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Here are some facts about the 1500's
Although these aren't specific to Wisconsin stories, most Wisconsinsites have a European heritage. Below are some facts about the 1500's, most if not all originating in Europe.
JUNE MARRIAGES
Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May and still smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor.
DON'T THROW THE BABY OUT WITH THE BATHWATER
Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then the sons and the other men, then the women, and finally the children. Last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty that you could actually lose someone in it-hence the saying "Don't throw the baby out with the bath water".
IT'S RAINING CATS AND DOGS
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 dogs and cats and other small animals, (bugs, rats, and mice) lived in the roof. When it rained it became slippery and sometime the animals would slip and fall off the roof-hence the saying "It's raining cats and dogs".
CANOPY BEDS
There was nothing to stop things from falling in the house. This posed a real problem in the bed room where bugs and other droppings could really mess up your nice clean bed. Hence a bed with big posts and a sheet hung over the bed afforded some protection. That's how canopy beds came into existence.
DIRT POOR
The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt, hence the saying "dirt poor".
THRESHOLD
The wealthy had slate floors that 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 in he entry way-hence, a "threshold".
PEASE PORRIDGE HOT
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 stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and add to these to start over the next day. Sometimes the 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".
BRINGING HOME THE BACON
Sometimes they would obtain pork, which made them feel quite special. When a visitor 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".
CHEWING THE FAT
They would cut off a little to share with guests and all sit around and "chew the fat". Those with money had plates made of pewter. Food with a high acid content caused some of the lead to leach into the floor, causing lead poisoning and death. This happened most often with tomatoes, so for the next 400 years or so, tomatoes were considered poisonous.
TRENCH MOUTH
Most people did not have pewter plates, but had trenchers, a piece of wood with the middle scooped out like a bowl. Often trenchers were made from stale paysan bread which was so old and hard that they could use them for some time. Trenchers were never washed and a lot of times worms and mold got into the wood and old bread. After eating off wormy moldy trenchers, one would get "trench mouth".
UPPER CRUST
Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottoms of the loaf, the family got the middle and the quests got the top, or "upper crust".
FUNERAL WAKES
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".
GRAVEYARD SHIFT, SAVED BY THE BELL, DEAD RINGER
England is old and small, they started running out of places to bury people. So they would dig up the coffins and take the bones to the "bone house" and reuse the grave. When reopening these coffins, one out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized that they had been burying people alive.
So they tied a string to the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would sit 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."
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