Medieval chores weren’t putting clothes in the washing machine or giving the bathroom a wipe, they were weaving and sewing clothes by hand and then laboriously washing them in the stream, and hauling buckets of shit. Everything was much harder and much less pleasant, and that was how you spent your ‘free time’.
The point is they had all of that to do by hand, and still managed to “work for hire” less time than us in a society where over 90% of the stuff is automated.
You have a misconception of peasant life I believe. They had far more free time for socializing than you’d ever believe and the work they had to do day to day was not this slog you envision.
Chores took up most of a woman’s day not even that long ago. Before electricity, cleaning the house and doing laundry were labour intensive as hell.
In medieval times women worked too, but mostly the jobs that didn’t require strength and endurance like farming or blacksmithing. Making and fixing clothes as a second source of income wasn’t that uncommon, and it was one of the major reasons why people feared the steam engine centuries later.
Leisure was often work too. Things like hunting and, for free peasants, training to fight were taken as leisurely activities, but they could hardly be omitted. Chopping wood and maintaining small forests was critical to survive the winter but was done together.
I don’t know why you’d think peasants had any more leisure time than modern people. That was probably true for the upper classes, but certainly not for the peasants.
I don’t know why you think modern people have more leisure time?
Peasant work was seasonal first of all, most work wasn’t consistent nor were they afforded wages. Most works resulted in a direct product for the person doing the work, cooking, clothes making, farming.
You don’t understand how much leisure peasants had. Most culture we consider today is from peasant work. Dancing, music, song, joking, and while cooking is work cooking is also a social gathering of work and then eating. Peasants weren’t the working class we are today, we work far more and have far more chores to do. Making clothes by hand was harder but your quality was higher and clothes lasted, they didn’t shop for groceries or deal with car upkeep, they didn’t spend 8 hours at work and an hour traveling both ways.
Peasants were peasants because they didn’t have work to do and generate income with, it was literally mostly chores or leisure.
This is why the black plague was helpful, less people meant workers could make more demands and we see the beginning of a work culture develop.
Peasant work was seasonal first of all, most work wasn’t consistent nor were they afforded wages. Most works resulted in a direct product for the person doing the work, cooking, clothes making, farming.
Which is why the work was done year-round. When grains don’t grow, other plants like cabbages and onions do. Husbandry is a year-round business, too. Then there was flax to be spun into linen, which would take from autumn to spring to be completed. There was less to be done, but peasants didn’t get months of holidays. If they stopped working, they either starved or were punished by their lords.
I’m sure there were regular folks dancing and singing all day, but that was not the reality for the vast majority of the workforce. Today we have singers and comedians like there were bards and jesters back then, but society doesn’t need as many.
You’re right that their clothes were of better quality, but it also took much longer to produce such clothes, and to barter for the materials to make them. Groceries were replaced by toiling on the field, and car upkeep was oxen upkeep or bartering for plow repairs.
The 150 days myth seems to have spread the idea that Medieval peasants were some kind of happy-go-lucky farmers who went around having fun all day. That article has been thoroughly debunked. Perhaps you’d be better off in Medieval times if you work 60 hours a week and don’t get any paid time off, but even then you’ll spend a lot less time on chores and household tasks because of modern machinery.
I don’t get months of holidays? I haven’t had off in years bro. I get two days off from my job a year I don’t request, I am a chef.
Peasants always stopped working, work was probably done before the sun was even close to going down. Hunting, fishing, cooking are leisure activities they aren’t work you imagine.
It took long to produce clothes but you don’t need 47 outfits that are made to fall apart in less than a year.
150 days isn’t a myth. It is a stretch of the truth but we work more, we have less time. We have more ability to do things like travel or forms of entertainment but no.
You are confusing the peasants of then with middle class people. The poors, me, we work 40-60 hours a week sometimes two jobs with no vacations often in the hours office workers aren’t working because we are running the movie theaters, salting the roads, cooking your food, etc.
A 9-5 is probably not actually the peasantry.
People had more free time and less stressors than we do today.
Peasants had at least a couple changes of clothes, plus the Sunday and festivities clothes.
Also don’t forget that salmon for dinner didn’t catch itself, you either spend the time, or it’s lobster night again. And better remember to get some flour to the baker to get some bread made for the family, or it’s lobster with month old moldy bread. Better hope the chickens lay some eggs for breakfast.
but that would still be considered leisure today.
do you know how many times i leave for work wishing i had time to do a load of wash, clean my bathroom, do the dishes or any other chore?
yeah they had chores and we could debate that is work but they had more leisure time absolutely
Medieval chores weren’t putting clothes in the washing machine or giving the bathroom a wipe, they were weaving and sewing clothes by hand and then laboriously washing them in the stream, and hauling buckets of shit. Everything was much harder and much less pleasant, and that was how you spent your ‘free time’.
Leave it to modern people to ‘wish they’d live in mediveal times’
The point is they had all of that to do by hand, and still managed to “work for hire” less time than us in a society where over 90% of the stuff is automated.
You have a misconception of peasant life I believe. They had far more free time for socializing than you’d ever believe and the work they had to do day to day was not this slog you envision.
Chores took up most of a woman’s day not even that long ago. Before electricity, cleaning the house and doing laundry were labour intensive as hell.
In medieval times women worked too, but mostly the jobs that didn’t require strength and endurance like farming or blacksmithing. Making and fixing clothes as a second source of income wasn’t that uncommon, and it was one of the major reasons why people feared the steam engine centuries later.
Leisure was often work too. Things like hunting and, for free peasants, training to fight were taken as leisurely activities, but they could hardly be omitted. Chopping wood and maintaining small forests was critical to survive the winter but was done together.
I don’t know why you’d think peasants had any more leisure time than modern people. That was probably true for the upper classes, but certainly not for the peasants.
I don’t know why you think modern people have more leisure time?
Peasant work was seasonal first of all, most work wasn’t consistent nor were they afforded wages. Most works resulted in a direct product for the person doing the work, cooking, clothes making, farming.
You don’t understand how much leisure peasants had. Most culture we consider today is from peasant work. Dancing, music, song, joking, and while cooking is work cooking is also a social gathering of work and then eating. Peasants weren’t the working class we are today, we work far more and have far more chores to do. Making clothes by hand was harder but your quality was higher and clothes lasted, they didn’t shop for groceries or deal with car upkeep, they didn’t spend 8 hours at work and an hour traveling both ways.
Peasants were peasants because they didn’t have work to do and generate income with, it was literally mostly chores or leisure.
This is why the black plague was helpful, less people meant workers could make more demands and we see the beginning of a work culture develop.
Which is why the work was done year-round. When grains don’t grow, other plants like cabbages and onions do. Husbandry is a year-round business, too. Then there was flax to be spun into linen, which would take from autumn to spring to be completed. There was less to be done, but peasants didn’t get months of holidays. If they stopped working, they either starved or were punished by their lords.
I’m sure there were regular folks dancing and singing all day, but that was not the reality for the vast majority of the workforce. Today we have singers and comedians like there were bards and jesters back then, but society doesn’t need as many.
You’re right that their clothes were of better quality, but it also took much longer to produce such clothes, and to barter for the materials to make them. Groceries were replaced by toiling on the field, and car upkeep was oxen upkeep or bartering for plow repairs.
The 150 days myth seems to have spread the idea that Medieval peasants were some kind of happy-go-lucky farmers who went around having fun all day. That article has been thoroughly debunked. Perhaps you’d be better off in Medieval times if you work 60 hours a week and don’t get any paid time off, but even then you’ll spend a lot less time on chores and household tasks because of modern machinery.
I don’t get months of holidays? I haven’t had off in years bro. I get two days off from my job a year I don’t request, I am a chef.
Peasants always stopped working, work was probably done before the sun was even close to going down. Hunting, fishing, cooking are leisure activities they aren’t work you imagine.
It took long to produce clothes but you don’t need 47 outfits that are made to fall apart in less than a year.
150 days isn’t a myth. It is a stretch of the truth but we work more, we have less time. We have more ability to do things like travel or forms of entertainment but no.
You are confusing the peasants of then with middle class people. The poors, me, we work 40-60 hours a week sometimes two jobs with no vacations often in the hours office workers aren’t working because we are running the movie theaters, salting the roads, cooking your food, etc.
A 9-5 is probably not actually the peasantry.
People had more free time and less stressors than we do today.
What the fuck is a peasant with literally the clothes on their back and nothing else doing with all this “leisure time” anyway?
Ya fucking deluded.
You’re so right, the consensus of actual historians is meaningless now
Peasants had at least a couple changes of clothes, plus the Sunday and festivities clothes.
Also don’t forget that salmon for dinner didn’t catch itself, you either spend the time, or it’s lobster night again. And better remember to get some flour to the baker to get some bread made for the family, or it’s lobster with month old moldy bread. Better hope the chickens lay some eggs for breakfast.