Windswept Rains

Life on the 1500's

LIFE IN THE 1500'S

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 the1500s:

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, the women and 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, 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) floor to help keep their
footing. As the winter wore on, they added more thresh until, 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."

(Getting quite an education, aren't you?)

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, would hang up 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
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 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."

And that's the truth. Whoever said History was boring ??