HOMELIFE
Home life
In early castles, life was far from comfortable. The wind whistled through wooden shutters in the windows and
most people slept on benches or on rough mistresses,oops mattresses in the great hall. But by the 1200s,
castles had well furnished bed chambers and living rooms, heated by large open fires and lit by candles. The
better rooms had glass windows and plastered walls hung with fine tapestries. Floors were covered with sweet
smelling herbs or rush matting.
1- The wardrobe
The top room in the lord's tower
was used by the lady's personal
servants. Linen and cloths were
stored in large chests.
2- Master bedroom
This had rush mats on the floor and
richly decorated walls. A lady in
waiting could sleep on the truckle
bed which was pulled out from
under the main bed.
3- The solar
This was the lords private living
room. After a hearty meal he might
retire here for a game of chess.
4- Basement
A trapdoor led from the solar room
to the basement. Weapons,coins
and other valuables might have
been kept here.
Reading and writing
Few people in the Middle
Ages knew how to read or
write. There were not
many schools and most
children never went to
one. Boys had more
opportunity to learn than
girls,
The lady, the wife of the lord, usually played an important part in
running the castle. She organised servants and entertained visiting
noblewomen. When the lord was away, she might inspect local farms
or organise supplies and repairs to the castle. Even so, it was still a
mans world, Women were believed to be inferior to men and, in some
areas, they could not own land or make a will.From the age of six or
seven, the children of nobles were often sent to live in another lord's
castle. Boys became pages and learned to fight. Girls learned how to
manage a household. Many marriages between nobles were arranged
when the children were still in their cradles, and most lords and ladies
were married by the time they were fourteen.
Entertainment
Travelling musicians called
jongleurs often visited castles
to entertain guests. Lords and
ladies also liked to play music,
sing and compose poetry
themselves. Listening to
storytellers' tales of romance
and chivalry, embroidery and
games of chess were other
popular pastimes.
Bath time
Only the richest people could enjoy
a soak in a hot bath. Wood for
heating the water, cloth to line the
tub, and bath oils all had to be paid
for. King John of England bathed
once a month and it cost him five
pence each time. (A labourer had to
work a whole week to earn this
amount.)
Rats, rats, rats
Rats were everywhere, in the
kitchens, in the cellars, in the
stables¦.. Rats destroyed stores of
grain and spread diseases. They
carried the fleas which spread the
deadly sickness called the plague.
Herbal remedies
In the Middle Ages, doctors often used
herbs to treat patients. Confrey was
meant to help broken bones mend more
quickly. Yarrow was applied to flesh
wounds to help stop bleeding.
Apart from ladies-in-waiting,
laundresses were the only other
women to work in the castle. The rest
of the jobs were done by men and
boys.
Folded bedding was put into barrels
and liquid soap poured through them.
They were then pounded with a
wooden bat to remove the dirt.
Soap was made from olive oil and
scented with herbs from the 700s in
southern Europe but was not widely
available in northern Europe until
much later. Often soap was made
locally from animal fat, wood ash and
soda.
Clean and healthy
People in the Middle Ages were much less fussy about living in smelly and dirty places than we are today. A
castle's toilets were little more than holes with stone seats, few rooms had running water, and baths were an
expensive luxury. Every now and then the castle was cleaned from top to bottom. Wisely the lord and lady
would leave for a week or two while the whole building was aired, scrubbed and swept. The horrible job of
cleaning the cesspits below the toilets was done by men called "gong farmers". Between 1347 and 1351 a
plague known as the Black Death killed about 25 million people in Europe and Asia. People knew nothing
about the germs which spread disease. Young women died giving birth and young men died of wounds they
received in battle. But if people escaped these disasters, they often lived to a ripe old age.
Trendsetters
In the early 1400s, the well dressed nobleman might wear a hat with a tail called a "liripipe" which draped over
his shoulder (1). In the 1450s knee length clothes lined with fur (2) became popular with the nobles while
merchants wore longer robes (3). Women's dresses often had long trains which had to be looped over the arm
(4) and hats were very tall (5). Short tunics and pointed shoes (6) were all the rage with the most fashionable
young men.
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2
3
4
5
6
Women often hid their hair beneath head-dresses. Some of these were shaped like animal horns and others like
butterflies wings. The "steeple hat" could be nearly a metre tall. It needed a wire frame to support it.Some
men's shoes were so pointed that they had to be tied back. Others had wooden platforms for walking through
muddy streets.
Working cloths
Peasants could not afford to buy
fancy cloths. Instead they wore
simple tunics and shifts, woollen
stockings, cloaks, straw hats and
caps. With frequent repairing these
clothes could last for many years.
There were no shops selling ready
made cloths so the rich paid tailors
to make the latest fashions.
Fashion was very important in the Middle Ages. Just as kings built castles to impress people, the wealthy
dressed in rich costumes to impress each other. On important occasions noblewomen wore jewels and gold
chains and brightly coloured clothes. Colours had different meanings. Blue meant you were in love, yellow
meant anger and grey meant sadness.
In the early Middle Ages, the rich wore fairly simple cloths. But from the 1100s fashions became more and
more elaborate. Just like today, fashions, including hats, shoes, hairstyles, tunics and coats varied from years to
year. Laws banning outrageous dressed were passed in many parts of Europe in the 1200s and 1300s but they
were usually ignored.
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