Here are some facts about the 1500s:
They used to use urine to tan animal
skins, so families used to all pee in a pot & then once a day it was taken
& Sold to the tannery.......if you had to do this to survive you were
"Piss Poor"
But worse than that were the really
poor folk who couldn't even afford to buy a pot......they "didn't have a
pot to piss in" & were the lowest of the low. The next time you are
washing your hands and complain because the water temperature isn't just how
you like it, think about how things used to be.
Most people got married in June
because they took their yearly bath in May, and they still smelled pretty good
by June.. However, since they were starting to smell . ...... . Brides carried
a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor. Hence the custom today of carrying
a bouquet when getting Married.
Baths consisted of a big tub filled
with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water,
then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children. Last
of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose
someone in it. Hence the saying, "Don't throw the baby out with the Bath
water!"
Houses had thatched roofs-thick
straw-piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to
get warm, so all the cats and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the
roof. When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip
and fall off the roof... Hence the saying "It's raining cats and
dogs."
There was nothing to stop things from
falling into the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and
other droppings could mess up your nice clean bed. Hence, a bed with big posts
and a sheet hung over the top afforded some protection. That's how canopy beds
came into existence.
The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy
had something other than dirt. Hence the saying, "Dirt poor." The
wealthy had slate floors that would get slippery in the winter when wet, so
they spread thresh (straw) on floor to help keep their footing. As the winter
wore on, they added more thresh until, when you opened the door, it would all
start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed in the entrance-way. Hence:
a thresh hold.
In those old days, they cooked in the
kitchen with a big kettle that always hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things
to the pot. They ate mostly vegetables and did not get much meat. They would
eat the stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and
then start over the next day. Sometimes stew had food in it that had been there
for quite a while. Hence the rhyme: Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas
porridge in the pot nine days old. Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made
them feel quite special. When visitors came over, they would hang up their
bacon to show off. It was a sign of wealth that a man could, "bring home
the bacon." They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all
sit around and chew the fat.
Those with money had plates made of
pewter. Food with high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the
food, causing lead poisoning death. This happened most often with tomatoes, so
for the next 400 years or so, tomatoes were considered poisonous.
Bread was divided according to
status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle,
and guests got the top, or the upper crust.
Lead cups were used to drink ale or
whisky. The combination would Sometimes knock the imbibers out for a couple of
days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them
for burial. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and
the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would
wake up. Hence the custom of holding a wake.
England is old and
small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people. So they
would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the
grave. When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have
scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people
alive... So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through
the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have
to sit out in the graveyard all night (the graveyard shift.) to listen for the
bell; thus, someone could be, saved by the bell or was considered a dead
ringer.
Thanks to Wally for the post
Very interesting!
No comments:
Post a Comment