Hospitality in Early Modern England

This book is the first study of the ideal and practice of hospitality in England between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries. In early modern England, hospitality was believed to be a vital social virtue, comparable in significance to the maintainance of honesty or the proper pursuit of honour. It was a Christian and moral duty to keep a good house: to be open and generous in entertainment of both rich and poor, neighbour and stranger. Felicity Heal demonstrates the significance of the forms and rituals attached to hospitality in the period, offering a comprehensive analysis of hospitality at all levels of society, including nobility and gentry, clergy and magistracy, and yeomanry.