Is it true that Europeans were filthy during the Middle Ages

No.

Yes.

maybe.

Perhaps.

I don't know

Can you repeat the question?

YOU'RE NOT THE BOSS OF ME NOW

Yes, that's why they mostly drank beer instead

Well, back then alcohols like beer were the safest things to drink because of poor water quality.

>>1514375
Of course it's true. Arabs gave Europeans the idea of sanitation.

They're still pretty fucking dirty.

>>1514415
http://leslefts.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/the-great-medieval-water-myth.html?m=1

Absence of evidence (of drinking water) does not equal evidence of absence.

SIRE! SIRE!
The peasants are revolting!

Yes. Without the roman administration regularly cleaning all the natural springs, rivers, wells etc all water went bad for centuries

>>1514436

>There is no evidence
>It's just a massive coincidence that you have greater genetic alcohol resistance among the descendants of people who settled down and polluted their local water supplies than among nomadic and aboriginal peoples.
>Mommy, how do I tie my shoes again?

>>1514436
1). >blogspot
2). Except glass bottles for alcohol use are a common find in middle-ages archaeology. And is one of the reasons why a number of European countries have the drinking cultures they d now.

- http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/1223/1/1223_v1.pdf
- http://www.fire.ca.gov/resource_mgt/archaeology/downloads/Bottles.pdf
- http://www.eaines.com/archaeology/the-archaeology-of-ancient-alcohol/
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_alcoholic_beverages

>>1514375
>the water was unsafe to drink?

What do you mean, "was"? Untreated water has always been unsafe to drink. That's why you have to boil or otherwise purify it first.

no.
The filthy bit is completely wrong: there were laws against it in plenty of areas (medieval prague, for instance, you could be fined or jailed for not bathing), public baths etc were common.

Bathing and washing was less common than today - probably bathing every other day or two,rather than every day, and the really unclean people bathing once a week.
The myth comes from the religious hermit types who considered cleanliness to be a sin of price, and refused to ever bathe. They were regularly noted in contemporary accounts, because people thought this was unusual.

Water was not unsafe to drink - the very idea that water was unsafe is idiotic. We'd have never survived past the neolithic, if that were the case.
Water in some CITIES and downstream was unsafe, and in those areas, the use of short ales, or wines, where the water had been boiled during distillation was safer.

If you lived on a farm in medieval england, or were a forester in medieval bavaria, then it was perfectly safe to drink water - safer than today, probably.
If you lived in London, or Cologne, however, you'd have been a fucking idiot to go down to the Thames or Rhine, and pull up a bucket of water, and drink it. Because that would be as polluted as the Ganges is today.

Is it true they call it the dark ages because there was a great volcanic eruption and the sky was filled with ash so it was literally dark for centuries?

>>1514473
it's not because water was bad it's because beer is good

>>1514494
>Untreated water has always been unsafe to drink.
maybe if you live in india

>>1514533
DRINK UP
CHEERS!

>>1514533
Nah, back in the day they used to drink really light beers with like 1% alcohol, the sole purpose of that alcohol was to purify the drink

>>1514549
>he drink beer solely for the alcohol
Disdain

>>1514549
>the sole purpose of that alcohol was to purify the drink
in that case you wouldn't brew it to be fucking 1% because that does literally nothing. that's just a myth,

>>1514549
Nope you idiot. How the fuck is one percent going to purify it? If anything the bacteria died during the boil.

>>1514558
Except to kill bacterium and filth that can possibly lurk or grow from within it. That 1% alcohol is just enough for microscopic impurities.

>>1514563
It can still prevent bacteria from growing within it.

>>1514568
>>1514572
no, it can't and that's a fucking retarded urban myth and only reason people drank lots of ale was that they didn't have fucking coca cola back then.

>>1514572
No. You literally know nothing. I'm a biologist and this is just stupid.

>>1514558
>>1514563
Roughly any presence of alcohol can do away with germs and microbes.

>>1514542
ebic.

>>1514580
no. it. can. not.

>>1514563
>>1514568
>>1514578
if there's alcohol in it at all, it should be enough to deal a blow to whatever bacteria is in it. and even if the presence is lacking, it hampers they're ability to grow or stay within an alcohol-based liquid.

>>1514527
Video games aren't real , anon.

>>1514586
You ain't much for readin, eh Cletus?

>>1514589
what the fuck are you talking about?

>>1514586
>>1514578
>>1514563
>>1514558
http://aem.asm.org/content/72/4/2627.full

While bacterial grow in ethanol is possible, and there are ethanol-resistance bacteria out there, it's pretty rare, and low concentrations of alcohol are enough for the basic bacterium that can be found in water from sources like a river or well.

>>1514375
dumbass

>>1514375
True. Good thing white race is dying.

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>>1514420
no

>>1514601
>While bacterial grow in ethanol is possible, and there are ethanol-resistance bacteria out there, it's pretty rare, and low concentrations of alcohol are enough for the basic bacterium that can be found in water from sources like a river or well.

That's not what that source says at all. It says that low concentrations on ethanol have some interesting but minor effects on a specific strain of bacteria and cause them to form a biofilm.

It doesn't say they were killed or that 1% of alcohol would wipe out all the baddies in a drink.

Not that Medieval peasants even knew what the fuck bacteria were anyway.

>>1514375
Read a medieval account by a person living then and you'll find neither is really true.

>>1514420
Arabs taught Europeans how to breathe

>dey dranks dem alcohols cuz dey retards who cannot into wells, springs, rivers and shiiiiiieeeeeeeet

fucking hell /his/ you are getting worse every goddamn day, every fucking millisecond more like

we have people writing specifically about people drinking water, people finding water, people recognizing polluted water, people passing ordnances not to fuck with water from fucking antiquity onwards

>>1514494
How do you think we stayed hydrated before humans figured out fire

>>1514922
Watermelons.

>>1514440
tell them to take a shower

>>1514494
>>1514572
>>1514601
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mL3sho1CpkI
see 6:00

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>>1514375
Is it true that I want to punch this fuckface for making idiots like you believe in hollywood and 19th century armchair historians as credible sources?

>>1515023
>le ebic europa was always magnificent and clean and pure : D : D

it took fucking muslims to civilize you lot

>>1514375

> middle-ages

My grandmother and her mom and dad bathed one time a week in a wooden tub they laborously filled with boiling water and soap cuttings.
First the father would bathe, then the mother, and then my grandmother. In the same water.

This was in Southern Denmark in the 30's and 40's

Real cleanliness is a modern invention

>>1515023
Terry Jones was the reason Monty Python made The Holy Grail, and actually made a documentary series about medieval misconceptions.

>>1515014
Man, how we human deals with water before neolithic culture? Our ancestor must have very strong immune system that can handle bacteria and shit. Not to mention giardia. Fuck giardiasis, that's fucking terrifying.

These kinds of threads always annoy me because they dont define century or region. The "middle ages" can be taken to mean anything from the 6th to 17th century. Europe was also certainly not homogenous culturally. Probably the byzantines were cleaner than celts (no offense). And then of course there were muslims in Iberia for a very long time. Etc

Id bet there were cultural trends of both increased and decreased bathing in various areas throughout the centuries. A lot of which probably was a result of how people incorrectly figured the black death spread.

It wasn't Ike they drank beer instead of water, the just put a little alcohol and sweeteners like honey in water to make it safe. Just look up what "mead" is. The romans watered their wine down heavily too. Some populations, im sure, had access to streams and rivers of clean water. Shit ive drank water straight from a mountain stream before and Im American in the current year.

The lower classes actually consumed more alcohol as a source of calories than a source of hydration. French peseants would have a very heavy beer with honey and burries mixed in called a "saison" instead of food. Thryre delicious btw.

>>1515056
they didn't need to. crappy water wasn't an issue before hundreds and thousands of people with their domestics packed together to live tightly in one place, natural waters are drinkable even today if you just get away from civilization and watch that there aren't any animal carcasses or stuff like that.

>>1515134
>the just put a little alcohol and sweeteners like honey in water to make it safe
no, they put it there to make it taste better. you guys are just over-analyzing simple things.

>>1515044
that's because they were shit poor most likely.

>>1515250

They were, and they lived in a small town and not in one of the bigger cities, but back then, heated water was a luxury and even in the cities, most people that lived in apartments only washed their feet, groin, armpits and face+hair, filling a bathtub was simply impractical.

And considering the demographics and the general poverty in Denmark in the 30's, a majority part of the population probably had questionable hygeine seen with modern standards.

Btw, my grandmother's family did the 4-story wash every day, she didn't go to school filthy like the toiletmen's kids

>Is it true that Europeans were filthy during the Middle Ages
No, people bathed frequently. I'm most familiar with early medieval Ireland and the late middle ages in central Europe but going by references in literature and such people bathed a few times a week.
>and that the water was unsafe to drink?
No, the water they had access to was largely safe to drink. They didn't "drink weak beer instead of water" or "add alcohol to water" or anything else like that. In fact they often used water to dilute alcohol and fruit juice.

>Source
Misconceptions about the Middle Ages, Harris and Grigsby

>>1515436
>They didn't "drink weak beer instead of water" or "add alcohol to water" or anything else like that. In fact they often used water to dilute alcohol and fruit juice.

That's the same thing you doofus.

>>1515566
no it isn't. if the water was bad that would only make your beer bad too.

>>1514420
arabs also taught us basic medicine.

imagine living in an unpredictable environment such as Italy in the 14th century. cities fought each other so war everywhere, violence was common, leprosy, the Black Plague. who can focus in personal hygiene in such a moment? Plus at that time you could easily die with just a cold.

>>1514388
>>1514389
>>1514398
>>1514403
>>1514406
>>1514407
perfect

>>1515578
do you not know alcohol is a disinfectant?

>>1515578
>alcohol: kills microbes
>distillation: kills microbes

>>1515173
Oh yeah definitely. Let me clarify. Its not like ancient people knew they were killing bacteria with alcohol. You don't have to know why something works to know that it works. But ancient people, who probably brewed alcohol in the first place because it makes you drunk, certainly noticed that people weren't shitting themselves to death as much when they drank beer as when they were drinking water from certain sources.

But they also knew that running, clear water with fish swimming in it in the wild was fine to drink and shit colored water wasn't. People are being retarded and acting like because our ancestors figured out that alcohol made local water drinkable, that they were using it for literally every water source...


Even if you don't have modern science, if one of your fucking family members dies, you're going to think pretty fucking hard about what caused it.

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>>1514926
maybe in africa

For you? Yes. You would probably get dysentery and die within a month.
For them? They're used to it, like Indians living in India.

>>1514420
WE

No, like all myths about the Middle Ages that's a Renaissance thing.

>>1515669
>>1515918
jesus christ you're stupid

even today

Middle Ages saw human and animal waste thrown into the street or the river, with disused sewers and baths of the Romans left to decay.

Even in the 1300s there were open sewers to carry waste to the rivers,and drinking water was taken from the same river that they put the waste into.

>>1514375
Filthy for our modern standards but not as bad as you would think. There are strong clues that they regularly (weekly or maybe even daily) bathed, especially when open water was near.

Water generally only is unsafe to drink when it's either not moving or polluted by human shit etc. (Ganges).

Most people still washed once a week. They didn't have soap and the water was cold, but it's better than nothing.

>>1514375


no, being a rural peasant was probably pretty great until the 14th or 15th century when Yurop went full Renaissance and was the worst to live in


>public baths and mixed bathing were a big thing until the Renaissance "if my clothes are clean, that means I'M clean! no need to wash my shitty ass" retardation (plus you could get some sex maybe)
>washing was something you did whenever you could, was part of middle ages culture
>water was probably fine, there just aren't many historical documents or literature mentioning drinking water because they probably assumed it was fucking obvious people drank water a lot

>>1514549

>beer is strong enough liquor to sterilize things

is this knave serious

>>1514542

Go to a local pond and have a drink. Its filled with fish feces, algae, and microscopic parasites.

>>1518553
RUNNING WATER NIGGA DAYM

>>1514375
>Is it true that Europeans were filthy during the Middle Ages
no
>and that the water was unsafe to drink?
yes

>>1515014
Looks like the primitive technology guy is just about ready to make his own malt and brew his own beer. Guess finding hops might be a problem, but he could also use other herbs for gruit.

Using hot stones to heat up the wort is actually a historical technique used to make Steinbier.

>>1518553
who the fuck drinks from some random shitty ditch anyway that's why we have (and had) things like springs and wells you retard

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It's well known throughout the world that African kings gave the knowledge of sanitation to the Iberians under Al Andalus. They also taught them about medicine and taught them couched lance charges

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>>1518635
>Egypt means black in Greek

>>1514375
They weren't filthy, but most weren't exactly clean either, and they didn't wear brown rags. Dirty is a better word.

And yes the water wasn't safe to drink and still isn't, not for extended periods from the source anyway.

>>1517635
You accidentally wrote 'you're' instead of 'I am'

>>1518536
Why did things get so backwards in the Renaissance?

>>1518927
They didn't, this is just /pol/ getting butt-hurt.

Just say the magic words, Dark Ages, and they'll get so triggered they'll have a stroke.