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Hang At The Girdle

Hang At The Girdle image
Parent Issue
Day
28
Month
August
Year
1903
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

In the middle ages at the girdle were hung the thousand and one odds and ends needed and utilized in every day affairs. The scrivener had his ink horn and pen attached to it, the scholar his book or books, the monk his crucifix and rosary, the innkeeper his tallies, and everybody his knife. So many and so various were the articles attached to it that the flippant began to poke fun.

In an old play there is mention of a merchant who had hanging at his girdle a pouch, a spectacle case, a "punniard," a pen and ink horn and "a handkerchief, with many other trinkets besides, which a merry companion seeing said it was like a haberdasher's shop of small wares." In another early play a lady says to her maid: "Give me my girdle and see that all the furniture be at it. Look that cizers, pincers, the penknife, the knife to close letters with, the bodkin, the ear picker and the scale be in the case."