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From: "Phyllis Ryerse" <>
Subject: [RYERSON-L] Life in the 1500's -- omygosh!!
Date: Fri, 21 May 1999 10:31:35 -0400

> Life in the 1500's: (or things we would never know without the internet!!)

> Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in
> May and were still smelling pretty good by June. However, they were
> starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the
> b.o.
>
>Baths equaled 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 - took
their baths in the same water!
By that time 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
> pets...dogs, cats and other small animals, mice, rats, 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. So, they found if they made beds with
> big
> posts and hung a sheet over the top, it solved that problem.
Hence those beautiful big 4 poster beds with canopies.

> The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt,
> hence the saying "dirt poor".
>

> The wealthy had slate floors which would get slippery in the winter when
> wet. So they spread thresh 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
> at the entry way, hence a "thresh hold".
>

> They cooked in the kitchen in a big kettle that always hung over the
> fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot.
> They mostly ate vegetables and didn't 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 in there for a month. Hence the rhyme: peas porridge hot, peas
> porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old."
>

> Sometimes they could obtain pork and would feel really special when that
> happened. When company came over, they would bring out some bacon and
> hang it to show it off. It was a sign of wealth and that a man "could
> really bring home the bacon." They would cut off a little to share with
> guestsand would all sit around and "chew the fat."
>

> Those with money had plates made of pewter. Food with a high acid
> content
> caused some of the lead to leach onto the food. This happened most often
> with tomatoes, so they stopped eating tomatoes...for 400 years.
>
> Most people didn't have pewter plates, but had trenchers - a piece of
> wood with the middle scooped out like a bowl. Trenchers were never
> washed
> and a lot of times worms got into the wood. After eating off wormy
> trenchers, they would get "trench mouth."
>

> ;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 whiskey. 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 they started running out of places to bury
> people. So, they would dig up coffins and would take their bones to a
> house and re-use the grave. In reopening these coffins, one 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 their wrist and 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 to listen for the bell. Hence on the
> "graveyard shift" they would know that someone was "saved by the bell"
> or he was a "dead ringer".
>

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• [RYERSON-L] Life in the 1500's -- omygosh!! by "Phyllis Ryerse" <>