Piss poor and other sayings that came
from the 1500s...
Where did piss poor come from? They
used to use urine to tan animal skins, so families used to all pee in
a pot and then once a day it was taken and 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" and 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
whiskey. 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 History was boring!!!
