Curiosities of Olden Times
1869
Why do we wear black to mourn? Who first decided that a will must be written on vellum, witnessed by specific numbers of people, or contain certain magical phrases? S. Baring-Gould, that indefatigable Victorian collector of the strange and overlooked, takes readers on a wander through the forgotten oddities of human custom. Beginning with the evolution of mourning dress from its ancient roots to the black-clad widows of Victorian England, this book reveals how meanings blur and transform across centuries until the original reason is entirely lost. But mourning is only the beginning. Baring-Gould excavates strange wills that bequeath impossible conditions, peculiar legal cases where justice bent to superstition, and the curious ways primitive beliefs calcified into formal law. This is anthropology before it had a name, written with the verve of a man who genuinely delighted in human eccentricity. For anyone who has ever wondered why we do what we do, and who suspects the answer might be 'because someone, somewhere, once believed something utterly bizarre.'
