From: 
        Nzx3turbo@aol.com
     To: 
        mrdamone@bellsouth.net




  Life in the 1500s:
  Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May
  and were still smelling okay by the following month.  However they were
  starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body
  odor.

  Baths equaled a big tub filled with hot water that the entire household was
  expected to use.  The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean
  water, then all other sons and men, then the last were the women and finally
  the children. Last of all 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."

  In the 16th century, houses had thatched roofs, thick straw, piled high, 
  with no wood underneath. It was the only place or animals to get warm, so all 
  the pets--dogs, cats and other small animals--mice, rats, bugs, etc., lived in
  the roof. When it rained, it became slippery and sometimes  the animals would
  slip and fall out of the roof, which led to the saying,

  "It's raining cats and dogs."

  With the thatched roofs, there was nothing to stop things from falling into
  the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and animal
  droppings could really mess up your nice, clean bed. So, people found if they
  built a bed with big posts and hung a sheet over the top, it addressed that
  problem. So was born, the big beautiful, four-poster canopy beds.

  Floors were 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 (clean straw) on the floor to help
  keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they kept adding more thresh
  until, when the door was opened, the thresh would start slipping outside. A
  piece of wood was placed at the entry way, hence a "threshold."

  People in the 16th century 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.

  The average person 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, which started the rhyme:
  
  "Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot, nine days old."

  On rare occasions, people could obtain pork and would feel really special.
  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 guests and 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 into the food. This happened most often
  with tomatoes so, thinking they were poisonous, people stopped eating
  tomatoes-for 400 years.

  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 of the lead content
  and the alcohol would sometimes knock the drinker out for a couple of days.
  Some of these unfortunate imbibers would pass out at the side of the road, where
  someone walking along 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, waiting to see if they would wake up. Hence the
  custom of holding a "wake."

  Being a small country, England started running out of places to bury the dead.
  So, coffins would be dug up and the occupants' bones would be taken to a house
  and the grave reused. In reopening these coffins, one out of 25 coffins was 
  found to have scratch marks on the inside. They realized they had been burying
  people alive. It became custom to tie a string to the deceased wrist, 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 to the bell. Hence, on the 
  "graveyard shift," they would know that someone was "saved by the bell," or he 
  was a "dead ringer."

  You learn new things every day. Or in this case, you learn old things, really
  old things, every day.


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