Hospitality in Early Modern England

Abstract

Abstract This book is a study of the ideal and practice of hospitality in England between the 15th and 17th centuries. In early modern England, hospitality was believed to be a vital social virtue, comparable in significance to the maintenance of honesty or the proper pursuit of honour, and seen as one of the foundations of the moral economy. It was a Christian and moral duty to keep a good house: to be open and generous in entertainment of both rich and poor, neighbour and stranger. Hospitality is now regarded very differently, and our changed attitudes hamper our approach to the history of this period. This study restores the hospitable ideal to its central place in early modern culture. The book examines the manner in which hospitality changed between 1400 and 1700, and its relationship to social realities, and demonstrates the significance of the forms and rituals attached to it. This book is an analysis of beliefs and practices relating to hospitality at different social levels and in various settings. The book examines not only the nobility and gentry, the group on whom the duty of hospitality was most incumbent, but also the clergy, the urban magistracy and the yeomanry.