old cliches
Ok, I thought this was so interesting.. I had actually read it before, but I wanted to share it with someone else. I'm not even sure if these stories are true, but they sound fairly believable to me.
Sayings Originating from the 1500s
Most people got married in June because they often took their yearly bath in May and were still smelling pretty good by June. However, they were on the verge of smelling, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the B.O.
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 to use the water was 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 where animals could get warm, so all sorts of pets 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." In fact, there really 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 that if they made beds with big posts and hung a sheet over the top, it addressed that problem. Hence those beautiful big four-poster beds with canopies.
The floor in most homes was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt, hence the saying "dirt poor."
The wealthy often had slate floors, and they would get slippery in the winter when wet. So they started spreading thresh on the floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they just kept adding more thresh and when you opened the door, it would actually start slipping outside. So a piece of wood was placed at the entryway to prevent this, hence a "thresh hold."
Dinner was usually 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 people could obtain pork and would feel really special when that happened. So 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, and food with a high acid content would cause some of the lead from the pewter to leach into the food. This happened most often with tomatoes, so people stopped eating tomatoes ... for 400 years. Most people didn't have these pewter plates, but had "trenchers" instead -- a piece of wood with the middle scooped out like a bowl. Trenchers were rarely washed, so worms often 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 eventually they started running out of places to bury people. So, they would dig up coffins and would take their bones to a house and reuse the grave. In reopening these coffins, one out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they assumed they had been accidentally burying people alive (probably after being mistaken for dead versus just knocked out from drinking out of lead cups!) So they thought to tie a string on the "dead" person's wrist and lead it through the coffin, up through the ground and tied to a bell. Someone would then sit out in the graveyard all night to listen for any bells. Hence, while on the "graveyard shift" they would know whether someone was "saved by the bell" or was a "dead ringer."
Sayings Originating from the 1500s
Most people got married in June because they often took their yearly bath in May and were still smelling pretty good by June. However, they were on the verge of smelling, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the B.O.
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 to use the water was 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 where animals could get warm, so all sorts of pets 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." In fact, there really 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 that if they made beds with big posts and hung a sheet over the top, it addressed that problem. Hence those beautiful big four-poster beds with canopies.
The floor in most homes was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt, hence the saying "dirt poor."
The wealthy often had slate floors, and they would get slippery in the winter when wet. So they started spreading thresh on the floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they just kept adding more thresh and when you opened the door, it would actually start slipping outside. So a piece of wood was placed at the entryway to prevent this, hence a "thresh hold."
Dinner was usually 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 people could obtain pork and would feel really special when that happened. So 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, and food with a high acid content would cause some of the lead from the pewter to leach into the food. This happened most often with tomatoes, so people stopped eating tomatoes ... for 400 years. Most people didn't have these pewter plates, but had "trenchers" instead -- a piece of wood with the middle scooped out like a bowl. Trenchers were rarely washed, so worms often 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 eventually they started running out of places to bury people. So, they would dig up coffins and would take their bones to a house and reuse the grave. In reopening these coffins, one out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they assumed they had been accidentally burying people alive (probably after being mistaken for dead versus just knocked out from drinking out of lead cups!) So they thought to tie a string on the "dead" person's wrist and lead it through the coffin, up through the ground and tied to a bell. Someone would then sit out in the graveyard all night to listen for any bells. Hence, while on the "graveyard shift" they would know whether someone was "saved by the bell" or was a "dead ringer."