some historic interesting junk

some interesting junk
 
There is an old Hotel/Pub in Marble Arch, London, which used to have
a gallows adjacent to it. Prisoners were taken to the gallows (after
a fair trial of course) to be hanged.
The horse-drawn dray, carting the prisoner, was accompanied by an
armed guard, who would stop the dray outside the pub and ask the
prisoner if he would like ''ONE LAST DRINK''.
If he said YES, it was referred to as ONE FOR THE ROAD.If he
declined, that prisoner was ON THE WAGON.
So there you go.. More bleeding history. 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 odour. 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. (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 leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight, 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
talking 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 and 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 realised they had been burying people alive. So they
would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, thread 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 ! ! ! So .. . .. get out
there and educate someone! Share these facts with a friend, like I
just did! !