-known(one of Alexander the Great's generals wrote about it) hence it was sometimes called Indian salt in French household books (the word sugar comes from Sanskrit). It was used extensively for medicines and, like salt, for preservation of food. Sugar was very expensive but it was sprinkled on top of almost all dishes savory and sweet. Of course, anyone who cooks medieval knows the favorite sauces were sweet and sour. Puddings, custards, candied nuts, etc. were served frequently. Other foods were sweetened with grape juice/wine and grape must as well as dried fruits. Mind you, I'm not talking about royalty here, these recipes are from household books of the bourgeois - the most famous is Le Menagier de Paris, but there are lots of them. As far as honey, in France, England,& Italy, honey was not a popular sweetener after the Romans left.(Romans knew sugar too, but preferred honey - sweets were still very common, see Apicius).