The Shield Of Time, PART SIX, 1146 A.D., II.
Without wanting to quote a twelve-line paragraph in full, I will try to document the author's appeal to four of the senses while Lorenzo and Wanda ride out of Anagni.
Sound
Hoofs clatter on cobbles.
Birds cry.
Smell
City smells are left behind.
The air is pure.
Sight
Sunlight torrents.
Land is bright and shadowed.
The valley is patchworked.
Streams are silver.
Villages are white.
Pasture is brown.
Forest is green with autumnal tints.
Sensation
The air is cool but warming.
And they plan a picnic lunch although action intervenes.
Poul Anderson could just have written that they rode out of the city but how much richer is his text for this description.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And in those days even a small city like Anagni must have been quite smelly!
Ad astra! Sean
Extremely smelly. "Fresh country air" can have its stinks, but not on the scale of a preindustrial city.
Hence the association of the country in traditional stories and the very language with health, children at play, cleanliness, etc.
Until almost within living memory, even in places like England death-rates were much higher in cities than in nearby country districts, and particularly so for children. People who could often sent their own children to spend large amounts of time in country settings for just that reason -- one cause of the popularity of boarding schools in remote locations among the English upper classes, for instance.
It was worse in warm weather. Note that the "Season", the time wealthy landowners spent in London, was in the cooler months.
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