István György TÓTH
Winter term 2000
Everyday life in early modern Europe: East and West
This seminar tries to find the differences and similarities in everyday
life in different parts of Europe, comparing the mentality and e social
structure, the clothing, living conditions, eating habits, schooling, and
reading materials of nobles, peasants, burghers in East and West. How did
Western standards arrive to Central and Eastern Europe, how did Central
Europe influence the West, how did people from France and Poland, from
England and Russia see the everyday life of other nations in early modern
Europe?
The seminar will prove that inspite of the clear dominance of the West
in fashion, furniture, housing, even in sense of time, the influences were
mutual, many influences arrived from Central Europe and especially from
the Ottoman Empire to the Western European countries.
The proposed subjects are the following:
1. Aristocrativ way of life
2. Noblemen's living conditions
3. Peasants' world
4. Food and drin
5. Tobacco, coffee, tea, brandy - luxury or everyday item?
6.Dress and fashion
7.Reading and writing
8. Time and space, sense of time, shaping of space
9. Intimacy, body, hygienia
Most important reading: see the reader prepared especially for this
course.
