Believe it or Not

oldbob

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Where did those eveyday phrases come from???

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 1500's:

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, 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.

(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 left overs 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.

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


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