Before alarm clocks (or, indeed, any clocks), how did people wake up in the morning? Was it expected that people would start work at a vague time? How did peasants compare with industrial workers?

by RhegedHerdwick

It seems so bizarre that I don't know this, especially as I imagine my own grandparents could tell me. I know that if you go to sleep around the same time you tend to awake around the same time, but there can be considerable variation. And without clocks, many people would struggle to go to bed at exactly the same time each day. Was it simply expected that some people would turn up to work late?

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