Abstract:
Historical archaeologists have drawn upon evidence from food and dining to consider the change from the communal to the individual, and the rise of the ‘Georgian Order’.  This paper uses ceramic and glass tableware in the context of the English country house, c1750-1850, to demonstrate the need for a deeper understanding of eating and dining in the historic period.  It contends that changes in dining were gradual and nuanced, and that the food consumed needs to be seen in the context of the tools used for its consumption.   It argues that dinner in the period c1750-1850 had a structure that changed over time, and which reflected changing attitudes towards class, gentility and identity.

(*Glasse, H (1796) The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy. London. Updated and revised reprint of the 1747 original edition. p.333)