Wouter Ryckbosch

In ‘splendid isolation'. A comparative perspective on the historiographies of the ‘material renaissance' and the ‘consumer revolution'

Richard Goldthwaites pioneering work on the material culture of the Italian Renaissance offered many clues for better understanding long-term changes and continuities in European patterns of consumption during the early modern period. Yet the large historiographical body on the subject of the ‘material renaissance’ has largely ignored or rejected these, and has more often than not studied the field in a sort of ‘splendid isolation’. This article presents a review of some of the most important contributions to this field, and attempts to link them to the ongoing debates on early modern consumer change in the social and economic history outside of Italy.

Arriving to a Set Table: The Integration of Hot Drinks in the Urban Consumer Culture of the Eighteenth-Century Southern Low Countries

This chapter aims to explore some of the ways in which the rapidly expanding consumption of sugar and hot drinks during the eighteenth century impacted upon the material culture of urban households in the southern Low Countries. The swift and widespread adoption of the domestic consumption of hot drinks, along with a variety of accompanying utensils and consuming practices during this period, has by now become a well-established historical finding. Relative prices and trade patterns have been substantively documented,1 as have the manners in which tea and sugar altered European ways of life, for instance by influencing patterns of domesticity and sociability during the early modern period.2 In many towns of the Southern Netherlands, the introduction of colonial goods transformed the structure and timing of meals, and profoundly influenced existing patterns of sociability.3 Yet, while a lot is known about the social and cultural practices of coffee and tea use, and even more is often suggested, important questions still need to be answered concerning the impact of this impressive shift in consumer tastes upon material cultural and consumer behaviour at large.