ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an Economie from the seventeenth century, the household established by John and Mary Evelyn at Sayes Court in Deptford in 1653, some few years after their marriage. John Evelyn is best known to architects as the author of Fumifugium, a proposal for the improvement of air quality in London; and as translator of Freart de Chambrays Parallel of Ancient and Modern Architecture. Evelyn's Instructions Economique is quite sparse on practical considerations. It consists instead mainly of reflections on the duties of members of the household to one another, duties that Evelyn grounds in his religious and political beliefs. In Evelyn's microcosmic metaphors, communal virtues take pride of place over the position of any individual or group. Love and harmony are placed at the centre, similarly Veritie is the insubstantial and transcendent soule of the household whereas the husband and wife are merely physical body parts, albeit the exalted body parts the head and heart.
