It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a woman in possession of a love of history, must be in want of a blog.
While writing my personal statement for university applications I read a number of books by Keith Thomas, a rather distinguished early modern historian who I later found out had been a fellow at my College. His books are always readable and full (sometimes too full) of entertaining anecdotes - I still remember the story from …
Continue reading Historical portraits of people and their pets
I was recently rather amused by a chapter in an 18th-century advice manual for women, entitled 'On being over-fond of animals'. This anti-pet diatribe comes from a 1756 publication called The Wife, which also features charmingly-named chapters such as 'The danger of living in the same house with any Relation of the Husband's', 'Sleeping in different Beds', and 'The …