Europe in 978 A.D. was in the middle ages of history, and during this period, there was no strong regime to rule the Western world.

Because there is no boss, there are naturally many small feudal countries, a big fight at the slightest disagreement, the Frankish Kingdom, the Kingdom of Italy, the Eastern Roman Empire, the Kingdom of England, the Later Umayyad Dynasty, etc., the group of heroes rose together, secession brought frequent wars, at the same time Catholicism imprisoned the people's thoughts, the development of science and technology and productive forces stagnated, and the people lived in hopeless suffering, so this period is generally called the "Dark Ages" in Europe and the United States.

This state of affairs lasted until the end of the 15th and 17th centuries, when Europe began to officially end with the Renaissance and the Age of Discovery.

But now, it's still an uncivilized place...

...

Eastern Rome, north of Constantinople.

Standing on the streets of Constantinople, the capital of Eastern Rome, Jiang Yin could smell the smell of human and animal feces in the air from a long distance, which made people a little disgusting.

"It stinks in here." Di Yan sniffed the air and frowned.

"How did these ancient Europeans live in such a dirty place?" Lin Yue was also a little confused, the streets and alleys here were not at all an order of magnitude with the Great Song Dynasty, not only some dilapidated buildings were crookedly crowded together, but the streets were also filled with the mixed smell of feces and urine.

Jiang Yin was also smoked and shook his head, it was rumored that the European cities in the Middle Ages were the dirtiest in the world, Jiang Yin had always been suspicious, but now, smelling the stench wafting from the streets and alleys, he could fully understand the dirty and smelly traditions of Europeans.

......

Medieval Europeans, who basically did not bathe for life, believed that water weakened the function of organs and exposed the human body to harmful air, and if water penetrated into the pores, it would transmit various diseases, and there was even a rumor that a layer of dirt could resist the invasion of disease.

The person who bathes is considered a sick person, and even bathing is a form of corporal punishment. At that time, some people boasted that she had not washed her face for eighteen years and was considered holy by everyone.

Sanitation in medieval Europe was extremely bad, and people not only did not bathe, but also fell behind in terms of public health. Because the Christian church at that time believed that washing the body was sacred, from the princes and nobles to the common people, there was no habit of bathing.

Medieval Europeans ate with their fingers when eating, and used forks to make cutlery after the mid-18th century, before they used to cut food with knives and eat with their hands and claws, and the use of separate utensils, plates, and cups also began in the mid-to-late 18th century, people used the same utensils when drinking soup, and everyone drank with a wine glass.

Before the 13th century, Europeans used their fingers to eat. There were also certain rules when it came to eating with fingers: the Romans used the number of fingers to distinguish status, commoners were five-fingered, educated nobles only used three fingers, and the ring and little fingers could not touch food, a dining rule that continued into the 16th century and was still practiced by Europeans.

Eating with dirty hands was an extremely disgusting thing in the eyes of the Song people, but it was unbelievable that Westerners in this era had practiced it for hundreds of years.

Regarding feces and urine, this also had a unique culture in medieval Europe.

Urine is considered sacred by many Europeans, and the ladies wash their faces with urine, believing that urine can make them radiant; Urine was also used in the church, and the most commonly used disinfectant in the Victorian era was wine or urine; In the Middle Ages, people rarely washed clothes or bathed, but when they washed their clothes, they would use a mixture of urine and alkali as laundry detergent, which in the eyes of modern people was simply ignorant to the extreme.

In medieval Europe, for ordinary people, the floor was their toilet, and after pulling it, it was okay to shovel it into the corner of the wall. Besides, they are usually used to the smell of body odor, so they naturally feel indifferent to the feces and urine that are close at hand.

Only the most discerning nobles and high-ranking priests would have a special toilet in the living room, and it was elegantly furnished and comfortable – vaguely called "private room", "comfortable place", "necessary place" or "prayer room" because of the somewhat indecent word toilet.

Ordinary civilians dispose of feces and urine at home, they are directly poured into the root of the street wall or dig a pit in their backyard and pour it in, in the dark in the corridor and behind the doorway, and almost everywhere, people can see thousands of piles of 'dung', the stench emitted by the rotten human feces in the corner of the wall, and people will also smell the foul smell.

So standing on the streets of Constantinople, Jiang Yin and others will smell such a stinking smell, before the Renaissance and the beginning of the Age of Discovery, Europeans did not reflect the slightest nobility, but fox smell, ignorance, dirty is their label.

Constantinople, the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire, was densely populated, with piles of houses and Caucasian people dressed in different clothes...

...

"Are these people so careless about hygiene, and they are not afraid of getting sick?" Lin Yue asked in disbelief.

"Brother Lin, don't say it, in later history, because of their unhygienic habits, Europe experienced a terrible disease." Jiang Yin shrugged his shoulders and said.

"Oh? What is the disease? "Di Yan is not very familiar with history, so naturally he is not clear.

However, Lin Yue thought for a moment and asked uncertainly: "Could it be the world-famous Black Death?" ”

Jiang Yin smiled slightly: "Exactly." ”...

.....

From 1347 to 1353, the plague plague called the "Black Death" that swept through Europa killed 25 million Europeans, accounting for 1/3 of the total population of Europe at that time!

Even in the 20th century, the Second World War, which was the most tragic in human history, only 5% of Europe's population died as a result of the war, which is enough to see the devastating effect of this plague on Europe.

In September 1347, the Black Death arrived in the first stop in Europe - Messina, a port city in Sicily in southern Italy, and in November it jumped to Genoa in the north and Marseille, a Mediterranean port city in France, by water, in January 1348, it conquered Venice and Pisa, and in March 1348, it occupied Florence, an important industrial and cultural city in the center of Italy.

As a result, the Black Death concentrated its forces in these cities, and radiated to all parts of Europe by land and water: from northern Italy through the Brenner Pass to Tyrol, Kärnden, and Styria to Vienna; In France, starting with Marseille and sweeping the entire country from Provence to Normandy, Paris "fell" in August 1348; In the summer of 1348, the Black Death found a breakthrough in its attack on England - the port of Dorset.

conquered London in August, and conquered all of Britain the following year; At the beginning of 1349, the Black Death crossed the Rhine from northeastern France, reaching Basel in May, Frankfurt in August, Cologne in November, and Hamburg, Bremen, and Danzig in 1350...... The Black Death's expedition turned to Northern Europe, to Eastern Europe, and finally to Russia in 1352-1353, ending its shocking and bloody expedition.

In terms of countries, Italy and France were the hardest hit by the pandemic; A few countries, such as Poland and Belgium, have been lucky enough to slip through the net. Among the cities, the hardest hit was Boccaccio's hometown of Florence: 80% of the population died of the Black Death.

In Boccaccio's Decameron, Florence suddenly becomes a hell on earth: pedestrians walk down the street and suddenly fall to the ground and die; Those who stay at home die alone, no one knows until the stench is smelled; Every day, every hour, large numbers of corpses were transported outside the city; The cows roamed the streets of the city, but there was no sign of them.....

Since then, since the Renaissance, Europeans have gradually increased their awareness of bathing and public hygiene.

And now, the people here are still ignorant and ignorant.

But this is exactly what Jiang Yin wants to see, because these ignorant people will become the first miners he will start the white slave trade.....

......