You might find the origin of these sayings interesting:
They used to use
urine to tan animal skins, so families used to all pee in a pot & then once
a day it was taken & Sold to the tannery.......if you had to do this to
survive you were "Piss Poor"
But worse than
that were the really poor folk who couldn't even afford to buy a pot......they
"didn't have a pot to piss in" & were the lowest of the low
The next time
you are washing your hands and complain because the water temperature isn't
just how you like it, think about how things used to be. Here are some facts
about the 1500s:
Most people got
married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and they still
smelled pretty good by June.. However, since they were starting to smell .
...... . Brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor. 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 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 entrance-way. Hence: a thresh hold.
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 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 the 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.
