Where did piss poor come from?

NOW THIS IS A REAL EDUCATION
Us older people need to learn something new every day...

Just to keep the grey matter tuned up.

Where did "Piss Poor" come from? Interesting history.

They used to use urine to tan animal skins, so families used to all pee in a pot.

And then once it was full 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 1500's

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 odor.

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 the 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 and 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 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 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; “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 realized they had ben burying people alive.
So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead 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!!!

Velly interesting step back into history, thanks for sharing.

quote:

They "didn't have a pot to piss in" and were the lowest of the low.

If they were REALLY poor, they "didn't have a pot to piss in, nor a window to throw it out of".

The "upper crust" got "posh" accommodations. On voyages to India, the ship was headed easterly, and the sun - even in these low latitudes, would shine on the starboard side of the ship, making the already hot situation even warmer. So the expensive cabins were on the port side. On the return voyage, the reverse was true - desirable accommodations were on the starboard side. The expensive tickets were labelled "Portside Out, Starboard Home", abbreviated "P.O.S.H."

quote:

If they were REALLY poor, they "didn't have a pot to piss in, nor a window to throw it out of".

HMMM...........seems like if they were really poor, they would not throw out such a valuable commodity. But, certainly, being too poor to afford a window (or the heat loss associated with a window) is pretty poor.

Perhaps urine was not always marketable, if there was no tannery nearby, for example. Or if the tannery used oak bark or brains or whatever.

BTW, Harris Tweed used to be cured by soaking the wool in human urine. Considering the climate in the Hebrides, the cozy local pub must have been quite fragrant.

quote:

HMMM...........seems like if they were really poor, they would not throw out such a valuable commodity. But, certainly, being too poor to afford a window (or the heat loss associated with a window) is pretty poor.

I think the idea was hyperbole; if they didn't have a pot, not having a window was even worse - and they couldn't empty a non-existent pot out a non-existent window...

quote:

Originally posted by Rusty:

quote:

HMMM...........seems like if they were really poor, they would not throw out such a valuable commodity. But, certainly, being too poor to afford a window (or the heat loss associated with a window) is pretty poor.

I think the idea was hyperbole; if they didn't have a pot, not having a window was even worse - and they couldn't empty a non-existent pot out a non-existent window...

some of these sayings take on a life of their own. But it's always fun to learn origins, even if everything doesn't always make sense..

Sorry Corey; I was going to PM this to you until I read the rest of the posts.
see www.snopes.com/language/phrases/1500.asp
www.snopes.com/language/phrases/wagon.asp
scroll down to "origins"

Very entertaining. Much appreciated.

Here's one that I know is a fact.

The term "Pay the Devil" gets used all the time, like "pay the devil his due", "when your Father gets home you're going to pay the devil".

The term actually comes from the days of wooden cargo ship building (I learned this at the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath, Me.). Back in the day, wooden 4 masters were built with no large internal structures, basically they were completely hollow and put together with intricate chunks of wood that had to fit together precisely along the hull. One in particular, in the bow of the ship, was considered the most difficult and was done last. It held everything together and was nicknamed the "Devil" for it's difficulty.

Meanwhile, as the ship is being built, men are following along and "paying" the cracks with ancient sealants like pine pitch. Since the last piece in the ship structure was the Devil, Paying the Devil meant the ship was essentially finished. So the term "Pay the Devil" actually means "I'm done with a difficult task".

That's also the origin of the term "Between the Devil and the deep blue sea"

I am more familiar with a different ‘devil’ – in (old) nautical terms is the seam between any hull planks – usually sealed with some sort of caulk. So some poor sailor would have to be suspended over the water to recaulk the seams out in the middle of the ocean – that would put him ‘between the devil and the deep blue sea’

"The Devil"was also used for the two planks on either side of the keel.

and all that without antiperspirants/deodorants, oh the good old times ...

I always liked history this way a lot better than all them famous kings, generals and battles. But thinking back to my childhood (yes for some of you that's not that long ago in the 70s), we used a old farmhouse of a family friend for ski vacations. You had to go down in the basement (bare rock/clay walls/floor) to get water from a spring (no running water in the house, no HOT WATER. warm it up on the wood stove. The outhouse was outside (in the cold winter nights) and a chamberpot with lid was a greatly appreciated item. And someone had to get up in the morning getting that stove going.

Here in the Midwest, there is favorite expression
about a nice running car,

"I wouldn't be afraid to drive that car all the way to California"....

That was a favorite of my Dad's generation...born in the 1920's....I'm guessing that it has to do with the OKIE migration from Oklahoma to California during the depression.....


Another interesting observation in my travels...in many foreign countries and even in larger U.S. cities, people are more likely to grocery shop on a daily basis. But here in our rural area, people go to the grocery store once a week or once a month. They have a tendency to stock up on groceries....they never shop daily. It dawned on me this is probably a generational habit they picked up from their parents or their parents picked up from their grandparents where people would "go to town" one day a week, usually Saturday where they would sell their items, eggs, milk, butter etc.... and buy the extra groceries they needed. Even though my parents were professionals, this is the way they did it in the 1970's when they raised our family....

It's interesting to sit back and analyze people and try to figure out why they do the things they do....