Our Legal Heritage: King AEthelbert - King George III, 600 A.D. - 1776: June 2011 (Sixth) EditionReilly, S. A.
History
Our Legal Heritage: King AEthelbert - King George III, 600 A.D. - 1776: June 2011 (Sixth) Edition
Reilly, S. A.
Law -- England -- History
Since one loom could provide work for about six spinners, the weaver
had his wool spun by other spinners in their cottages. Sometimes the
master weaver had an apprentice or workman working and living with him,
who had free board and lodging and an annual wage. Then a fuller made
the cloth thick and dense by washing, soaping, beating, and agitating
it, with the use of a community watermill which could be used by anyone
for a fixed payment. The cloth dried through the night on a rack outside
the cottage. The weaver then took his cloth, usually only one piece, to
the weekly market to sell. The weavers stood at the market holding up
their cloth. The cloth merchant who bought the cloth then had it dyed or
dressed according to his requirements. Its surface could be raised with
teazleheads and cropped or sheared to make a nap. Some cloth was sold to
tailors to make into clothes. Often a weaver had a horse for travel, a
cow for milk, chickens for eggs, perhaps a few cattle, and some grazing
land. Butchers bought, slaughtered, and cut up animals to sell as meat.
Some was sold to cooks, who sold prepared foods. The hide was bought by
the tanner to make into leather. The leather was sold to shoemakers and
glovemakers. Millers bought harvested grain to make into flour. Flour
was sold to bakers to make into breads. Wood was bought by carpenters
and by coopers, who made barrels, buckets, tubs, and pails. Tilers,
oilmakers and rope makers also bought raw material to make into finished
goods for sale. Wheelwrights made ploughs, harrows, carts, and later
wagons. Smiths and locksmiths worked over their hot fires.
Games with dice were sometimes played. In winter, youths ice- skated
with bones fastened to their shoes. They propelled themselves by
striking the ice with staves shod with iron. On summer holydays, they
exercised in leaping, shooting with the bow, wrestling, throwing stones,
and darting a thrown spear. The maidens danced with timbrels. Since at
least 1133, children's toys included dolls, drums, hobby horses, pop
guns, trumpets, and kites.
The cold, indoors as well as outdoors, necessitated that people wear
ample and warm garments. Men and women of position dressed in long full
cloaks reaching to their feet, sometimes having short full sleeves. The
cloak generally had a hood and was fastened at the neck with a brooch.
Underneath the cloak was a simple gown with sleeves tight at the wrist
but full at the armhole, as if cut from the same piece of cloth. A
girdle or belt was worn at the waist. When the men were hunting or
working, they wore gown and cloak of knee length. Men wore stockings to
the knee and shoes. The fashion of long hair on men returned.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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