Frances Elizabeth Baldwin Sumptuary Legislation and Personal Regulation in England

Annotation

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. The subject throws much light upon the civilization of the times when these laws were in operation, and the treatment here adopted endeavors to exhibit them in the surroundings of contemporary social history. No attempt is made to sharpen legal definitions, for the Middle Ages took it for granted that every government had the right to check extravagance and restrain luxury for the public good (since luxury in individuals was presumed to lead to the corruption of the state and even by weakening it to endanger its national existence). The philosophical discussion of this matter which took place in later times probably hastened the disuse of this.