How to Behave Badly in Elizabethan England: A Guide for Knaves, Fools, Harlots, Cuckolds, Drunkards, Liars, Thieves, and Braggarts

Every age has its bad eggs, rule-breakers and nose-thumbers, and Elizabethan England was particularly rank with troublemakers -- from snooty needlers who took aim with a cutting "thee," to lowbrow drunkards with revolting table manners. Acclaimed popular historian Ruth Goodman draws on advice manuals, court cases, and sermons to offer a colorfully crude portrait of offenses most foul. Mischievous readers will delight in this celebration of one of history's naughtiest periods, when derision was an art form.