Things to do

Make a tussy mussy
The causes of diseases were not understood in medieval times. One theory was that bad smells could make people ill. Tussy mussys were believed to be a way of protecting from diseases, particularly the plague, by guarding against bad smells. A tussy mussy is a sweet-smelling…

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Make your own Viking tortoise brooches
We know quite a lot about what Vikings used to wear, and our information comes from a range of sources, including archaeology. However, fabrics do not survive very well when buried in the soil, so archaeologists do not often find pieces of clothing. What they do recover are…

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Teeth through time: Marvellous medieval mouthwash
Today we can go to the dentist and know how to look after our teeth by brushing regularly and eating fewer sweets. But this wasn’t the case for our ancestors. From the Ancient Egyptians to the 17th century, people believed that tooth-worms caused cavities (painful…

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