5 HORRIFYING Realities Of Daily Life In Historical Times

History has amazing highlights and the civilizations that helped build the world we know of today
have a lot to take credit for.
From the monolithic pyramids at Giza to the brilliant and provocative artworks of the
Renaissance, you would think that living in any of the centuries when mankind was reaching
for the stars is something you would want to witness and participate in, but you may
want to think twice about it.
While being a badass knight might sound epic to you or being one of Socrates’ valued
students is a high honor, it’s the things that happen in between the knightly duties
or the lessons at school that you should take heavily into consideration.
Daily life in the Medieval Ages or in Ancient Rome isn’t as glammed up to be, and the
things we have read in our school’s history books have been, pretty much, filtered down
to suit the taste of a general, more wholesome audience.
So in today’s video, we are letting you in on some of the things that may surprise
you about daily living in historical times.
Here are 5 horrifying realities of daily life in the early centuries of the world!
Number 5: Plumbing Problems One of the greatest inventions introduced
into human civilization is indoor plumbing.
It is something we take extremely for granted on a daily basis.
To us, it’s just part of a routine we go through every morning.
We sit, we flush, we wash, and once our business is down the drain and off to the sewer system,
it is not our business anymore.
As they say, out of sight, out of mind.
Sadly, the same cannot be said for people living in the days preceding indoor plumbing.
Voiding your bowels is an almost non-stop horror movie that you have to live through
every waking day and every waking moment of your life.
Take the Ancient Romans for example.
You would think that for a civilization that has pioneered a revolutionary system for irrigation
through the aqueducts, they would have found a solution to their plumbing problems.
At the height of their Empire, the Romans did have a way of meeting the daily demands
of bowel movement through a public toilet system.
However, there really was no sewage management system in place when it comes to dealing with
human excrement.
The public toilets were also a horror show regarding hygiene, and one would already be
risking his health by simply sitting on one of the latrines with pipes that lead directly
to a river of poop directly below.
Believe it or not, you are even at risk of catching fire using one of these public facilities
because of the large amount of methane build-up that’s steaming out of each toilet seat.
The
medieval age was no better.
In those days, people tried to be innovative and creative regarding getting rid of their
offal.
Some would dig cesspits and bury their waste, but it would eventually spill over to a neighbor’s
yard.
One woman named Alice Wade created a sophisticated wooden pipe system that ran underneath her
neighbors’ yards and home and led directly to the street where her waste would end up.
It was a clever contraption up until it clogged and backed up her neighbors’ sewage and,
of course, you can’t fail to notice the accumulation of poop on the street.
If you think this is already horrific, most people in those days simply went in the streets
or wherever it is that they need to do their business in buildings, public squares, and
marketplaces.
Number 4: Traveling Can Be Tricky Another everyday activity that we can freely
do these days is traveling.
With the convenience of modern transportation, we can safely move from one place to another
no matter the distance.
Traveling abroad – or even to a nearby town – back in the day, is a completely different
story.
We have all seen the movies where commoners traveled armed only with a walking stick and
a rucksack filled with their personal belongings.
They would be lucky if they had a horse to ride.
One of the most challenging parts of traveling in the ancient world was a safe and clean
place to rest.
In fact, many travelers had no choice but to sleep out in the open and be vulnerable
to the elements and either freeze to death or be attacked by wild animals.
Travelling in a group may sound like a logical way to keep safe but you would still run the
risk of armed bandits who would not think twice of slitting your throat before running
off with your belongings or, in a sudden, ironic twist of fate, run the risk of being
robbed and murdered by your companions should conditions become rough.
Ignorance of local customs in a foreign land may also prove to be a problem.
Language barriers are the obvious hurdles but in times where political disputes and
territorial skirmishes abound, being misinformed of the goings on may land you a one-way ticket
to prison – if you’re lucky.
It also goes without saying that food and water can be a problem when you did not plan
out your supplies correctly.
Food poisoning is rampant especially if you end up foraging and hunting for food that
could potentially do more harm to your body than you think.
An inn or a monastery are relatively safe places to find lodgings and food to eat, granted
that is the elements or bandits did not get to you first.
Even the most sophisticated traveling party can be susceptible to the horrors of traveling
abroad.
Injury and accidents are as common as the air they breathe.
In one account in 1190, Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I met his untimely death when he
drowned crossing the Saleph River during the Third Crusade.
I think it’s safe to say that, back then, if you really don’t have to go anywhere
important, it’s safe to stay at home.
Number 3: No Quarter for the Unemployed In any government in any country and in any
kind of economic system, unemployment is a necessary evil in the cogs of industry and
progress.
Today, we treat the unemployed humanely and offer help in the form of welfare, career
counseling, and many other programs that can help anyone get on their feet and start building
a life.
I wish the same could be said centuries ago especially in the Medieval Age.
For example, being unemployed in 16th Century England is somewhat considered as a criminal
offense.
Because the unemployed had to wander and travel from one town to the next looking for any
means of income, they would often be seen by law enforcement and other locals as vagrants
and are swiftly thrown in jail.
Well, the lucky ones at least.
More often than not, the unemployed are tied to carts and dragged around town while being
flogged and whipped to a bloody pulp.
Talk about motivation.
However that all changed in 1547 when the flogging law was changed and, instead, a vagrant
could have the option of either being branded like cattle or be sold into slavery.
By the time 1600 rolled in, a new set of laws were passed that offered rewards to people
who would capture and bring in vagrants.
It was, as you can assume, a terrible plan to get the jobless off the streets as most
people opted to make this a lucrative form of living by simply tackling and picking up
anyone they find sleeping on the streets or suspect of vagrancy.
The government was not at all evil.
In some form, they did provide assistance to the poor and the jobless.
However, as part of the deal, they will be asked to wear a badge with the letter “P”
stitched into it to identify them in a crowd.
If an individual refused to wear it, he or she would be fined an equivalent of two weeks’
wages: wages that they did not have in the first place and could not have because they
don’t have any form of employment to earn it.
Number 2: Being a Woman is Really, Ridiculously Tough
The Ancient World, hands down, is brimming with misogyny and testosterone that many societies
– except for some that also put women in high regard as their male generals like Sparta
– treat the fairer sex as second class citizens and just a means of producing offspring.
A woman’s ordeal in the ancient world begins at birth.
In Athens, it was common practice for a couple to leave their new born, the female child
exposed to the elements to die.
Rome is no different.
Especially in poor families, parents would often choose to raise a son than a daughter
saying that a female child is far too burdensome and costs a lot more money to rear.
Most families who do have a female infant would opt to kill the child or leave it exposed
to the elements instead.
The virtue of also keeping your virginity if you were a woman back then was a matter
of life and death.
An Athenian man who finds out that his unmarried daughter is no longer a virgin will sell her
into slavery in the blink of an eye.
Another gruesome story happened in Rome when a priestess of the goddess Vesta lost her
virginity before reaching the age of 30.
She was promptly buried alive; and in Israel, a woman who lost her virginity before tying
the knot could be dragged into the streets and be stoned to death.
Thinking of a dream wedding?
Well, if you were living in the days of the Ancient Romans and the early centuries of
the Chinese and Japanese empires, you better forget it.
Back then, brides were secured by abducting them through invasion, war, and whatever conquest
their empires are enterprising on.
In some parts of China, the kidnapping of brides was not outlawed until the 1940s.
Without kidnapped brides, the Roman Empire would have probably collapsed and crumbled
early with accounts of it being told in several legends such as the kidnapping of the Sabine
women.
Number 1: Death by Common Cold It goes without saying that the field of medicine
is yet to make a revolutionary step forward in the days of the ancient Greeks, Romans,
and even the Medieval Ages.
In fact, most deaths that aren’t attributed to illnesses are caused by tiny injuries like
cuts and scrapes that, left untreated, led to severe infection that spread to the vital
parts of the body.
If a person is lucky, he gets to keep his life but lose an infected limb or two.
Among women, childbirth is one of the leading causes of death because of unsanitary practices
and environments.
An infant is also at high risk of dying due to mishandling and various forms of bacteria
present in the surroundings.
Wealth and status are no guarantee to keep you in perfect health.
However, history has seen more deaths in crowded urban areas than in far off farmlands.
Maybe it is because of the unsanitary conditions of the cities.
For one, no one really knows where to throw their poop or where to poop.
The Black Plague is a result of the lack of upkeep in the cities that has cost millions
of lives across Europe.
Suffice to say that, with the combination of an overcrowded urban landscape and poor
medical information, simply catching the common cold signs you a one-way trip to the grave
in a matter of days.

5 HORRIFYING Realities Of Daily Life In Historical Times

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