What Does the Victoian Attitude to Death Tell Us About the Period? Essay Example
What does the Victorian attitude to death tell us about the period?
The Victorians attitude to death was multi-faceted. They believed in Are Morendi, death was very commercial during that period. Death was virulent and the process of burial or cremation was very ritualistic. During the period, death became more medicalised and there were changes to how each different religion treated death.
Death was virulent in Victorian Britain; it "surrounded the Victorians at home and in the streets" as a result of this cure all' pills became fashionable. These were pills that claimed to cure everything from backache to typhoid. In London almost a quarter of children died before they reached aged 5, this figure decreased a little when you went out of London, except in Bradford which had the highest infant death rate in the whole of England Families were so used to children dying young that they took a while before they named them, often just referring to them as baby until they to a few years old or the next child came along. Death was so commonplace that the etiquette of what to do when calling round a family that had recently had a deceased, was in Mrs Beetons's Book of Household Management, which was the middle class wife's bible on how to behave.
Death for the Victorians was very ritualistic, from the dress to the funeral procession. Vaults had been popular before the Victorian age but now became a fashion and social statement; they were a way of showing wealth. There was a strict dress code that was mostly for women during the mourning period. Full mourning had to be worn from the day of the funeral for a year if it was for immediate family, then half mourning for another 6 months, then after that it was appropriate for people to wear colourful clothes and continue with their life. For other relations, it was half mourning for six to nine months. There were rules about stationary during the mourning period, hatband width for men and other such minute details
The Victorians attitude to death was multi-faceted. They believed in Are Morendi, death was very commercial during that period. Death was virulent and the process of burial or cremation was very ritualistic. During the period, death became more medicalised and there were changes to how each different religion treated death.
Death was virulent in Victorian Britain; it "surrounded the Victorians at home and in the streets" as a result of this cure all' pills became fashionable. These were pills that claimed to cure everything from backache to typhoid. In London almost a quarter of children died before they reached aged 5, this figure decreased a little when you went out of London, except in Bradford which had the highest infant death rate in the whole of England Families were so used to children dying young that they took a while before they named them, often just referring to them as baby until they to a few years old or the next child came along. Death was so commonplace that the etiquette of what to do when calling round a family that had recently had a deceased, was in Mrs Beetons's Book of Household Management, which was the middle class wife's bible on how to behave.
Death for the Victorians was very ritualistic, from the dress to the funeral procession. Vaults had been popular before the Victorian age but now became a fashion and social statement; they were a way of showing wealth. There was a strict dress code that was mostly for women during the mourning period. Full mourning had to be worn from the day of the funeral for a year if it was for immediate family, then half mourning for another 6 months, then after that it was appropriate for people to wear colourful clothes and continue with their life. For other relations, it was half mourning for six to nine months. There were rules about stationary during the mourning period, hatband width for men and other such minute details