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lissa_quonSo I'm currently milking my university's Inter Library Loan system for all it is worth and hitting the historical reference books like a crazy person. Considering some of these books cost a pretty penny I'm going to be missing these when I graduate.
The one I'm currently reading is Drunks, Whores, and Idle Apprentices which is a collection of transcribed biographies of criminals from 18th century, mainly England so far. These life stories were apparently recorded before the criminals were to be hanged. Some of them do seem a tad embellished but the picture it paints of the time period is definitely interesting. The collector of these stories even did the courtesy of footnoting or translating the thieves canting* which is rather heavily used in some of these.
Me being the grand geek that I am I am finding this a rather fascinating read once I got used to the grammar.
If anyone has a spare hundred bucks burning a hole in their pocket or access to this book and an interest in 18th century n'er do wells I do highly recommend this one.
*Thieves cant was a slang used by thieves, pick pockets, burglars, fences and such. It was practically a separate language from the English of the time and could be used to identify members of such groups to each other and was also used so that crimes could be planned with few overhearing making sense of it. Hilariously enough quite a few phrases we use nowadays comes from this "improper" slang.
The one I'm currently reading is Drunks, Whores, and Idle Apprentices which is a collection of transcribed biographies of criminals from 18th century, mainly England so far. These life stories were apparently recorded before the criminals were to be hanged. Some of them do seem a tad embellished but the picture it paints of the time period is definitely interesting. The collector of these stories even did the courtesy of footnoting or translating the thieves canting* which is rather heavily used in some of these.
Me being the grand geek that I am I am finding this a rather fascinating read once I got used to the grammar.
If anyone has a spare hundred bucks burning a hole in their pocket or access to this book and an interest in 18th century n'er do wells I do highly recommend this one.
*Thieves cant was a slang used by thieves, pick pockets, burglars, fences and such. It was practically a separate language from the English of the time and could be used to identify members of such groups to each other and was also used so that crimes could be planned with few overhearing making sense of it. Hilariously enough quite a few phrases we use nowadays comes from this "improper" slang.