The new year had arrived, however, in January of 1508, which seemed to be a bit cold......

In general, July is the hottest month in the Northern Hemisphere, while January is the coldest month. Therefore, in his previous life, Marin always felt that the Spring Festival was the most reliable. Because, after the Spring Festival, it means that spring is coming. However, the special Western New Year, after the end of January, is extremely cold and makes people a little desperate.

Of course, he is now a European, so it is natural for him to follow the local customs and celebrate the New Year of the Western calendar. However, after the Western New Year, a cold wave from Eastern Europe came to northern Germany, which caused the entire northern part of Germany to freeze.

Normally, the northern part of Germany is weakly affected by the warm North Atlantic Current, and the winters are not too cold, at most minus a few degrees. However, in January this year, due to the influence of the cold wave in Eastern Europe, the temperature actually fell below -10 degrees. In many areas, heavy snowfall and unusually cold.

In modern times, cold is just cold. But in ancient times, cold weather meant that someone had to freeze to death......

Sure enough, the reports sent from all over the country reported that someone had frozen to death.

However, there is no way around it. Because, in this era, Europeans did not have down jackets and cotton clothes. As for the quilt, there are none. Because, in this era, Europeans did not use cotton products.

As for quilts made of down, they were only available to the aristocracy and wealthy merchants. And those serfs obviously don't have the money to buy duvets. And down jackets or something, not even the aristocracy.

It's not that the aristocrats can't afford to use down jackets, but down products have a disadvantage - they are easy to pile up......

The quilt made of down is okay, because it is flat, and the down is evenly distributed. However, if it is made into clothes, the wrapped down has a characteristic - it is easy to deposit down. In the end, the down of the down jacket is all piled up under the clothes......

Therefore, even the aristocracy, in winter, could only wear a few layers of woolen clothes to keep warm. Moreover, the effect is not too good.

In this kind of weather, most people basically huddle at home, sitting in front of the fireplace to make a fire.

But the problem is that in this era, the forest belonged to the aristocracy. Without the permission of the nobles, the peasants did not dare to go into the mountains to cut firewood at will. Otherwise, if you are caught, no one will avenge your grievances.

If they meet a well-meaning nobleman and face the cold, they may allow the peasants to go into the mountains to chop wood for warmth. If you encounter indifference and ruthlessness, you don't care if the people live or die. Moreover, in this era, the aristocracy, regardless of whether the people live or die, is the majority. Therefore, it is rare to meet a noble lord who cares about the life and death of the common people, and the serfs will be grateful.

……

Relatively speaking, the situation in Beihai is much better than that of other countries. Because, Marin popularized adobe houses and ondols. At the very least, in Marin's manor, every family lived in an adobe house and a kang with good warmth.

Moreover, for the serfs on his own estate, Marin was not stingy in distributing firewood to them. Therefore, when the severe cold came, only two people froze to death in the manor under the name of Marin in Beihai Kingdom. Others, because they hid on the kang in the adobe house, were not too affected by the cold.

Most of the people who were frozen to death reported from all over the world were what happened in other aristocratic estates, especially the original estates of old nobles.

This is because most of the manors in the names of the ministers and generals under Marin are imitations of Marin's manors. Because it imitated Marin's manor, it was natural that adobe houses and ondols were also promoted. Therefore, in the manor of the military officials under Marin, there are very few people who freeze to death.

And most of the estates of the old aristocratic families still retain their former habits. The houses where the serfs lived were still very dilapidated. Because they did not get information sharing from Marin's side, their serfs were not able to live in better warm adobe houses.

In fact, the cost of adobe houses is very low and cost-effective. However, most of the old nobles were not reused by Marin, so they naturally could not share information with Marin and the new nobles under Marin. Therefore, the low-cost and practical house of adobe houses was not popularized in the estates of the old aristocracy. This time, when encountering such a huge cold wave that occurs once in decades, many people naturally froze to death.

……

Although the cold wave is raging, life still has to go on. Many people must continue to work, otherwise, the whole society will be chaotic.

For example, Marin and his ministers had to go to work normally to deal with various problems. Of course, there was no shortage of stoves for the stoves in the offices of Marin and his ministers.

You can't have a fire in the office, and you can't fix the fireplace. However, Marin popularized stoves with external chimneys, so that the office was not cold, and there was no fear of stuffiness or even gas poisoning.

However, those who work outdoors are more miserable. For example, the guards guarding the gates of the palace shivered with cold......

And on the streets, the hired workers who delivered food and other necessities of life were also shivering with cold. Basically, pedestrians walking on the street are shaking as they walk, as if they have a cerebral thrombosis.

Even when the officials were commuting to and from work, the distance from the room to the carriage was shivering.

Marin felt that he should invent a warm artifact......

……

The first thing he thought of was cotton clothes, but there was no cotton in Europe now. Those who traveled through the Tang Dynasty could also get a large amount of cotton from Gaochangguo. Marin now, not to mention that he doesn't have any cotton in his hand, even if he wants to go to Mexico to get cotton, it will take several months to go back and forth. At that time, it was estimated that it was summer, who would make the cotton clothes for?

Therefore, to make a cold-proof artifact, the first condition is to have materials......

When covered with a velvet quilt at night, Marin naturally thought of a down jacket......

Down jackets are not made of velvet, but of duck down. So, the next day, Marin sent his men to collect eiderdown everywhere.

Once you've collected enough duck down, it's time to sew down jackets. Thanks to Marin, he had read about this and had dismantled his old down jacket to play. Therefore, he knows that down jackets are actually clothes sewn into small independent lattice spaces.

This method actually existed as early as the Tang Dynasty. The southerners of the Tang Dynasty "included goose down" and sewed it in a double-layer cloth. Each square with interlaced needlework is an independent space separated from other squares. There is goose down in the squares......

However, this method was not popularized in ancient times. Because, after the Song Dynasty, cotton was promoted. With cheap cotton quilts and clothes, this kind of cumbersome goose down clothes and quilts were abandoned.

As for the problem of heavier cotton clothes? The ancients were less productive and paid more attention to the issue of cost than to the question of whether clothes were heavy or not...... So, this early down jacket did not spread......

The modern down jacket was invented by foreigners after World War I. One is named Eddie. Bauer's guy found that by sewing duck down into a small square space enclosed by vertical and horizontal needles and threads, the clothes made no longer had the problem of fluff depositing down in the past. Then, a modern version of the down jacket was introduced.

Compared with cotton clothes, down jackets are lightweight, breathable, and their warmth performance is no worse than cotton clothes. Then, this down jacket took the world by storm. In my country, it was only in the 80s of the last century that people began to wear it. At that time, who had an opinion on a down jacket, a proper big guy or an overseas relationship......

As soon as he said to do it, Marin ordered someone to find a tailor and sew the spread duck down into two layers of relatively dense cloth (the cloth with large pores may fall off), and then made a down jacket that looked bloated.

When Marin put it on, he found it very warm. It's just that there is a smell of duck droppings......

So, Marin took off the duck dung-smelling down jacket with great disgust, and asked people to find the best velvet and sew a down jacket again. Sure enough, this high-grade velvet has no peculiar smell. However, the cost is high—a few pounds of velvet, worth 10 gold coins......

In other words, the cost of this velvet down jacket is as high as more than 10 gold coins...... Counting the fabric, needlework, and tailoring labour, the estimated cost is 12 gold coins......

Therefore, Marin thinks that it is most economical to treat those duck down that smells of duck feces to remove the odor. Otherwise, if it is made of velvet, the average small nobleman cannot afford to wear it......

Marin gave this task to the tanners, because they had the technology to remove odors from smelly animal leathers. Although duck down is not leather, it is estimated that it can also remove odors with a little adjustment using their technology.

However, before the technology of removing the odor of eiderdown was developed, the down jacket spread among the upper class of the Beihai country......

Because, wearing a down jacket, Marin walked alone in the snow for a long time, and he looked completely unafraid of the cold, which attracted the attention of the ministers.

At first, everyone saw that Marin was wearing a down jacket that was so bloated, and they thought that Marin was wearing a heavy outfit. As a result, Schwartz stepped forward and found that the clothes were so light......

Then, Schwartz also got a few pounds of velvet and asked Marlin to make a contract for processing......

So, the next day, Schwartz also put on a down jacket and looked like "I'm comfortable, I'm warm......

Then, the high-ranking people in the entire palace sent velvet and asked for processing of it......

None of them are short of money, and when they see good things, they naturally want them. What's more, down jackets are very practical and can make them go out very calmly on a cold day.

These important civil and military generals of the Beihai Kingdom not only made down stocks for themselves, but also made down jackets for their families. Although the cost was quite large, their fiefdoms were made of advanced agricultural technology, and the grain production was very high. So, naturally, they have the money to splurge. A mere down jacket doesn't make them feel expensive.

In this way, down jackets are quickly becoming popular in the upper echelons of the North Sea Country......