Sweet and clean? : bodies and clothes in early modern England

Author:

North, Susan, 1956-

Format:

Book

Language:

English

Imprint:

Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2020

Subject:

Clothing and dress - Great Britain - History - 17th century
Bathing customs - Europe - History - 17th century
Hygiene - England - History - 17th century
Clothing and dress - Great Britain - History - 16th century
Clothing and dress - Great Britain - History - 18th century
Bathing customs - England - History - 17th century
Bathing customs - England - History - 18th century
Bathing customs - England - History - 16th century
Hygiene - England - History - 16th century
Hygiene - England - History - 18th century
Medicine - History - 17th century
Medicine - History - 18th century

ISBN:

9780198856139 and 019885613X

Description:

xiv, 341 pages : illustrations (chiefly color) ; 24 cm

Bibliographic Note:

Includes bibliographical references and index

Contents:

1. Digging the dirt in the pursuit of cleanliness -- 2. Manners and health -- 3. Clothing and disease -- 4. Clean bodies -- 5. Wearing linens -- 6. Owning linens -- 7. Manufacturing linens -- 8. Sewing linens -- 9. Washing linens -- 10. More washing -- 11. Washing bodies -- 12. Sweet and clean

Summary:

"Sweet and Clean? challenges the widely held beliefs on bathing and cleanliness in the past. For over thirty years, the work of the French historian, George Vigarello, has been hugely influential on early modern European social history, describing an aversion to water and bathing, and the use of linen underwear as the sole cleaning agent for the body. However, these concepts do not apply to early modern England. Sweet and Clean? analyses etiquette and medical literature, revealing repeated recommendations to wash or bathe in order to clean the skin. Clean linen was essential for propriety but advice from medical experts was contradictory. Many doctors were convinced that it prevented the spread of contagious diseases, but others recommended flannel for undergarments, and a few thought changing a fever patient's linens was dangerous. The methodology of material culture helps determine if and how this advice was practiced. Evidence from inventories, household accounts and manuals, and surviving linen garments tracks underwear through its life-cycle of production, making, wearing, laundering, and final recycling. Although the material culture of washing bodies is much sparser, other sources, such as the Old Bailey records, paint a more accurate picture of cleanliness in early modern England than has been previously described. The contrasting analyses of linen and bodies reveal what histories material culture best serves. Finally, what of the diseases-plague, smallpox, and typhus-that cleanliness of body and clothes were thought to prevent? Did following early modern medical advice protect people from these illnesses?" -- Provided by publisher

Collection:

BGC Monograph Stacks

Call Number:

GT735 .N67 2020

Available

c.1