Cleanliness is Next to Godliness

For more than 30 years, archaeologists have recorded and studied the colonial past of Parramatta, the second-oldest European settlement in New South Wales. Archaeological investigations provide a wealth of information that contributes to the interpretation of the landscape, the history of the town’s development and our understanding of the people who lived there. Cleanliness is Next to Godliness uses archaeological assemblages generated by these investigations as the basis for exploring what these mainly British settlers and their descendants held as societal beliefs, principles and norms (termed “Victorian values”), which emerged concerning cleanliness and health-related issues.

Dr E. Jeanne Harris explores the ways in which the colonial population of New South Wales was heavily influenced by “Victorian values”, which encouraged good health practices through a clean lifestyle. Eight residential sites were chosen for examination based on the following four criteria:

• sealed rubbish deposits
• a long 19th-century date range
• a cross-section of social classes
• identified resident(s) associated with the location and deposits.

Synthesising these findings, Cleanliness is Next to Godliness analyses the evidence for social reforms that promoted both public health initiatives and personal health practices, providing insight into the everyday lives of those who lived in Parramatta in the 19th century.

Cleanliness is Next to Godliness is the first scholarly work that presents the archaeology of Victorian social conventions as evidence of something more than respectability manifested as socio-economic status, manners and etiquette.