Review by Choice Review
This innovative, scholarly book offers a fresh perspective on early modern Europe. In the centuries before the invention of modern techniques of illumination, the coming of night transformed life. With darkness, for example, came crime, which might mean poaching game but could mean armed robbery, and violence was far more frequent and lethal than now. Night also meant license, ranging from the brawls of intoxicated apprentices to the indiscretions of masked revelers. In an age of wooden buildings and wax candles, the hours between dusk and dawn were marked by the ever-present risk of calamitous fire. Ekirch (Virginia Tech) is at his best (which is very good) when he shows how the mentality of the peoples of early modern Europe differed from today's, as readers of his passages on courtship, witchcraft, and prayer will discover. Gracefully written and richly illustrated, this work is strongly recommended to all students of European history. ^BSumming Up: Highly recommended. Most levels/libraries. S. Bailey Knox College
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
Historian Ekirch re-creates the ambience of the European nocturnal world prior to the advent of artificial lighting in a fresh and thought-provoking cultural inquiry. Drawing on works of literature, letters, diaries, and criminal court documents, and maintaining throughout an infectious sense of wonder, Ekirch ignites the reader's imagination with example-rich descriptions of humankind's age-old fear of darkness and belief that the night is the domain of demons, witches, and ghosts. Turning to science to document the fact that we are more prone to illness, accidents, and death at night, Ekrich then lists a plague of former nighttime hazards, including spooked horses, emptied chamber pots, fire, and the dastardly crimes of the time. He compares the rural night with the city night, night as endured by the poor and enjoyed by the wealthy, and discusses sleep habits, romance, storytelling, dreams, and the liberation under the stars of the otherwise oppressed and maligned, from slaves to gays and lesbians. As Ekirch so vividly evokes the old magic of true night, he casts a skeptical eye on our brightly lit, 24/7 life, in which the heavens are obscured and we sit enraptured before computer and TV screens, oblivious to nature. --Donna Seaman Copyright 2005 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Engrossing, leisurely paced and richly researched, this history finds Ekirch reminding us of how preindustrial Westerners lived during the nocturnal hours, when most were plunged into almost total darkness. By describing how that darkness spelled heightened risk-of stumbles, drowning, fires and other dangers-Ekirch accounts for the traditional association of nighttime with fear and suspicion, illuminating the foundations of popular beliefs in satanic forces and the occult. He also describes how the night literally provided a cloak of darkness for crimes and insurrections, and how fear of the night sometimes led to racist blame and accusation. A professor of history at Virginia Tech, Ekirch ranges across the archives of Europe and early colonial America to paint a portrait of how the forces of law and order operated at night, and he provides fascinating insight into nocturnal labor-of masons, carpenters, bakers, glassmakers and iron smelters, among many others. The hardest nocturnal workers were women, Ekirch writes, doing laundry after a full day's domestic work. Ekirch also evokes benign nighttime activities, such as drinking and alehouse camaraderie; the thrill of aristocratic masquerades; the merrymaking of harvest suppers and dances. A rich weave of citation and archival evidence, Ekirch's narrative is rooted in the material realities of the past, evoking a bygone world of extreme physicality and preindustrial survival stratagems. 8 pages of color and 60 b&w illus. (June) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Before the Industrial Revolution, the daily departure of the sun had effects on people far different from those we experience in our own brightly illuminated age. Why? A first-time author explains. Here, Ekirch (History/Virginia Tech) argues--and persuasively demonstrates--that darkness in earlier eras fostered "a distinct culture with many of its own customs and rituals." And he should know. He's researched his subject thoroughly (the endnotes run to 109 pages), trying with moderate success to cram into categories all he's discovered. Unquestionably, Ekirch gives us a vast number of arresting details: Earlier generations, for example, believed that noxious vapors came with night; they didn't admire sunsets; hanging the hearts of pigs over the hearth kept demons out of the chimney; humans have better night vision than most other animals; Pepys' wife (worried about his carnal dreams) would periodically inspect his penis during his sleep; and some early thinkers believed sleep was caused by fumes rising to the brain from the belly of the sleeper. But there are also a number of observations that seem too patent for the attention Ekirch gives them. He tells us that dark was more dangerous than light, that the night facilitated storytelling, that people drank a lot, that lovers and criminals used the cover of darkness, that some people had bad dreams, that bundling was fun, that chamber pots could smell bad. Nonetheless, he's done a creditable job of cataloguing the activities of the night--from nightwatching (a profession, he quips, probably older than prostitution) to enjoying masquerades to dung-burning to praying. He shows, too, that informal youth gangs sometimes ruled the dark streets in A Clockwork Orange fashion, and he reveals that sleeping the entire night through was a rarity in an earlier age. Too many potential dangers (fire!), suspicious sounds, foul odors, strange bedfellows and inconsistent diets routinely ruined rest. A fascinating tale but, unfortunately, often in need of more graceful telling. (60 b&w illustrations, 8 pp. color illustrations, not seen) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
