The Daily Feather — Divine Cuckoo-Pint Herbs
“The most pure and white starch is made of the rootes of the Cuckoo-pint, but most hurtful for the hands of the laundresse that have the handling of it, for it chappeth, blistereth, and maketh the hands rough and rugged and withall smarting.”
Gerard's Herbal, 1633
It’s lucky the nuns were doing God’s work. Around 1440, a time when stiff collars were first a thing, the good sisters of Syon Abbey could only use starch made from the roots of the cuckoo-pint flower, a.k.a. starchwort, for communion linen. For less divine duds, ordinary starch began by boiling bran in water, letting it stand for three days, straining out said bran, and then dipping the garment in the sour, starchy water. Once dry, smoothing and polishing required a slickstone. The disruptors of the 17th century rolled out a rainbow of starches from yellow, to red, to green. Alas, this was linked to scandal in starchy London. Blue starch, however, when used in moderation, made whites seem whiter, and what’s not to like about that? A laundress of the era might have replied with one simple word: “Time.” Starchmaking could take up to a month.
Suffice it to say, starched anything was an exclusive purview of the wealthy who could afford to employ staff to tediously toil away such that their masters and mistresses could keep up with crisp appearances. If only we could report that all things wealth disparity had changed in the handful of centuries since.
With a hat tip to QI’s longest-standing fishing amigo, Jim Bianco, the Investment Company Institute reports that 38% of the U.S. population makes $50,000 or less. That same cohort is among the 18% who own mutual funds (upper left chart).