(no subject)
This is pretty interesting. 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.
Here are some facts about the 1500s:
Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May and still
smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell so 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
dogs, 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 really 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 the floor to help
keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they kept adding more thresh until
when you opened the door it would all start slipping outside. A piece of
wood was placed in the entranceway. Hence the saying 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 the 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 and 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 "upper crust."
Lead cups were used to drink ale or whisky. The
combination would sometimes knock them 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 thought 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."
And that's the truth... Now, whoever said that History
was boring!