Sweet and Clean? : Bodies and Clothes in Early Modern England

"Sweet and Clean? Bodies and Clothes in Early Modern England challenges the widely held beliefs on bathing and cleanliness in the past. For over 30 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 practised. 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?" -- Oxford Scholarship Online "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 Cover Sweet and Clean?: Bodies and Clothes in Early Modern England Copyright Dedication Contents Acknowledgements Conventions, Measurements, and Abbreviations List of Figures 1: Digging the Dirt in the Pursuit of Cleanliness PART I: ADVICE 2: Manners and Health 3: Clothing and Disease 4: Clean Bodies PART II: PRACTICE 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 APPENDIX: List of surviving linens examined Shirts Smock/Shifts Night clothes Drawers Bibliography Archival Digital Archives Primary Published Sources Secondary Published Sources Index "How dirty were our ancestors, really? Academic history has persuaded us that everyone in the early modern era thought bathing was unhealthy, so they didn't do it. Sweet and Clean? challenges this view, using a range of fascinating evidence to tell a different story about the washing of bodies and scrubbing of clothes in early modern England."--Provided by publisher