At Day's Close: Night in Times Past (51 page)

At least a few major cities resisted improvements in artificial illumination. In Rome, Pope Gregory XVI (1765–1846), in an odd twist of logic, forbade street lamps lest the populace use their light to foment rebellion. Opposition to lighting was also pronounced in Cologne, which in 1801 a visitor pronounced “at least two centuries behind the rest of Germany in the improvement of arts and sciences.” The
Kölnische Zeitung
in 1819 printed a litany of arguments, including the conviction that lamps interfered “with the divine plan of the world” preordaining “darkness during the night time.” In England, to save money, such provincial centers as Sheffield, Leicester, and Norwich, as late as the 1820s, still reserved street lighting for “dark nights.”
25
Even in cities with gas, not all streets fared the same. Central boulevards stood the best chance of receiving lamps, as did shopping districts and neighborhoods of the propertied classes. Artificial illumination became both a symbol and a determinant of urban differentiation. Numerous back lanes, side streets, and alleys remained bereft of public lighting. Of his childhood in Berlin, a writer recalled, “A step into the side streets, and you felt set back by centuries.” For their part, the lower orders found themselves in ill-lit warrens segregated from major thoroughfares and wealthier residential areas. Whereas their forbears had once roamed cities and towns at will, exerting nocturnal authority over a vast domain, the indigent were increasingly confined to zones of darkness riddled by extensive crime, as captured by Gustave Doré in his prints of London slums. “Beyond the bounds of civilization,” a well-to-do resident of New York City observed of impoverished neighborhoods at mid-century.
26

Notably, when urban disorders occasionally flared, among the first casualties were street lamps. Contrary to papal fears, light was a friend of the established order. For tactical and symbolic reasons, these weapons of government surveillance fell prey to destruction from Milan to Goteborg. Set in Paris during the upheavals of 1830, Victor Hugo’s famous novel Les Misérables (1862) contains a chapter entitled “The Street Urchin an Enemy of Light,” depicting the lantern-smashing techniques of the orphan Gavroche in bourgeois neighborhoods. “Along with the réverbères,” stated an account of the first night of the July Revolution, “all other symbols of the treacherous king’s authority were destroyed.” Similarly, during the Revolution of 1848 in Vienna, an observer recalled, “Many people, mostly of the lower classes, had assembled on the Glacis, smashing the gas lanterns, destroying the lantern poles. . . . Out of the pipes came the gas and produced gigantic red columns of fire.”
27

However spectacular, this was not the final gasp of resistance to modern lighting. For much of the nineteenth century, darkness found welcome sanctuary in the countryside, which still contained large pockets of rural fundamentalism inimical to enhanced trade, transportation, and communications. There, the forces of modernization were temporarily checked or forced, at least, to adapt to rural ways. Labor discipline in a Lancashire cotton mill during the 1830s entailed parading the effigy of a ghost across the shop floor at night to deter child workers from sleeping. For artificial illumination, village households continued to rely upon tallow candles, rushlights, and oil lamps. Thus did the West Yorkshire village of Pudsey escape the “vulgar intrusion” of “busy-bodies,” boasted a resident in 1887. “There is no gas, no street lamps, and very little light shown from the dwellings.” The European countryside, still mysterious and unpredictable, remained a world of fairies and fireside tales, poaching, and midnight pranks. “There was no gas in the streets then,” recalled a Staffordshire textile worker in 1892. “This dispeller of mischief and ghosts had not then come into the available resources of civilization.”
28

Anon.,
Lantern Smashing in Vienna
, 1848, 1849.

Toward the turn of the century, gas, then electricity, along with other marvels of modernity, inexorably transformed rustic communities. By World War I, if not sooner, country villages comprised an unmarked grave for many vestiges of traditional life. So in his small classic,
Change in the Village
(1912), the Surrey wheelwright George Sturt described how “braying” motorcars, “new road-lamps,” and “lit-up villa windows” breached the “quiet depths of darkness.” For the time being, Sturt also wrote of his “first sleep,” though that too would pass.
29

Today we inhabit a nonstop culture characterized by widespread electric lighting both within and outside homes and businesses. Never before, in our everyday lives, have we been more dependent upon artificial illumination, arguably the greatest symbol of modern progress. Besides boasting all-night television and radio, twenty-four-hour service stations and supermarkets, evening has become the primary time of employment for a growing segment of the Western workforce, not to mention millions of moonlighters. Darkness represents the largest remaining frontier for commercial expansion. Thomas Edison’s dictum “Put an undeveloped human being into an environment where there is artificial light and he will improve” has carried the night as well as the day. No shortage of metropolitan areas in Europe and North America currently bill themselves as “twenty-four-hour” cities. Not surprisingly, sleep, too, has fallen prey to the hurried pace and busy schedules of modern life. In the United States today, perhaps 30 percent of adults average six or fewer hours of rest a night, with that portion rising as more persons stretch their waking hours. Disdaining sleep as a waste of time, many adolescents find their slumber harmed by television, computers, and other sources of sensory stimulation. Meanwhile, the United States military, seeking a battlefield advantage, has begun investigating ways to keep soldiers awake for periods of up to seven days.
30

Europe at Night
, W. Sullivan, n.d.

In John Dryden’s comedy
Amphitryon
(1690), the ancient deity Mercury demands of Night, “What art thou good for . . . but only for love and fornication?” In view of our present trajectory of technological change, we might well pose the same question today. Increasingly, rather than render nighttime more accessible, we are instead risking its gradual elimination. Already, the heavens, our age-old source of awe and wonder, have been obscured by the glare of outdoor lighting. Only in remote spots can one still glimpse the grandeur of the Milky Way. Entire constellations have disappeared from sight, replaced by a blank sky. Conversely, the fanciful world of our dreams has grown more distant with the loss of segmented sleep and, with it, a better understanding of our inner selves. Certainly, it is not difficult to imagine a time when night, for all practical purposes, will have become day—truly a twenty-four/seven society in which traditional phases of time, from morning to midnight, have lost their original identities.
31
The Russian government has even attempted to launch an experimental “space mirror” designed to transform night into twilight in selected locations with the aid of reflected light from the sun.
32

The residual beauty of the night sky, alternating cycles of darkness and light, and regular respites from the daily round of sights and sounds—all will be impaired by enhanced illumination. Ecological systems, with their own patterns of nocturnal life, will suffer immeasurably. With darkness diminished, opportunities for privacy, intimacy, and self-reflection will grow more scarce. Should that luminous day arrive, we stand to lose a vital element of our humanity—one as precious as it is timeless. That, in the depths of a dark night, should be a bracing prospect for any spent soul to contemplate.

NOTES

(A fuller set of citations may be found at
www.wwnorton.com
.)

ABBREVIATIONS

Add. Mss.
——
Additional Manuscripts, British Library, London

AHR
——
American Historical Review

Assi 45
——
Northern Assize Circuit Depositions, Public Record Office, London

Bargellini, “Vita Notturna”
——
Piero Bargellini, “La Vita Notturna,” in
Vita Privata a Firenze nei Secoli XIV e XV
(Florence, 1966), 75–89

BC
——
British Chronicle
(London)

Beattie, Crime
——
J. M. Beattie,
Crime and the Courts in England, 1600–1800
(Princeton, N.J., 1986)

Beck, Diary
——
David Beck,
Spiegel van Mijn Leven; een Haags Daboek uit 1624
, ed. Sv. E. Veldhijsen (Hilversum, 1993)

Best, Books
——
Donald Woodward, ed.,
The Farming and Memorandum Books of Henry Best of Elmswell,
1642 (London, 1984)

BL
——
British Library, London

Bodl.
——
Bodleian Library, Oxford

Bourne,
Antiquitates Vulgares
——
Henry Bourne,
Antiquitates Vulgares
;
or, the Antiquities of the Common People
...(Newcastle, Eng., 1725)

Bräker, Life
——
Ulrich Bräker,
The Life Story and Real Adventures of the Poor Man of Toggenburg
, trans. Derek Bowman (Edinburgh, 1970)

Brand 1777
——
John Brand,
Observations on Popular Antiquities
... (New Castle upon Tyne, 1777)

Brand 1848
——
John Brand et al., Observations on the Popular Antiquities of Great Britain . . . , 3 vols. (London, 1848)

Breton,
Works
——
Alexander B. Grosart, ed.,
The Works in Verse and Prose of Nicholas Breton
. . . , 2 vols. (1879; rpt. edn., New York, 1966)

Burke,
Popular
——
Peter Burke,
Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe
(London, 1978)
Culture

Burt,
Letters
——
Edward Burt,
Letters from a Gentleman in the North of Scotland to His Friend in London
. . . , 2 vols. (London, 1754)

Cannon, Diary
——
Memoirs of the Birth, Education, Life, and Death of Mr. John Cannon, 1684–1742, Somerset Archaeological and Natural History Society, Taunton, England

Carter,
Diary
——
Jack P. Greene, ed.,
The Diary of Colonel Landon Carter of Sabine Hall
, 1752–1778, 2 vols. (Charlottesville, Va., 1965)

Clegg,
Diary
——
Vanessa S. Doe, ed.,
The Diary of James Clegg of Chapel en le Frith,
1708–1755, 2 vols. (Matlock, Eng., 1978)

Cohens,
Italy
——
Elizabeth Storr Cohen and Thomas V. Cohen,
Daily Life in Renaissance Italy
(Westport, Ct., 2001)

Cole, Diary
——
Francis Griffin Stokes, ed.,
The Blecheley Diary of the Rev. William Cole
... 1765–67 (London, 1931)

Cowper, Diary
——
Diary of Dame Sarah Cowper, Hertfordshire County Record Office, Hertford, England

Crusius,
Nocte
—
Jacobus Andreas Crusius,
De Nocte et Nocturnis Officiis, Tam Sacris, Quam Prophanis, Lucubrationes Historico-Philologico-Juridicae
(Bremen, 1660)

Defoe,
Tour
——
Daniel Defoe,
A Tour thro’ the Whole Island of Great Britian
. . . , 2 vols. (1724–1726; rpt. edn., London, 1968)

Dekker,
Writings
——
Thomas Dekker,
The Wonderful Year [Etc] and Selected Writings
, ed. E. D. Pendry (Cambridge, Mass., 1968)

Dietz,
Surgeon
——
Master Johann Dietz,
Surgeon in the Army of the Great Elector and Barber to the Royal Court: From the Old Manuscripts in the Royal Library in Berlin
, trans. B. Miall (London, 1923)

Drinker,
Diary
——
Elaine Forman Crane et al., eds.,
The Diary of Elizabeth Drinker,
3 vols. (Boston, 1991)

DUR
——
Daily Universal Register
(London)

Dyer, Diary
——
Diary of William Dyer, 2 vols., Bristol Central Library, Bristol

East Anglian Diaries
——
Matthew Storey, ed.,
Two East Anglian Diaries,
1641–1729: Isaac Archer and William Coe
(Woodbridge, Eng., 1994)

ECR
——
George Francis Dow, ed.,
Records and Files of the Quarterly Courts of Essex County, Massachusetts
, 8 vols. (Salem, Mass., 1911–1921)

Evelyn,
Diary
——
Esmond Samuel De Beer, ed.,
The Diary of John Evelyn
, 6 vols. (Oxford, 1951)

F. Platter,
Journal
——
Seán Jennett, ed. and trans.,
Beloved Son Felix: The Journal of Felix Platter, a Medical Student in Montpellier in the Sixteenth Century
(London, 1962)

Falkus, “Lighting”
——
Malcolm Falkus, “Lighting in the Dark Ages of English Economic History: Town Streets before the Industrial Revolution,” in D. C. Coleman and A. H. John, eds.,
Trade, Government, and Economy in Pre-Industrial England: Essays Presented to F. J. Fisher
(London, 1976), 248–273

Flaherty,
Privacy
——
David H. Flaherty,
Privacy in Colonial New England
(Charlottesville, Va., 1972)

FLEMT
——
David I. Kertzer and Marzio Barbagli, eds.,
Family Life in Early Modern Times,
Vol. 1 of
The History of the European Family
(New Haven, 2001)

G and LDA
——
Gazetteer and London Daily Advertiser

G and NDA
——
Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser
(London)

Garnert,
Lampan
——
an Garnert,
Anden i Lampan: Etnologiska Perspektiv på ljus Och Mörker
(Stockholm, 1993)

GM
——
Gentleman’s Magazine
(London)

Griffiths,
Youth
——
Paul Griffiths,
Youth and Authority: Formative Experiences in England, 1560–1640
(Oxford, 1987)

Grose,
Dictionary
——
Francis Grose,
A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue
(London, 1785)

Harrison,
Description
——
William Harrison, The
Description of England
, ed. Georges Edelen (Ithaca, N.Y., 1968)

Heywood,
Diaries
——
J. Horsfull Turner, ed.,
The Rev. Oliver Heywood, B.A., 1630–1702; His Autobiography, Diaries, Anecdote and Event Books
. . . , 4 vols. (Brighouse, Eng., 1882)

HMM and GA
——
Harrop’s Manchester Mercury and General Advertiser

HPL
II
——
Georges Duby, ed.,
Revelations of the Medieval World
, trans. Arthur Goldhammer, Vol. 2 of Philippe Ariès and George Duby, eds., History of Private Life (Cambridge, Mass., 1988)

HPL
III
——
Roger Chartier, ed.,
Passions of the Renaissance,
trans. Arthur Goldhammer, Vol. 3 of Philippe Ariès and Georges Duby, eds.,
History of Private Life
(Cambridge, Mass., 1989)

HWW
III
——
Natalie Zemon Davis and Arlette Farge, eds.,
Renaissance and Englightened Paradoxes,
Vol. 3 of Georges Duby and Michelle Perrot, eds.,
A History of Women in the West
(Cambridge, Mass., 1993)

Isham,
Diary
——
Norman Marlow, ed.,
The Diary of Thomas Isham of Lamport (1658–81)
... (Farnborough, Eng., 1971)

Janekovick-Römer, “Dubrovniks” Zdenka Janekovick-Römer, “‘Post Tertiam Campanam’: Das Nachtleben Dubrovniks im Mittelalter,”
Historische Anthropologie 3
(1995), 100–111

JIH
——
Journal of Interdisciplinary History

Josselin,
Diary
——
Alan Macfarlane, ed.,
The Diary of Ralph Josselin
(London, 1976)

JRAI
——
John Cameron and John Imrie, eds.,
The Justiciary Records of Argyll and the Isles
, 1664–1742, 2 vols. (Edinburgh, 1949, 1969)

JSH
——
Journal of Social History

JUH
——
Journal of Urban History

Jütte,
Poverty
——
Robert Jütte,
Poverty and Deviance in Early Modern Europe
(Cambridge, 1994)

Kay,
Diary
——
W. Brockbank and F. Kenworthy, eds.,
The Diary of Richard Kay
, 1716–51 of Baldingstone, Neary Bury: A Lancashire Doctor
(Manchester, 1968)

Koslofsky, “Court Culture”
——
Craig Koslofsky, “Court Culture and Street Lighting in Seventeenth-Century Europe,”
Journal of Urban History
28 (2002), 743–768

Lavater,
Spirites
——
Lewes Lavater,
Of Ghostes and Spirites Walking by Nyght, 1572,
ed. John Wilson Dover and May Yardley (1572; rpt. ed., Oxford, 1929)

LC
——
London Chronicle

LDA
——
London Daily Advertiser

Lean,
Collectanea
——
Vincent Stuckey Lean,
Lean’s Collectanea
... , 4 vols. (Bristol, 1902–1904)

Legg,
Low-Life
——
Thomas Legg,
Low-life or One Half of the World, Knows not How the Other Half Live
... (London, 1750)

Le Loyer,
Specters
Pierre Le Loyer,
A Treatise of Specters of Straunge Sights
, Visions, and Apparitions ... (London, 1605)

LEP
——
Lloyd’s Evening Post
(London)

LE-P
——
London Evening-Post

Lewis, Diary
——
Diary of John Lewis, 1718–1760, Bodleian Library, Oxford, MS. Eng. misc. f. 10

LM
——
Leeds Mercury

Lottin,
Chavatte
——
Alain Lottin,
Chavatte, Ouvrier Lillois: Un Contemporain de Louis XIV
(Paris, 1979)

Lowe,
Diary
——
W. L. Sachse, ed.,
The Diary of Roger Lowe
(New Haven, 1938)

Matthiessen,
Natten
——
Hugo Matthiessen,
Natten: Stuier I Gammelt Byliv
([Copenhagen], 1914)

Ménétra,
Journal
——
Jacques-Louis Ménétra,
Journal of My Life
, ed. Daniel Roche, trans. Arthur Goldhammer (New York, 1986)

Moryson,
Itinerary
——
Fynes Moryson,
An Itinerary Containing His Ten Yeeres Travell .
. . , 4 vols. (Glasgow, 1907)

Moryson,
Unpublished Itinerary
——
Charles Hughes, ed.,
Shakespeare’s Europe: A Survey of the Condition of Europe at the End of the 16th Century, being Unpublished Chapters of Fynes Moryson’s Itinerary (1617) .
. . (New York, 1967)

Muchembled,
Violence
——
Robert Muchembled,
La Violence au Village: Sociabilitié et Comportements Populaires en Artois du XVe au XVIIe Siècle
(Turnhout, France, 1989)

Nashe,
Works
——
Ronald B. McKerrow, ed.,
The Works of Thomas Nashe
, 5 vols. (Oxford, 1958)

NHCR
I
——
Charles J. Hoadly, ed.,
Records of the Colony and Plantation of New Haven
,
1638–1649
(Hartford, Ct., 1857)

NHCR
II
——
Charles J. Hoadley, ed.,
Records of the Colony or Jurisdiction of New Haven, 1653 to the Union
(1663) (Hartford, Ct., 1858)

NHTR
——
Franklin Bowditch Dexter and Zara Jones Powers, eds.,
New Haven Town Records
, 3 vols. (New Haven, 1917–1962)

NYWJ
——
New York Weekly Journal

O’Dea,
Lighting
——
William T. O’Dea,
The Social History of Lighting
(London, 1958)

OBP
——
The Proceedings on the King’s Commissions of the Peace, Oyer and Terminer, and Gaol Delivery for the City of London; and also Gaol Delivery for the County of Middlesex, Held at Justice-Hall in the Old Bailey

ODNB
——
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
(Oxford, 2004)

OED
——
Oxford English Dictionary
, 1st edn. (Oxford, 1888–1928)

PA
——
Public Advertiser
(London)

Parkman,
Diary
——
Francis G. Walett, ed.,
The Diary of Ebenezer Parkman 1703–1782
(Worcester, Mass., 1974)

Paroimiographia
——
Paroimiographia: Proverbs, or, Old Savves & Adages, in English (or the Saxon toung) Italian, French, and Spanish, whereunto the British, for Their Great Antiquity and Weight are Added .
. . (London, 1659)