the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the editors of The Journal of

Interdisciplinary History

Material Culture and Cultural History

Author(s): Richard Grassby
Source: The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Vol. 35, No. 4 (Spring, 2005), pp. 591-603
Published by: The MIT Press
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Journal of Interdisciplinary
History, xxxv:4 (Spring, 2005), 591-603.

RichardGrassby

Material Culture and Cultural History Many cultural

historians ignore the physical environment in which culture is
embedded. They elevate abstract ideas above things, symbolic
meaning above utility, and imagination above empirical facts.
They generalize from images and texts as though they were material commodities, focusing on how the world was represented and
perceived, not on how it functioned or how it was physically or
emotionally experienced. Style is accorded more significance than
form or content; the method of representation is considered to
be as meaningful as the object. In the giddy world of symbolic interpretation, goods have no practical use and the consumption
function has no basis in reality. An indulgent subjectivism creates
what has been termed the conceptual equivalent of the permissive
society.'
Material life is partly shaped by cultural imperatives. Social
reality has to be structured to be perceived and understood.
Whether it communicates through words or visual representation,
the cultural system relies on metaphor and symbolism. When literal language fails, people express ideas through metaphorical
analogies. Economists have their personal agendas and employ
rhetoric, metaphors, and allegories, as well as logic and mathematics. Historians often conceptualize in metaphors to relate concrete
facts to abstractions.2
Culture is, however, evinced in distinct forms generated by
Richard Grassbyis a retired scholar currently residing in Hagerstown, Maryland. He is the author of Kinship and Capitalism:Marriage,Family and Business in the English-SpeakingWorld,
158o-1740 (New York, 2001); The Idea of Capitalismbeforethe IndustrialRevolution(Lanham,
Md., 1999).
C 2005 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and The Journal of Interdisciplinary

History, Inc.
I Theodore K. Rabb and Jonathan Brown "Introduction," in Rabb and Robert I. Rotberg
(eds.), Art and History: Images and Their Meaning (New York, 1988), 5; Ernest Gellner,
"Knowledge of Nature," in Mihulas Teich, Roy Porter, and Bo Gustafsson (eds.), Natureand
Societyin HistoricalContext (Cambridge, I997), I6.
2 Christopher Y. Tilley, Metaphorand Material Culture (Oxford, 1999), 7; Deirdre N.
McCloskey, The Rhetoricof Economics(Madison, 1998; orig. pub. 1985), 19; Jacques Le Goff,
(trans. Steven Rendall and Elizabeth Claman), History and Memory(New York, 1992), 121;
Roger Chartier (trans. Lydia G. Cochrane), CulturalHistory:BetweenPracticesand Representations, (Ithaca, 1988), 96.

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592

RICHARD GRASSBY

human responsesto opportunitiesin specific historicalcontexts.

Hence historiansof materialcultureuse artifacts,as well as written
evidence, to reconstruct the patterns of meanings, values, and
norms sharedby membersof society. As in archaeologyand aesthetic theory, the formalsystemis both perceived and interpreted
through materialthings.
What is the value and importanceof this approachand what
problemsof evidence andinterpretationhave to be overcome?Do
goods possessintrinsicmeaning or is cultureresponsiblefor creating it? Do people impose meaning on things, or do they discover
it in them? Can the study of artifactsbe integratedwith cultural
theory?These questionsarisein all culturesand periods, but here
they will be consideredprimarilyin relation to the pre-industrial
society of early modern England.3
ARTIFACTS
AS EVIDENCEHistoriansof

materialculture describe,
and
of artificiallyconthe
characteristics
categorize,
compare
in
structedobjects that have survived physicalor representational
form-their size, shape, color, design, weight, and volume. With
the help of literaryand archivalrecordsthey identify and measure
the quantity,as well as the quality,of goods and determine how
they were made, distributed,and relatedto each other; when and
where they appeared;and who acquiredthem for what use. Thus
are artifactssubjected to archaeometricanalysisof their internal
structureand viewed in a specific temporalsequence and spatial
context. Goods are subjectedto both etic and emic analysis-the
study of their objective attributesand their significanceto those
who used them. The ultimate objective is to move beyond the
concrete data and graspthe more nebulous concept of culture.4
Objects give materialform to the rules and belief patternsof
those who trade,purchase,or use them. Those with sharedattributes can be grouped as a style or type characteristicof a discrete
period. Unlike culturalanthropologists,materialculturalistsmay
not be directly concerned with systemsof belief and practicalac3 This article draws on the author's unpublished study of the material culture of the English
business community, 1590-1740.
4 Daniel Miller, "Introduction," in idem (ed.), MaterialCultures:Why Some Things Matter
(Chicago, 1998), I9; D. J. Bryden and D. L. Simms, "Spectacles Improved to Perfection,"
Annals of Science,L (1993), 27; Jules D. Prown, Art as Evidence:Writingson Art and Material
Culture(New Haven, 2001), 93.

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MATERIAL

CULTURE

AND CULTURAL

HISTORY

593

tivity, but they are certainly interested in goods as symbols and

tools of culture, and in the structuralpatterns by which artifactsare
organized into meaningful relationships.5
This approach engages the senses as well as the mind. Visual
images and tactile objects help to recapture chosesvecues,the physical conditions of everyday life and the options for action of different groups. The exteriors and interiors of homes reveal how
people met the basic needs of food, shelter, and warmth and
whether levels of comfort, privacy, personal security, and taste improved. Changes in the material quality of life in early modern
England have been demonstrated by a quantitative analysis over
time of both goods and services.6
The number, type, repetition, and distribution of goods at
different levels of society identify luxuries and distinguish wants
from needs. The emergence of a consumer society in eighteenthcentury England tended to blur the distinction. Omissions of categories from certain contexts indicate the preferences and values of
particulargroups. By establishing where and when items appeared,
historians can identify patterns of selection as well as degrees of
variation from the norm, innovations, transfersfrom other groups,
and revivals. The juxtaposition of objects in space is often telling.
For instance, the relative position of graves in a New England
cemetery indicates social relationships and family conflicts.7
Objects can be read as well as counted. Goods make visible
statements about the hierarchies of value. They carry social and
personal information within a larger framework. Inanimate objects
communicate relationships and mediate progress through the social world; their diffusion bridges cultural boundaries and connects
centers with peripheries. Although artifactsare produced at particular moments, their persistence creates histories. In addition to information and ideas, they can convey hidden cultural constraints,
moral standards, social fears, and emotionally laden issues.8
5 Mikhail M. Bakhtin (ed. Michael Holquist; trans. Caryl Emerson and Holquist), The
DialogicImagination:Four Essays (Austin, 1981), 262.
6 Thomas J. Schlereth, MaterialCulture:A ResearchGuide (Lawrence, 1985), 12.
7 Ian W. Brown, "The New England Cemeteries," in Steven Lubarand W. David Kingery
(eds.), Historyfrom Things (Washington, D.C., 1993), 140-159.
8 Grant D. McCracken, Cultureand Consumption:New Approachesto the SymbolicCharacter
of
ConsumerGoodsandActivities(Bloomington, 1988), 19; Cary Carson, "The Consumer Revolution in Colonial British America," in Ronald Hoffmann, idem,and PeterJ. Albert (eds.), Of
ConsumingInterests:The Style of Life in the EighteenthCentury (Charlottesville, 1994), 693;

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594

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GRASSBY

Possessions, if carefully interpreted, constitute evidence of

character, interest, and quality of life. The relative economic value
and symbolic importance of goods can be gauged from their proportionate volume, mass, scale, and distribution. The meaning of
objects becomes clear within narrative contexts. Artifacts provide
the depth of image that artistscreate through linear and tonal perspective; for example, inventories of artifacts can re-create the interiors of early modern English houses that no longer exist. In rare
cases, like the archaeological site at Port Royal, Jamaica, which
was devastated by an earthquake, the interdependence of objects
has been preserved completely intact.9
Material culture sheds light on how people understood themselves. Objects and their combinations can evoke the atmosphere
of a house or room. Artifacts can convey a sensory perception of
the past through sight, smell, touch, and texture. In early modern
England, people were more occupied with things than with abstractions; distance, quantity, and time were measured physically.
Making sense of past experience requires replicating the tone and
texture of life.10
Culture structures behavior and design. Furniture and clothfor
example, reflect specific attitudes to the body. Interior deing,
sign can, like architecture, be seen as a cultural performance. The
arrangement of furniture creates a unified visual and spatial rhythm
of fixed settings; the larger pieces serve as symmetrical anchors accented by smaller pieces. The position of chairs and tables, around
walls or in the center of a room, creates zones of activity in which
individuals can pose or interact. The layout determines whether
contact is restricted or facilitated and whether goods are stored
or displayed. Artifacts have both practical and symbolic functions,
indicating changing hierarchies of value."
Robert B. St. George, "Introduction," in idem (ed.), Material Life in America, 16oo-186o
(Boston, 1988), 8; Karin L. F. Calvert, Childrenin the House: The MaterialCultureof Early
Childhood,16oo-19oo (Boston, 1992), 4.
9 See, for example, the apothecary's shop, reconstructed by David G. Vaisey, "Probate
Inventories and Provincial Retailers," in Philip Riden (ed.), ProbateRecordsand the Local
Community(Gloucester, 1985), 96-97. Henry M. Miller et al. (eds.), The Archaeologyof Sixteenth-and Seventeenth-Century
BritishColonizationin the Caribbean,United States, and Canada
(Tucson, 1996), 7.
10 Keith V. Thomas, "Numeracy in Early Modern England," Transactions
of the Royal HistoricalSociety,XXXVII (1987), 122-123.
11 Mimi Hellman, "Furniture, Sociability, and the Work of Leisure," EighteenthCentury
Studies, XXXII (1999), 417. This study of France illustrates the exaggerated "cultural" approach to domestic interiors.

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MATERIAL CULTURE

AND CULTURAL

HISTORY

595

THEMEANING
OF OBJECTSHow can the significance of objects be
measured? Postmodern archaeologists deny that the analysis of sets
of artifacts can result in a single meaning, since meaning is linked
intrinsically to various practices. Meanings are diverse, but culture
is specific. According to Geertz, the specific patterns created by
systemic relationships between diverse phenomena can be expressed either by artifactsor by performances. The inherent meaning of goods is dependent on a knowledge of beliefs and
perceptions external to the objects involved. People construct material culture. Ideas, beliefs, and meanings interpose themselves
between people and things. The value of goods in early modern
England varied with individual desires, social ambitions, the market for exchange, and cultural prescription.12
Material culturalists have to take account of individual motivation and the psychology of taste. The meaning of any object is
not separable from the opportunity and desire to acquire it. Symbolic properties may be less influential than the personal search for
identity. In a consumer-driven society such as eighteenth-century
England, things are often more important for their associations and
their past histories than for their ostensible properties. Clothes and
jewelry perpetuate significant memories for those who wear them.
Possessions take value in collection and arrangement; the ultimate
referent is personal experience. According to certain scholars, the
physical solidity of artifacts provided a defense against a fleeting
memory and a precarious identity in a mutable world. The most
valued objects are usually those hardest to acquire. When goods
increase in volume and availability, they yield less satisfaction. But
value is usually created by the intensity of desire, not simply by
rarity, which may reflect only lack of demand.13
Goods also have social utility and mediate human relationships; people want to symbolize and advance their status through
display and conspicuous consumption. Consumption in early
12 Tilley, "On Modernity and Archaeological Discourse," in Ian Bapty and Tim Yates
Post-Structuralism
and the Practiceof Archaeology(London,
(eds.), ArchaeologyafterStructuralism:
1990), 15I; Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation
of Cultures(New York, 1973), 44. One attempt
to reconstruct the performances of a culture is Donna Merwick, PossessingAlbany, 163o-1710o:
The Dutch and EnglishExperiences(Cambridge, 1990), 3. Ian Hodder, Readingthe Past: Current
in Archaeology(New York, I99I; orig. pub. I986), 3, 6.
Approachesto Interpretation
13 Peter Stallybrass,"Worn Worlds," in Margreta de Grazia, Maureen Quilligan, and idem
(eds.), Subjectand Objectin RenaissanceCulture(New York, 1996), 3; Colin Campbell, "The
Meaning of Objects," Journal of Material Culture, I (1996), 94-97; Mark Csikszentmihalyi,
"Why We Need Things," in Lubar and Kingery (eds.), Historyfrom Things, 28.

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modernEnglandwas not just the voluntarypursuitof objectsbut a

compulsory social activity, vulnerable to changes in perception
and fashion,in which the mannerwas as vital as the fact of possession. The display of possessions has always demonstratednew
status, protected the existing hierarchy within and between
groups, and announced social standing and allegiance. Group
identity involves consumption and display.Elites strive to corner
the market in certain culturalproducts. Possessionsmay belong
initiallyto individuals,but in the long run, they can be accumulated only by families or institutions.14
To economic determinists,material culture is created and
defined by the market.As Sahlinsargued, the "differentiationof
symbolic value is mystified as the appropriationof exchangevalue."To traditionalMarxistsand to criticaltheorists,capitalism's
pecuniary culture and bourgeois society were based on the exchange of commodities for profit, more like fetishesthan genuine
human needs. Some argue that in earlymodern England,capitalism incorporatedculture into economics as a formal rationality;
culture became a commodity produced, distributed, and consumed like other goods. Once individualswere no longer economicallyself-sufficient,they measuredtheir worth by what they
possessed.English paintingsand printed works have been interpreted as metaphoricalas well as literal representationsof the
market. Indeed, the market in academic discourse has become
a metaphorof practicesthat cannot be felt or located with precision."5
Culturalhistorianshave a reverse perspective;lifestyles and
14 Pierre Bourdieu (trans. Richard Nice), Distinction:A Social Critiqueof theJudgementof
Taste (Cambridge, Mass. 1984), xiii, 96, 229, 483; Mary Douglas and Baron Isherwood, The
Worldof Goods:Towardsan Anthropology
of Consumption(New York, 1996; orig. pub. 1979), 45, 73.
15 Marshall D. Sahlins, Culture and PracticalReason (Chicago, 1976), 213; Nigel Thrift,
"Owner's Time and Our Time," in Allan Pred (ed.), Spaceand Time in Geography:Essays
Dedicatedto TorstenHiigerstrand
(Lund, 1981), 56; John Brewer and Anne Bermingham, "Introduction," in idem (eds.), The Consumptionof Culture16oo-18oo: Image, Object, Text (New
York, 1995), 14; Ben Fine and Ellen Leopold, The Worldof Consumption(London, 1993), 68;
Elizabeth A. Honig, Paintingand The Marketin EarlyModernAntwerp(New Haven, 1999), I8;
Chartier (trans.Cochrane), "Introduction," in idem, The Cultureof Print:Powerand the Uses of
Printin EarlyModernEurope(Princeton, 1989), 9; Theodore B. Leinwand, Theater,Financeand
Societyin Early ModernEngland(Cambridge, 1999), 5; Igor Kopytoff, "The Cultural Biography of Things," in Arjun Appadurai (ed.), The SocialLife of Things: Commoditiesin Cultural
Perspective(Cambridge, 1986), 72-73.

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MATERIAL

CULTURE

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CULTURAL

HISTORY

597

tastes are not subjective or utilitarian but culturally determined.

Thus, they do not view the choice and preparation of food as a
matter of individual taste and smell. To them, eating in early modern England was more a mental activity than a physical one and
costume more a manner of communication than a means of keeping warm and dry. The symbolic characteristics of objects take
precedence over their physical properties. Constellations of objects are formed by cultural norms; the design and arrangement of
furniture reflect predetermined postures and allocations of space.
Clothes in a drawer have no meaning, but when worn they become a uniform with social and moral implications. Culture gives
meaning and thereby economic value to new goods; fashion establishes taste and directs individual desires and creativity. This
cultural interpretation of material life is as one-sided and limited as
the economic interpretation of material culture.16
LIMITATIONS AND CONSTRAINTS

The study of material culture in

early modern Englandencountersseveralproblems.First, the

physical evidence is ambiguous. Artifactsdo not usually offer a

clear message, or even an adequate picture, of everyday life. Their
survival depends on so many random factors that no consistent

body of rules can be establishedto judge their representativeness.

Finely crafted works made of durable materials were much more

common than ordinarygoods, which wore out from frequentuse.

Cheap utensilsmade of leather or wood disintegratedunless they

happened to sink into a marsh. Many products are ephemeral by

nature, either totally consumed or self-disintegrating.Objects

dent, chip, and oxidize. When their utility is reduced by new
technology or fashion, they are discarded as valueless. Most goods
that survive belonged to the rich or to public bodies. Virtually no
record remains of what has been lost. Because museums rarely

know the provenanceof their artifacts,they tend to separatethem

16 Stephen Mennell, All Mannerof Food: Eating and Taste in England (Urbana, 1996), 39;
Kevin Walsh, "The Post-Modern Threat to the Past," in Bapty and Yates (eds.), Archaeology
285. Marcia R. Pointon, Strategies
afterStructuralism,
for Showing:Women,Possession,and Representation in English Visual Culture, 1665-18oo (Oxford, 1997), 53; Chandra Mukerji, From
GravenImages:Patternsof ModernMaterialism(New York, I983), 13; Edmund R. Leach, Cultureand Communication:The Logicby WhichSymbolsAre Connected:An Introduction
to the Use of
Structuralist
Analysisin SocialAnthropology(New York, 1976), 55. Eric K. Silverman, "Clifford
Geertz," in Tilley (ed.), Reading Material Culture: Structuralism,Hermeneuticsand PostStructuralism
(London, 1990), 126.

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from their context, assuming a uniform cultural background to

give coherence to their displays. Until recently, museums sought
the unique, significant, and noble to the neglect of the ordinary
and utilitarian. Paintings are revered for their aesthetic qualities
and creative originality, not for what they reveal about those who
commissioned or acquired them.17
Probate inventories of personal possessions survive in large
numbers for England, but they are unevenly distributed by period
and region. Those from after 1700, when the volume of personal
goods increased, are less common and less detailed. It is often
difficult to judge the design of furniture or to distinguish luxuries
from basic necessities or tools. Appraisersusually knew the market,
but their responsibility was to assessthe resale value, not the quality, of goods; iron, brass, pewter, silver, and gold were usually
listed by weight. Despite the random effect of sudden death, inventories also relate primarily to older persons and to one stage of
the life cycle.
Inventories also remove things from their proper context.
They can establish the existence and value of objects, but not their
personal significance. Nor are they comprehensive. Many common personal items were omitted because they had been bequeathed by will, taken by a widow or relatives, or considered
trivial, ephemeral, or cheap; children's toys, clothes, small utensils,
and food routinely fell into this category. Clothes and utensils are
often bunched in parcels. Many items defy clear identification because of vague descriptions or strange spellings or nomenclature.18
Artifacts mirror both a producing and a consuming image.
Material goods are subjects and objects at the same time. Subjects
can be reified as objects and objects idolized as subjects. Artifacts
Svetlana Alpers, The Art of Describing:Dutch Art in the SeventeenthCentury(Chicago,
17
1983), 233; Christopher Dyer, Standardsof Livingin the LaterMiddleAges: SocialChangein England, c. 1200-1520 (Cambridge, 1989), 207; Krzystof Pomian, Collectionneurs,amateurset
curieux.Paris, VeniseXVIe-XVIIIe siecle(Paris, 1987), 16; Donald Preziosi, "The Question of
Art History," in James Chandler, Arnold I. Davidson, and Harry Harootunian (eds.), Questions of Evidence:Proof, Practice,and Persuasionacrossthe Disciplines(Chicago, 1994), 221; Ivor
Noel Hume, "MaterialCulture with the Dirt on It," in Ian M. Quimby (ed.), MaterialCulture
and the Study of AmericanLife (New York, 1978), 38-39.
18 The best guide to the strengths and weaknesses of English inventories is Vaisey, "Introduction," in idem (ed.), ProbateInventoriesof Litchfieldand District1568-168o (Stafford, 1969).
See also Lorna Weatherill, "Probate Inventories and Consumer Behaviour in England, 16601740," in Geoffrey H. Martin and Peter Spufford (eds.), The Recordsof the Nation (London,
1990), 268; Nancy C. Cox, "Objects of Worth," MaterialHistoryReview,XXXIX (1994), 33.

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MATERIAL

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constitute both the evidence employed to reconstitute a culture

and part of the very culture that they are supposed to explain. Although most early cultures, like that of England before the eighteenth century, tried to limit accumulation and consumption, the
diffusion and influence of goods in practice proved difficult to
control. Objects were continuously renovated, rediscovered, copied, and given new values.19
Artifacts cannot reveal underlying cultural values without
other evidence. They say little about intentions, which have to be
inferred from behavior, and their study does not generally determine their personal meaning. A string of pearls may have been
worn for status or for sentimental reasons. To "read" inanimate
objects is speculative at best. The world as lived is different from
the world as thought.
Nor is there a foolproof method of distinguishing the literal
from the emblematic in any past work of art. Early modern English paintings may be simple depictions with no hidden meaning.
Whatever their interpretive bias, one of their functions was to record people and events. Neither the precise intentions of artists
nor the reactions of their proposed audiences can easily be determined. Symbolic images in the seventeenth century were usually
contested, frequently misunderstood, and always constrained by
reality. Works painted uyt dengheest cannot be differentiated from
those drawn naerhet levenwith any certainty. Contemporary artists
frequently copied pictures and depicted stereotypes. Art objects
were rarely intended to represent reality literally; they reflected
what artistswished to portray within the limits of their skills. Artists were often reluctant to depict everyday life because they
wanted to elevate their status and address eternal truths and universal values. The decorative arts have always constituted a special
class of evidence, shaped by imagination as well as by craft tradition and the market.20
The analysis of a painting is often a presupposition. A study of
Boston merchant John Freake's portrait describes him as cosmo19 Jiirgen Habermas (trans. Thomas Burger), The StructuralTransformation
of the Public
Sphere:An Inquiryinto a Categoryof BourgeoisSociety (Cambridge, Mass., 1989), 37; David
Lowenthal in Tim Ingold (ed.), Key Debates in Anthropology(London, 1996), 2I I.
20o Ernst H. Gombrich, Art and Illusion:A Study in the Psychologyof PictorialRepresentation
(New York, 1961; orig. pub. 1960); David Wallace, "Bourgeois Tragedy or Sentimental
Melodrama, " EighteenthCenturyStudies,XXV (I991), 141; Peter Burke, Eyewitnessing:The
Uses of Imagesas HistoricalEvidence(Ithaca, 2001), 31.

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(GRASSBY

politan, secular, self-confident, self-conscious, and neither extravagant nor mean-solely on the basis of his clean-shaven chin, his
moustache and natural hair, and his well-cut but not extravagant
clothes and jewelry: "The exquisite detail would make it difficult
to deny the subject's pride in personal appearance and his joy in
the materialistic pleasure brought him by his God-blessed, Calvin
condoned prosperity." The artist was probably studio-trained in
the English didactic tradition to mark the wealth and status of his
sitter by treating his body and clothes as props-standard practice
when painting self-made men. The limner who repainted the portrait in 1674 may have followed instructions from the sitter or his
family about how to depict him. But without corroborative evidence, Feake's actual intentions or character defy the portrait. He
may have hated the way that he had been represented.21
The study of objects does not reveal archetypes; on the contrary, it suggests how easily a culture fragments. Theory has too
often obscured a proper analysis of visual images and artifacts and
sidestepped the question of quality. Like econometricians, cultural
historians often describe what the world would be like if their theories were correct. Such theories are simulated, not tested against
evidence; whatever validation or invalidation they acquire comes
in comparison with other theories, not empirical discoveries. The
facts are reconstructed from the theory, not the theory from the
facts. Without the discipline of empirical context, theoretical jargon degenerates into gibberish: "'Enclosing' should be not only
localized, but contextualized in the heteroglot conditionality of its
feudal-capitalist interarticulation." Such jargon verges on selfparody and sounds like the prophesies of the Azande witchdoctors
described by Evans-Pritchard, disembodied voices speaking in disconnected sentences.22
LudmillaJ. Jordanova, "The Representation of the Family," in Joan H. Pittoch and Andrew Wear (eds.), Interpretation
and CulturalHistory(New York, 1991), 115; Wayne Craven,
Colonial AmericanPortraiture:The Economic,Religious, Social, Cultural, Philosophical,Scientific,
and AestheticFoundations(New York, 1986), 43. Lillian B. Miller, "The Puritan Portrait, Its
Function in Old and New England," in David D. Hall and David G. Allen (eds.), Seventeenth
CenturyNew England(Boston, 1984), 171; Susan E. Strickler, "Recent Findings on the Freake
Art Museum, V (1981), 49-55.
Portraits,"Journalof the Worcester
22 Ann S. Martin and J. Ritchie Garnison, "Introduction," in idem(eds.), AmericanMaterial
Culture: The Shape of the Field (Knoxville, 1997); Eric J. Hobsbawm, On History (London,
1997), 11o; McCloskey, "Economics as a Historical Science," in William N. Parker (ed.), EconomicHistoryand the ModernEconomist(Oxford, 1986), 66; Frances Borzello and A. L. Rees
(eds.), The New Art History(London, 1986), 35. The extract is from James R. Siemon, "Land-

21

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MATERIAL CULTURE

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Modern attemptsto reconstructhow individualsthought and

actedin the earlymodernperiod are obstructedby the lack of immediate, physical contact and the intervention of theory. Earlier
generationsdid not necessarilyconform to the categoriesof modern intellectuals.Defining by metaphoris dangerous,and proving
by metaphoris impossible.During the seventeenth century, severalthinkerscame to distrustmetaphorand theoreticalcorrespondence, provoking what has been termed a crisis of representation.23
Despite these difficulties,establishingthe quantityand variety of
movablesin earlymodernEnglandor their method of distribution
does not presentmuch of a problem.Littlewas thrown away until
devoid of any use. The qualityof goods can frequentlybe inferred
from valuations,allowing for price fluctuationscausedby seasonal
shortages,interruptionsin supplyand distribution,and changesin
fashion and technology. Many possessionswere itemized and appraisedwith fastidiouscare.Many houses still stand,and vastnumbers of physical artifactsand works of art still survive. Archaeological finds unearthed during excavations also supplement the
documentaryevidence.24
Theory and empiricismcan be regardedas mutuallyreinforcing modes of historicalstudy.Although the pastis not an objective
entity, historicalknowledge can be transmittedand insights acquiredand exchanged.No interpretationcan be wholly subjective
because meaning must be shared.A hegemonic culture must be
persuasiveand connect with the subjectiveexperience of a particular group. Universalist theories of cultural determinism have
been successfullychallenged by an ideographic or relativistaplord Not King: AgrarianChange and Interarticulation,"in Richard Burt and John M. Archer
(eds.), EnclosureActs, Sexuality,Propertyand Culturein Early ModernEngland(London, 1994),
29. Edward E. Evans-Pritchard, Witchcraft,Oraclesand MagicamongtheAzande (Oxford, 1937),
169.
23 Thomas, "Ways of Doing Cultural History," in Rik Sanders et al. (eds.), Balans en
(Amsterdam, 1991), 77; Richard Pares (ed.
Perspectiefvan de Nederlandsecultuurgeschiedenis
Robert A. and Elizabeth Humphreys), The Historian'sBusiness and Other Essays (Oxford,
1961), 23; Burke, "Fable of the Bees," in Teich, Porter, and Gustafsson (eds.), Natureand Society, 114.
24 Donny L. Hamilton, "Simon Benning," in Little (ed.), Text-AidedArchaeology,39-53;
Paul A. Shackel, "Probate Inventories," ibid., 207; Peter J. Davey, "The Post-Medieval
Period," in John Schofield and Roger Leech (eds.), UrbanArchaeologyin Britain (London,
1987), 78.

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602

RICHARD

GRASSBY

proach. If culture were self-justifying and omniscient, individuals

would have no language in which to discuss or modify it. The
new "New Historicists" have rediscovered the materiality of the
everyday. Applying the methods, rather than the theories, of literary criticism has yielded positive results.25
Historians, unlike social scientists, do not usually rely on formal arguments or logical deduction from axioms. In the republic
of letters, historians rank with sophists rather than philosophers.
Historians straddle the gulf between culture and reality, arguing
that culture structures, and is structured by, practice over time and
that individuals construct their understanding of the world on the
basis of reality. Unconstrained by rigid parameters or by synchronic models, they have the tools to study the nuts and bolts of
life and explain the process of change.26
Abstract generalizations from literary sources or theoretical
readings of images are not sufficient to understand a historical culture, like that of early modern England. The attitudes, intentions,
and values of contemporaries require pragmatic study of their behavior, their possessions, their various pursuits, and their interaction with the environment. The mentality of those who left no
personal records can be inferred only from the hard, measurable
evidence of the physical artifacts that surrounded them.
The most effective method of reconstructing material culture
is to combine written evidence-didactic and informational literature and archival documents-with
the physical evidence of
and
Inferences
can be tested against
buildings, artifacts,
images.
25 T. Jackson Lears, "Concept of Cultural Hegemony," AmericanHistoricalReview, XC
(1985), 590. Kirsten Hastrup, A Passageto Anthropology:BetweenExperienceand Theory(New
York, 1995), 183. Melford E. Spiro, "Some Reflections on Cultural Determinism," in Richard A. Shweder and Robert A. Le Vine (eds.), CultureTheory(Cambridge, 1984), 334-335;
Maurice Bloch, Ritual, History and Power:SelectedPapersin Anthropology(London, 1989), 6;
Raymond Boudon, The UnintendedConsequences
of SocialAction (New York, 1982), 200; Patricia Fumerton and Simon Hunt (eds.), RenaissanceCultureand the Everyday(Philadelphia,
1999), 5. MartinJ. Wiener, "Treating 'Historical' Sources as LiteraryTexts,"Journalof Modern
History,LXX (1998), 620; David L. Smith, Richard Strier, and David Bevington (eds.), The
TheatricalCity: Culture, Theaterand Politicsin London, 1576-1649 (Cambridge, 1995).
26 Boudon (trans.Michalina Vaughn), The Uses of Structuralism
(London, 1971), 140. Joseph
M. Levine, Autonomyof History: Truth and Methodfrom Erasmusto Gibbon(Chicago, 1999),
lo9; John Smail, The Origins of Middle-Class Culture:Halifax, Yorkshire,166o-178o (Ithaca,
secc.
1994), 42, 47; Merry E. Wiesner in Simonetta Cavaciocchi, (ed.), La donnanell'economia
XIII-X VIII (Florence, 1990), 483.

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MATERIAL

CULTURE

AND

CULTURAL

HISTORY

603

precise statements of intention in private papers and against actual

behavior. People are culturally influenced but not culturally constructed. The social history of culture continuously interacts with
the cultural history of society. The material aspects of culture
should never be subordinated to its symbolic manifestations. The
road to myth is paved with metaphors.

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