Oh dear.

Jun. 9th, 2006 03:55 pm
tree_and_leaf: Peter Davison in Five's cricket gear, leaning on wall with nose in book, looking a bit like Peter Wimsey. (Books)
[personal profile] tree_and_leaf
I know that the idea that 'cleanliness is next to Godliness' is a Victorian idea with a decidedly silly side to it (God, after all, as has been shown, is not made of soap), but having just come across a fourteenth century nun proudly stating that she hadn't washed for thirty years (pouring water on your body being luxurious and generally self-indulgent), I think I prefer the Victorian idea, if one has to have one or the other.

Ah! She's just declared that she can't, however, stand dirty clothes. Oh well at least she (it's Margaretha Ebner, if that means anything to anyone) changed, unlike Elsbeth von Oye, who used to wander about wearing maggoty rags. I don't know how her fellow nuns stood her.

(no subject)

Date: 2006-06-09 03:33 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] nineveh-uk.livejournal.com
Golly. And we thinks it's bad standing too next to businessmen with raised armpits on the tube in August...

(no subject)

Date: 2006-06-09 03:39 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mrstater.livejournal.com
How could she tell how clean clothes felt when she had thirty years of grime underneath the clothes?

(no subject)

Date: 2006-06-09 06:18 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] aervir.livejournal.com
Are you sure that she lived in a convent and didn't become an anchorite...?

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