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book rec! (nonfiction)
Jul. 25th, 2010 12:41 pmDorothy Hartley's Lost Country Life is one of those books I found while trawling through the tiny Central library, on a low shelf tucked away in the mostly ignored DA section on the third floor. (DA, for those that don't know Library of Congress call numbers, is British history.) It's a fairly old book, originally published in 1979; it appears that I am the first person to check it out since the library bought it, which is just depressing. I took it out alongside Folklore and Customs of Rural England, which I read first; Folklore and Customs is a brief general survey of...well, various folklore and customs of rural England, brief notes on the sometimes-superstitious traditions kept up in farming country up until about the first and second world wars, sometimes carried on into the U.S. and Canada via immigrants. Imagine my surprise to read the section on wassailing apple orchards and finding a mention of the practice being carried on in Yakima, Washington!
The title of Lost Country Life is something of a misnomer -- I went into it thinking it was going to be similar to Folklore and Customs of Rural England, which uses a lot of interviews and thus falls into a timespan of living memory, primarily the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, though it also goes back earlier. Hartley's book should probably have been titled Lost Medieval Country Life, because that's the period that's covered; the end stretch of her period is Elizabeth I's reign. The start date is a little murky; at a guess, I'd put it post-Roman Britain, although the period that's covered is largely after the Norman Conquest, but things change slowly in the country.
The book is a survey of everyday life in the medieval countryside, far away from cities. Hartley talks briefly about the nobility, but her concentration is on the peasant folk and the ordinary people of England. She describes the book as "a down-to-earth study of people, their animals, plants, and jobs, in the days when almost all of them lived on and from the land. It is not a history, being agricultural rather than academic." The bulk of the book is divided into chapters based on the months of the year, each one prefaced by Thomas Tusser's farming calendar, and describes briefly the activities that might have been carried out during that month, whether that be the harvest, the care of cattle, or the making of hedges. Hartley also discusses trade, travel, markets and fairs -- a very good general survey of everyday life that's usually ignored in favor of lords and ladies, kings and queens, knights, churchmen, and wars.
If you like that sort of thing, it's a fun read, and very good for writers who like pseudo-medieval fantasy. Lots of things to think about!
( Excerpt )
Definitely a good read; going on my to-buy list, because it also makes a good reference book.
The title of Lost Country Life is something of a misnomer -- I went into it thinking it was going to be similar to Folklore and Customs of Rural England, which uses a lot of interviews and thus falls into a timespan of living memory, primarily the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, though it also goes back earlier. Hartley's book should probably have been titled Lost Medieval Country Life, because that's the period that's covered; the end stretch of her period is Elizabeth I's reign. The start date is a little murky; at a guess, I'd put it post-Roman Britain, although the period that's covered is largely after the Norman Conquest, but things change slowly in the country.
The book is a survey of everyday life in the medieval countryside, far away from cities. Hartley talks briefly about the nobility, but her concentration is on the peasant folk and the ordinary people of England. She describes the book as "a down-to-earth study of people, their animals, plants, and jobs, in the days when almost all of them lived on and from the land. It is not a history, being agricultural rather than academic." The bulk of the book is divided into chapters based on the months of the year, each one prefaced by Thomas Tusser's farming calendar, and describes briefly the activities that might have been carried out during that month, whether that be the harvest, the care of cattle, or the making of hedges. Hartley also discusses trade, travel, markets and fairs -- a very good general survey of everyday life that's usually ignored in favor of lords and ladies, kings and queens, knights, churchmen, and wars.
If you like that sort of thing, it's a fun read, and very good for writers who like pseudo-medieval fantasy. Lots of things to think about!
( Excerpt )
Definitely a good read; going on my to-buy list, because it also makes a good reference book.