Shh - don't tell anyone...

I overheard somebody the other day refer to a couple as "living over the brush". I hadn't heard that expression for a long, long time. What it means of course is that they are living together but not married. Today that's not exceptional, but not that long age it wasn't something you talked openly about. Where does the expression come from? Prior to 1753 and the Marriage Act of that year, there were no specific laws about how you got married. A marriage in Church would be recognised as legal without question, but it cost, and a lot of people couldn't afford it. So in many people's eyes if a man and a woman accepted each other as husband and wife, that was all that was needed. But how was this acceptance to be evidenced? And somehow the tradition arose that one way they could do this was by holding hands and stepping over a broomstick laid on the ground. And there you are.