A Little Bit Of History...

[Bazza454]

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 odour. 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 the 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 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, they would hang up their bacon to show it 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 "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."

And that's the truth... Now, whoever said that History was boring ! ! !

[michele]

Well when its taught to you that way its not boring at all I learnt something .. ;-)

[Hymer C 9.]

I enjoyed reading that thank you, I am going to print it off for the grandson he will probably pick and remember more information off that than a whole history lesson. Carol.

 

 

 

[CliveH]

Nice one Bazza

[BGD]

Nice one - very good stuff, and brings history to life.

 

Not sure about the historial validity of all of them though - as there's at least one which I know is very dodgy - the "wake" one.

 

I understood its origin came from the Norse "wacke", which was the toast/offering ceremony to the Norse gods by the villagers after a member of their community had died, so the gods would help that persons soul on its journey to Valhala. And this was a lot earlier than the 16th century.

 

Just a thought.....

 

 

Cheers,

 

Bruce.

 

 

 

[breakaleg]

the two finger salute, comes from the wars with france during agincore (pardon the spelling) the french generals would pay a bonus to any man who would bring back the two bow fingers of our archers, so we would taunt them by holding up our two fingers.

(nothing changes much, does it?)

pete

[Thai Bry]

"The Rule of Thumb."

Rumour has it that this was reputedly said by a judge, where you could beat your wife with a stick provided that the stick was no wider than your thumb.

Urban myth I think, but?????

Thai

[michele]

Don't you Butt me young man :D hope have have a big one cause i,m telling Mrs Thai.

 

How about old rope apparently the hangman used to save the rope he hung people with. Now if the person was nortorious people would want to buy the rope so the rope got longer & longer Money for old Rope..

da dahhhhhh ;-)

[carolh]

ok my contribution

 

cold enough to 'freeze the balls of a brass monkey'

 

In Napoleonic times the 'monkey' was a stand for cannon balls made of brass - on gun ships - the balls sat in the hollows and when it was cold the monkey would contract and the balls would fall out!

 

we live and learn

carol

[BGD]

There really are a million of these knocking about - but sometimes it's worth checking on Snopes.com, or one of the many other internet "Myth-Buster" websites before you swallow the explanation........

 

 

 

[breakaleg]

how can you be sure that snopes.com have got it right?

pete :-D :-D

[J9withdogs]

I used to work as a printer in a Victorian living museum.

 

There are lots of phrases which apparently come from printing such as:

 

Mind your p's and q's - because the type blocks are easily confused for those letters

 

To coin (or quoin) a phrase - quoins are the expanding blocks that hold the rows of type in the press

 

Out of sorts - 'sorts' was another name for type

 

 

[breakaleg]

i used to do printing at school, we were all very well behaved, because the standard punishment was sorting out the type what had been spilt on the floor into the right order.

pete

[BGD]

J9 - another one that came for the printing industry is "upper case" and lower case letters".

 

The newspaper typesetters who laid out the raised metal letters by hand and fitted them into a frame (which would then rotate in the printing press against an inked roller to print the paper), used to have the frame in the middle of their table, with the cases containing capital letters in the various fonts they could choose from placed above the rack, and the non-capital letters below the frame.

 

Also, because when the printing presses were running to print the newspaper, after the roller had applied the wet ink to the metal letters held in their frame and the frame had transferred it to the paper, the roll of paper would then pass through one or more heated rollers to dry the ink, before the paper roll was cut into sheets and collated. Because this process happened very quickly, the newspapers were still hot if the packers picked them off the press machine as soon as they were produced - we still say "hot news" and "hot off the press" to refer to news of something which has only just happened.

 

 

[J9withdogs]

Well after my time, Bruce

 

I was working a Columbian press dated 1870!

 

Oh and another one -

 

'To come a cropper' from the Cropper printing press of that era.

 

It was so vicious it chopped your fingers off if you to slow getting your hand out of the way when taking out one sheet of paper & putting in the next. That's why I type so slowly now...*-)

[Mick H.]

Another one!

 

Bless you,when someone sneezes you say Bless you because when you sneeze you close your eyes and open your mouth and the devil jumps in.

 

Mick H.