DOMESTIC LIFE IN ENGLAND

 Norah Lofts, BCA 1970.

The home and family in history are a fascinating subject area, but one which few writers have touched. Norah Lofts, the author of many popular historical novels, vividly describes in this book the day-to-day life of people in England from the time of the Norman Conquest to the present day (1970); their houses, clothes, table manners, furniture, food, medicine, sanitation (Or lack of it), attitudes to the family and neighbours – all the details of ordinary living which together bring the past alive again.

Many people know that the oyster, now a gastronomic luxury, was called ‘food for the poor’ in the nineteenth century.; but how many of us realise that the modern ‘curfew’ derives from the Norman French couvrefeu – the practice of damping down a fire at dusk in the days when houses were built of wood and pitifully vulnerable to fire? Or that, even in Tudor times, people avoided building houses with a south-facing aspect since plague germs were thought to be carried on the wind from the south?

This highly readable account of English domesticity through the centuries is complemented by superb illustrations and contemporary accounts, some charming, some horrifying, but all a part of the times in which they were written.

 The dust jacket is split, worn and rolled on a couple of edges although the front and rear illustrations by George Morland and Augustus John are largely intact. There is very slight movement in the boards, although the book is still tightly bound, and minor light tinting to the edge of some pages. The book has 16 pages of colour and 125 black and white illustrations.

The endpapers are illustrated with what seems to be a tavern scene. An excellent, well written account on the subject. As the book is heavy, parcel or surface mail might be the order of the day.