ES - todays history lesson

[Sharon R. Saroff]

There is a mention of tomatoes in this post.  Could we have a source
please?  I 'd like to post it to the SCA-Cooks Guild list.

Sindara


At 04:37 PM 6/17/99 -0500, you wrote:
>
>
>I don't know how true this is but it's interesting.
>
>	Alric
>
>> LIFE IN THE 1500s
>> 
>> 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.  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
>> pets...dogs, cats and other small animals, mice, rats, and 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 them from falling into the house.  This posed
>> a real problem in the bedroom where the 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 addressed 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
>> guests and would all sit around and "chew the fat."
>> 
>> Those with money had plates of pewter.  Food with a high acid content
>caused
>> some lead to leach into 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 the guest 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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