Category: Almanac of the Past

So, I started to write about the importance of beans on July 27th until waylaid by the Earl of Oxford’s Fart (see my post here).

This is the time of year when Beans were being harvested. The humble bean (Broad beans) were surprisingly important for the pre-modern diet. Virgil in his Georgics comments on the fallow system as follows:

‘Likewise, alternate years, let your cut fields lie fallow, and the idle ground harden with neglect: or sow yellow corn, under another star, where you first harvested beans. rich in their quivering pods’

Beans were introduced to the UK in the Bronze Age and are often found in Iron Age sites. But they grew in importance. By the thirteen hundreds beans represented 17% of Leicestershire crops, 30% by 1400 and 46% by 1588, and thereafter declined. Beans fix nitrogen in the soil so would have helped with the general fertility. But they were also a very healthy and filing food which had the added advantage that, when dried, they are virtually indestructible.

Aelfric of the Cistercian Rievaulx Abbey in Yorkshire wrote of eating ‘leaves and egg, fish and cheese, butter and beans’. Beans or peas would also have been eaten with bacon, which is like our Pea and Ham Soup. The salted bacon would provide the salt. Physician Andrew Boorde suggested the Danes lived on Beans and Salt Fish. (A Dyetary of Health 1542.) The place of Broad Beans in our diet has largely been replaced by beans from the Americas.

Elizabeth Tingle in ‘The Bean-Bellies’ of Leicestershire gives an interesting account of how much beans dominated midland farming. A well-known saying was ‘Shake a Leicestershire man by the collar and you may hear the beans rattle in his belly’

The Feudal system in the medieval system had the land owned by the Lord of the Manor, and managed by his Reeve. The land was divided up into three large fields which the Reeve arranged the dividing up of between the peasants. The fields were divided into furlong-length strips. A furlong was a furrow length, and was 220 yards long. By the end of the furrow the ox needed a rest, and were turned around. This system lead to the creation of ridge and furrows which you can often see in fields even to this day. (In Scotland its known as rigg and furrow.) These long ridge and hollows in fields are caused by non-reversible ploughs, which threw up the soil on the same side building it up.

The first field normally grew wheat or sometimes rye. The second field was planted with a mixture of crops which included peas and beans, rye, barley or oats, which are spring crops. The third field was left fallow, which allowed the sheep to graze upon it and their dung helped the field recover. The next year the fields were rotated. There were also water meadows and a common field. The common field was usably by everyone and became vital for the succour of poor people. All its resources could be exploited: for grazing, firewood, mushrooms, etc. The meadows were used to graze cows and then for making hay. ( see my post on haymaking here🙂 The woodland areas would be used for grazing pigs, providing fuel, and wood for manufacturing tools, and structures. Peasants had their own garden plot and often kept a pig.

Apart from the Bean-Belly article linked above, https://hodmedods.co.uk/blogs/news/ and https://charlescordell.com/17th-century-almanac-march were very helpful for this post.

To finish, it has to be with flatulence. Please guess who wrote these quotations:

‘A happy fart never comes from a miserable arse’

‘We are here on earth to fart around. Don’t let anybody tell you any different’

‘Fart for freedom, fart for liberty – and fart proudly’

Ok, here is a clue, the authors are Benjamin Franklin, Kurt Vonnegut and Martin Luther.

Answer Benjamin Franklin (3), Kurt Vonnegut (2) and Martin Luther (1).

First published on 29th July 2025

‘This Earl of Oxford, making of his low obeisance to Queen Elizabeth, happened to let a Fart, at which he was so abashed and ashamed that he went to Travel [for] 7 years. On his return the Queen welcomed him home, and said, ‘My Lord, I had forgot the Fart’.’

John Aubrey Brief Lives (1693). From https://en.m.wikiquote.org/

Now, Google AI tells me that:

‘Beans cause flatulence due to the presence of oligosaccharides, a type of sugar that the body struggles to digest. These sugars pass through the small intestine undigested and reach the large intestine, where gut bacteria ferment them, producing gas (hydrogen, methane, and carbon dioxide) as a byproduct. ‘

This is the second time I’ve used AI, the other was to get a short history of ice cream. (Click here to read it).

The Earl of Oxford is, of course, Edward de Vere (1550 -1604). One of the favourites of those who think Shakespeare didn’t write Shakespeare’s Plays. De Vere lived in a big house in Clapton, Hackney.  On the other side of Brooke Rd where I lived in the 1990’s. The House was originally called the King’s Place, and had a part in Henry VIII’s reconciliation with his daughter Mary. It came into the hands of Thomas Cromwell, and was eventually bought by de Vere. He died while living there and is buried in the nearby St John’s Church, Hackney. But plans for a grand tomb for him and his wife were not honoured by his heirs, and so his burial plot is not known. The House was renamed Brooke House, after Fulke Greville (Lord Brooke) Poet and courtier who lived here 1609-1628. He was from the Warwick Family.  Shakespeare was involved with his relative who enclosed the common land where the Royal Shakespeare Memorial Theatre now is. 

Fulke Grenville wrote the first biography of the inventor of the Sonnet, Sir Philip Sidney, his dear friend. The form which Shakespeare used to such good effect in his Sonnets.

Sir Philip Sidney’s sister Mary was a formidable literary star in her own right, completing some of her brother’s work after his death. She ran formidable salons in her houses at Wilton and Baynards Castle (in London).  She married the Earl of Pembroke.  Their son was William Third Earl of Pembroke who was founder of Pembroke College with James 1st and the Chancellor of Oxford University. But also he and his younger brother, Philip were the “incomparable pair of brethren” to whom the First Folio of Shakespeare’s collected works was dedicated in 1623.

Quite some literary nexus at Brooke Road, Clapton. De Vere himself was part of this world.  Considered one of the best Court Poets, Playwrights anf a patron of the arts. He was also a champion jouster. Not only was he from one of the oldest families but he was a ward of Queen Elizabeth I and married to Lord Burghley’s daughter.  He was evidently charming.  But also  murderous as he got involved with various fatal street battles with his enemies in London. His career  was up and down and full of crises.  He was involved with the Boy Companies that acted in the old Blackfriars friary.

There seems to have been an attraction to Catholicism, but he accused Arundell and Henry Howard of involvement in Catholic plot. They counter claimed he was guilty of

‘atheism, lying, heresy, disobedience to the crown, treason, murder for hire, sexual perversion, habitual drunkenness, vowing to murder various courtiers, and criticizing the Queen for doing “everything with the worst grace that ever woman did.

They claimed he was guilty of

‘serial child rape, claiming he’d abused “so many boyes it must nedes come out. Detailed testimony from nearly a dozen victims and witnesses substantiated the charge and included names, dates, and places. Two of the six boys named had sought help from adults after Oxford raped them violently and denied them medical care.’

(Quotations from Wikipedia)

None of the three suffered from these mutual accusations.

And I began this piece wanting to talk about the humble bean!

There is much more to say too, about Brooke House, De Vere and the Sidney’s.

But enough for now.

First Published 27th July 2025

My jaw literally dropped when I first came across a reference to St Wilgerfortis.  She is also known as St Uncumber. The stories of early Catholic martyrs, particularly female ones, are often so bizarre that I’m surprised I can be surprised.  But let’s uncumber the story.

Her Portuguese father promised her in marriage to a Moorish King or in other versions, a Sicilian King.  She had made a vow of virginity.  She prayed to God to make her repulsive so that the marriage would not go ahead.  God heard her prayers and she grew a beard.  The marriage was cancelled.  But her angry dad had her crucified. 

She is normally shown on a cross in female attire with a prominent beard. She is the patron saint of people who are trapped in unwanted or abusive relationships. So those who need to uncumber themselves from an unsuitable partner.  Wilgerfortis’s name is thought to derive from Latin “virgo fortis” meaning “courageous virgin”.  She goes under different names in different parts of Europe.  For instance, in France she is known as Débarras meaning “riddance”.

The cult was suppressed in the 16th Century but continued in some areas into the 19th Century.  The location of a statue to her in Henry VII’s Chapel, Westminster Abbey suggests she had some influence in England late into the medieval period.

The obvious trans aspects of her story gives her contemporary resonance.  Her status as protector of those wanting to uncumber themselves from unsuitable relationships has interesting discontinuities with traditional catholic theology.  I would love to hear a medieval Catholic discussion about her role.

She is both woman and man, and by being crucified both human and divine.  She is often shown with only one shoe on.  One explanation of this is that a fiddler played at her feet to comfort her during he death agonies.  So she dropped a silver shoe to reward the fiddler.  Others propose that the shoe is a symbol of female genitalia. One shoe on, one off can, therefore, be a symbol of shared male and female genitalia?

For a modern discussion on her role read this article; https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/13/7/616

How the cult developed is not known but a suggestion is made that early medieval icons of the crucifixion were dressed in gowns that were confused with female attire.  And it caught on providing comfort for people the image talked to. 

Perhaps, she shows the power of Art to break down traditional values.  There above you on the Church wall, the image evokes Christ, But both female and yet male. Human and Divine. And graphical condemning male violence against women. So a Saint who is non-binary, existing in the gaps between the normative?

Click here to see my post on St Agatha.

First published July 2025

Round about this time every year, the City of London, goes through its ancient Carmarking Ceremony.  This records that the vehicle has paid the 5/- license fee for going through Guildhall Arch. The ceremony brands each vehicle with a hot branding iron. A piece of wood is branded which is attached to the vehicle.

https://londonist.com/london/news/cart-marking-ceremony

See my post on Pancake Day at the Guildhall