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World finance hub, heart of British
government, home to millions.

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Today's London is a well-oiled
machine, a truly global city.

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And at its heart lies
the Square Mile,

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the historic core from
which the modern metropolis grew.

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The city of London
is 2,000 years old.

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Every street, every square, is built
on layer upon layer of history.

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But London has a hidden past,
a filthy secret,

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and it's this untold story that
I want to uncover.

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Because so much of the London we
know today was born from the dirt
and disease of the 14th century,

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a time when the city's authorities
were so overwhelmed by an explosion

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of people and their filth, that
nothing short of a catastrophe would
force them to clean up their act.

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This is the story of how filth
shaped this city,

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of how 700 years ago,
dirt and squalor and disease reached

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such epidemic proportions that they
sparked a revolution in attitude,

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a revolution that would see
all Londoners come together
to declare war on filth.

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'And as I'll discover,
it was a truly disgusting battle.

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'From rivers of animal guts
to mountains of excrement,

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'deadly diseases and bloody cures,

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'the medieval authorities
had a dirty fight on their hands.'

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I'm going to get down and dirty
in 14th century grime, to find out

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the hard way just how much filth
medieval London had to put up with,

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and discover how this
clean and modern city

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began to emerge from the muck
of the past.

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This is London Bridge,
a major thoroughfare

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leading into the city of London,
as it was 700 years ago.

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Today, it's packed with thousands
of commuters heading to work

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in the Square Mile, but in half an
hour it will be all but empty

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and it will be a chance to catch
your breath.

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In 14th century London, though,
there'd be no such let up.

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As the only bridge over the Thames,
it was a busy thoroughfare,

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seething with people,
animals and filth.

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In such a prime location, space was
at a premium, precarious high rises

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crowded on either side, shop fronts
opened out onto the road,

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leaving only a single lane
for traffic.

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At times,
it was virtually impassable.

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And it wasn't just the
bridge that was like this.

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It was the whole city,
all day, every day,

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because London was
at bursting point.

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The population had gone up by
nearly 500% from the previous

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two centuries, overwhelming any
attempt at town planning.

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By the start of the 14th century,

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London had grown from a small town
of around 17,000 people,

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into a thriving city,
with as many as 100,000 inhabitants,

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all hemmed in between the river
and the old Roman walls.

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There was no escaping the filth.

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So why were they all here?

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Reaching its peak at the start
of the 14th century,

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London had been growing for
200 years, ever since
a radical change of ownership.

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After Norman conquest in 1066,
London became the centre

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of a great empire that stretched,
at its height,

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across the British Isles
and down to the Pyrenees.

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It was a time of relative peace
and prosperity, so the economy
boomed and London,

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which had once been a wooden city,
was now recast in stone.

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London, more wealthy and valuable
than ever, was granted the power

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to self govern, by successive writs
and royal charters.

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The mighty Tower of London,

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an imposing stone bastion
of royal power,

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built by the king to protect his
capital, but also a symbol

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of just how important London
was to the crown.

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The Tower and the city,
cheek by jowl.

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The king needed the financial
support of his richest city,

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and Londoners were happy to have
strong, stable government,

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as long as it didn't interfere
in their affairs.

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Enjoying a certain
autonomy from the crown,

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London offered a way out of what,
for many, was a tyrannical system.

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Out in the countryside, the Normans
had confiscated land

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and imposed a system of enforced
labour that turned many people

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into serfs, little better
than slaves.

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But here in London
it was much freer.

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The king trod more warily
when it came to his

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rich and volatile capital city.

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It had its own laws.

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For example, if a serf
could escape here

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and survive for a year and a day,
he'd become a free man.

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And once you were here,
the opportunities were endless.

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Just like today, London offered
the chance to forge a new life,

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choose from a variety of trades,
have the opportunity

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to join a guild, or enter
the world of commerce.

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With its safe harbour, trade
flowed in and out along the Thames.

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Vast amounts of English wool
were exported to Europe,

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whilst wine, spices and fur
headed into the city.

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Myth has it that London
was so prosperous

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that the streets were paved
with gold.

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If you wanted to make it big,
this was the place to do it.

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When they arrived, they discovered
that the streets were not paved
with gold, far from it.

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So what was beneath the feet
of a 14th-century Londoner?

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First ingredient, because
it is England after all,
is soaking wet mud.

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'With few pavements or
solid road surfaces,

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'the ground underfoot was just
earth, wet and sticky all winter,

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'and choking dust in the summer.'

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Ingredient number two, animal dung.

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'There were as many animals
as people in London.

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'Horses, dogs and pigs jostled with
people for space in the streets.'

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Animal entrails.

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'Any part of a carcass not
worth eating would have been
dumped in the road.'

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Old rotting fish.

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'Fish was plentiful, and a popular
alternative to meat on holy days.

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Beer. 'A safer option than drinking
polluted medieval water.'

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And then a few hours later, urine.

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'Privies were a luxury not
everyone could afford.

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'Many people used a chamber pot and
then emptied it out of the window.'

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Right. I collected up all this mess,

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it only remains to dump it
on the streets.

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That smells completely
disgusting, unbelievable.

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The idea that would have been spread
around permanently is just terrible,
and it would have been

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mulched into the streets,
and 100,000 Londoners
walking on it daily.

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There we go. That really does
release the smell as well. Eugh!

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Bear in mind, of course, lots
of the sewers would be full,

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they'd just be ditches anyway.
There wouldn't be a proper way

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of cleaning the streets, so
especially in hot, summery weather,

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this stuff would just
sit around for weeks.

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And there are stories of whole
streets being made impassable,

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you just couldn't get from one end
to the other.

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Londoners, they weren't stupid,
they're just like you and me,

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so they came up with solutions.
They did not want to walk through
this stuff.

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So they came up with
ingenious solutions, in fact.

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New ways were invented to lift
you above the squalor,

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like these wooden over shoes
known as pattens.

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There we go.

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And, of course, they'd have got
quite proficient in these,
unlike me.

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We know about these because they've
been found in archaeological digs.

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I'm in wellies and
it's pretty disgusting.

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You really would have wanted a way
to be lifted above the muck,

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because there were no waterproof
shoes in those days,

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they were walking the streets
in leather.

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And on these, although they're quite
unsteady, you could actually just
about walk through the sludge.

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But there's one vital ingredient
for the medieval street

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that I've avoided so far,
and it's also the most disgusting.

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It's something we're all
familiar with,

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but these days we've perfected ways
of neutralising it.

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Well, the smell's getting worse
every step I take towards
this building.

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I still can't believe
I'm voluntarily doing this.

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That smell is, basically,
poo particles in the air,
attacking my nose.

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Oh, that's appalling. Oh, God!

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Doing other history programmes,
I spend my time in the library.

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This is Crossness Sewage Works
in southeast London,

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where the waste from over two
million people is treated every day.

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There's enough excrement here
to fill 20 Olympic-sized
swimming pools every hour.

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Oh, Jill, what is this place?
This is our fine screen plant,

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where our aim is to get out
as much rag as we can.

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You can see a little raft
of it there.

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Once you've taken all the
rubbish out, you just leave
concentrated human waste?

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Is that what this is?
Yeah, this is sewage.

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We still produce all this waste,
but now we've just worked out

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a sophisticated way of dealing
with it. But back then,

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they couldn't escape this, this
was running down their street,

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in the local brook,
through the Thames.

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It was just all around
the whole time, this smell.

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In the 14th century, of course,
they had no public sanitation.

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Undiluted raw sewage collected
in open gutters in the street.

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It would have smelled
a whole lot worse.

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The time has come
to get face to face

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with the final ingredient that we're
missing from that medieval street.

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Yeah, there's a little valve
here that's going to allow me

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to see some of this vital ingredient
of medieval London.

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The trouble is, I'm slightly
concerned, because this is under
very high pressure and I...

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The last thing I want to do
is spray it all over myself.

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Here it comes, like Mr Whippy.

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Whoa, whoa. Urgh!

160
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Ergh! Oh! A little bit
of splashing there.

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Right, so here it is, the ingredient
that every Londoner

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would have been familiar with.

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This is incredibly smelly because
of the gases associated with it,

164
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but it's also home to some of the
deadliest pathogens known to man,

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like salmonella and E. coli.

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Now we've managed to contain it
in these big tanks

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and this little bottle here,
but back then, it would have
been everywhere.

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So, here goes.

169
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HE COUGHS

170
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That's unbelievable.

171
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Oh, God. Can I...

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Can I go now?

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The squalid state of London's
streets may suggest its citizens
were free to run riot.

174
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But this was far from the case.

175
00:11:01,120 --> 00:11:04,280
So who was in charge?

176
00:11:04,280 --> 00:11:06,840
So, Ian, it's not like London's
a sort of anarchy,

177
00:11:06,840 --> 00:11:09,200
I mean, there is government here,
isn't there?

178
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There certainly is government
and, in fact, London has had

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00:11:12,360 --> 00:11:15,840
its charter for over 200 years by
the time the 14th century begins,

180
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and that charter gives it privileges
which it defends vigorously.

181
00:11:20,520 --> 00:11:23,360
It elects, by the 14th century,
its own mayor,

182
00:11:23,360 --> 00:11:26,160
and that mayor
is selected from 24 aldermen.

183
00:11:26,160 --> 00:11:30,200
Those aldermen are each head
of a ward of the specific
bits of the city.

184
00:11:30,200 --> 00:11:33,120
So it's got a very strong
administrative structure.

185
00:11:33,120 --> 00:11:37,680
Even so, the civic government was
more concerned with law and order

186
00:11:37,680 --> 00:11:42,080
and regulating trade, than
dealing with unprecedented filth.

187
00:11:42,080 --> 00:11:45,000
Cleanliness was a luxury
few could afford.

188
00:11:45,000 --> 00:11:48,240
Most people used the streets
to trade or work in,

189
00:11:48,240 --> 00:11:51,000
and, of course, as a place
to dump their waste.

190
00:11:51,000 --> 00:11:53,920
So this street follows the line
of the original medieval street.

191
00:11:53,920 --> 00:11:57,280
Can you give me any sense of what
it must have been like here?
Much darker.

192
00:11:57,280 --> 00:12:02,680
You'd have found the houses either
side leaning out over to the middle
of the street as each storey

193
00:12:02,680 --> 00:12:07,480
was built up higher. So you could
perhaps have reached across and
touched the house on the side.

194
00:12:07,480 --> 00:12:10,520
But you wouldn't have been looking
up, you'd have been looking down

195
00:12:10,520 --> 00:12:14,680
at your feet and avoiding whatever
you might have trodden in.

196
00:12:14,680 --> 00:12:20,160
Even holder or tenement was meant to
clear the area outside their house,
but, of course, not many did.

197
00:12:20,160 --> 00:12:26,440
If you think how few latrines there
are in London and how much effort
is required to shift everything

198
00:12:26,440 --> 00:12:31,600
out of the city, you realise that
it's not surprising that people
do leave things in the street.

199
00:12:31,600 --> 00:12:33,800
The infrastructure isn't there.

200
00:12:33,800 --> 00:12:39,120
The history of cleanliness is a bit
like a small child who's going to
go to the loo, they don't mention

201
00:12:39,120 --> 00:12:42,280
anything until they're absolutely
desperate, and our records

202
00:12:42,280 --> 00:12:44,400
are the records of absolute
desperation,

203
00:12:44,400 --> 00:12:47,360
when we can't put up with these
terrible smells any longer.

204
00:12:47,360 --> 00:12:50,360
Yes, you do have areas
which really were revolting.

205
00:12:51,880 --> 00:12:55,920
And one of the most desperate
stories of medieval waste management

206
00:12:55,920 --> 00:12:59,280
occurred in what used to be
Ebbgate Lane.

207
00:13:00,280 --> 00:13:04,960
Two proto dodgy plumbers,
Hockiel and Witt,
signed to build some toilets.

208
00:13:04,960 --> 00:13:09,440
Like most medieval latrines,
they were simply seats with a
hole cut out and a long drop.

209
00:13:10,600 --> 00:13:16,440
But according to the book of
customs from 1321, their design
left something to be desired.

210
00:13:18,360 --> 00:13:21,160
By building their toilets
as far out as possible,

211
00:13:21,160 --> 00:13:23,360
they may have kept
their own walls clean,

212
00:13:23,360 --> 00:13:28,880
but it meant human filth now rained
down onto the passersby below.

213
00:13:28,880 --> 00:13:31,040
The street became impassable.

214
00:13:33,840 --> 00:13:36,440
Hockiel and Witt were
hauled in front of the mayor,

215
00:13:36,440 --> 00:13:38,560
where they were hit with a big fine,

216
00:13:38,560 --> 00:13:42,760
but I bet their neighbours wish
they'd been hit with something else.

217
00:13:44,280 --> 00:13:48,880
And it wasn't just Ebbgate Lane
that was overflowing with filth.

218
00:13:48,880 --> 00:13:52,480
All over the Square Mile, the
street names give a vivid impression

219
00:13:52,480 --> 00:13:57,360
of what conditions were like within
the boundaries of the medieval city.

220
00:13:57,360 --> 00:14:02,120
Some still exist - Gutter Lane,
Seething Lane, Staining Lane -

221
00:14:02,120 --> 00:14:08,600
testament to their grubby history,
while others have been renamed
to hide their mucky past.

222
00:14:08,600 --> 00:14:13,080
This is Sherborne Lane, sounds
rather gentile, but 700 years ago,

223
00:14:13,080 --> 00:14:15,400
it had a far less salubrious name.

224
00:14:20,680 --> 00:14:25,160
So were Londoners just mad,
putting up with all this filth?
How did they really feel about it?

225
00:14:25,160 --> 00:14:28,680
And what was the medieval
mindset like when it came to
dealing with poo?

226
00:14:28,680 --> 00:14:31,920
Remarkably, we do know the answer
to some of these questions,

227
00:14:31,920 --> 00:14:35,040
and they're hidden deep within
the bowels of this building.

228
00:14:37,080 --> 00:14:40,880
I'm about to have a look at a very
rare and valuable document,

229
00:14:40,880 --> 00:14:44,600
one of very few that survives
from this period,
and it's going to give me

230
00:14:44,600 --> 00:14:49,360
a great sense of what life was
actually like for normal Londoners
in the 14th century.

231
00:14:49,360 --> 00:14:52,600
It's held here at the
London Metropolitan Archive

232
00:14:52,600 --> 00:14:55,320
and its hardly been touched
for 700 years.

233
00:15:01,680 --> 00:15:06,280
This is the Assize of Nuisance,
just basically a list of grievances

234
00:15:06,280 --> 00:15:09,360
brought by the people of London
to the attention of the government.

235
00:15:09,360 --> 00:15:13,360
It's absolutely beautiful, it's
hard to believe it's 700 years old.

236
00:15:13,360 --> 00:15:16,880
Many of these complaints actually
refer to the issue of filth,

237
00:15:16,880 --> 00:15:20,000
and, to me, it's such an important
reminder that Londoners

238
00:15:20,000 --> 00:15:23,200
weren't just the impotent victims of
the mess that lay all around them,

239
00:15:23,200 --> 00:15:26,120
they were actually trying to
do something about it.

240
00:15:26,120 --> 00:15:29,640
There were regulations in place to
stop Londoners throwing

241
00:15:29,640 --> 00:15:34,120
their waste onto the street,
even though they were often ignored.

242
00:15:34,120 --> 00:15:37,920
And these records show that
some people were coming up with
ingenious ways

243
00:15:37,920 --> 00:15:42,200
of getting rid of it,
often giving their neighbours
cause to complain.

244
00:15:42,200 --> 00:15:48,360
Here's a classic, the case of Henry
Young and John Koenig from 1347.

245
00:15:48,360 --> 00:15:52,240
The Assize concerns their waste
pipe, which they had diverted

246
00:15:52,240 --> 00:15:55,880
to pump their effluent into the
cellar of the property next door.

247
00:15:55,880 --> 00:16:01,720
This fantastic case of medieval
NIMBY-ism was investigated and
upheld by the mayor and alderman,

248
00:16:01,720 --> 00:16:05,640
who ordered the pipe to
be removed within 40 days.

249
00:16:05,640 --> 00:16:08,480
If this manuscript's going
to last another 700 years,

250
00:16:08,480 --> 00:16:12,560
people like me with sweaty, dirty
hands are going to have to wear

251
00:16:12,560 --> 00:16:14,800
these gloves when they handle it.

252
00:16:14,800 --> 00:16:20,240
And the next example is
that of Alice Wade,

253
00:16:20,240 --> 00:16:22,240
just here, I think.

254
00:16:24,000 --> 00:16:27,640
Now, she didn't really want to
pipe her waste into the street.

255
00:16:27,640 --> 00:16:33,960
So instead she came up with an
ingenious solution of sending
it into the rainwater gutter.

256
00:16:33,960 --> 00:16:36,600
She made a wooden pipe
to channel it away.

257
00:16:36,600 --> 00:16:40,000
The problem was, the poo
often blocked up the gutter,

258
00:16:40,000 --> 00:16:43,720
so her neighbours were greatly
inconvenienced by the stench.

259
00:16:43,720 --> 00:16:47,960
Again, she was given 40 days
to remove the nuisance.

260
00:16:47,960 --> 00:16:53,240
Londoners were becoming
increasingly sick of taking
crap from their neighbours.

261
00:16:53,240 --> 00:16:57,560
With so many peed off citizens, the
authorities had their work cut out.

262
00:16:59,880 --> 00:17:04,120
It's all too easy to imagine
medieval London as one
great, anarchic mess.

263
00:17:04,120 --> 00:17:09,320
But this document is a sharp
reminder that we're dealing with
a complex, regulated society.

264
00:17:09,320 --> 00:17:12,120
There are just some of the
many attempts that were made

265
00:17:12,120 --> 00:17:18,160
to overcome the problems created by
that number of people living in such
close proximity with each other.

266
00:17:18,160 --> 00:17:21,320
The fact they all too often failed
to deal with those problems

267
00:17:21,320 --> 00:17:23,400
wasn't because they were mad
or stupid,

268
00:17:23,400 --> 00:17:26,800
it just shows that the sheer scale
of that challenge

269
00:17:26,800 --> 00:17:28,960
overwhelmed their resources.

270
00:17:35,120 --> 00:17:39,640
Punishing individuals in a city
of thousands wasn't going to get
the streets clean.

271
00:17:39,640 --> 00:17:44,600
Even fines, which were hard to
enforce, did little to change the
culture of medieval fly tipping.

272
00:17:44,600 --> 00:17:50,160
In 1309, a charge of 40p was levied
on anyone who was found dumping

273
00:17:50,160 --> 00:17:52,920
rubbish outside their own house,
or anyone else's.

274
00:17:52,920 --> 00:17:56,280
The trouble is, wealthy Londoners
seemed quite happy to pay the fine,

275
00:17:56,280 --> 00:18:00,840
if and when they got caught,
and the city was probably pretty
glad to collect the money.

276
00:18:00,840 --> 00:18:06,160
So as nothing could stop the
people making a mess, it fell to
the authorities to clean it up.

277
00:18:06,160 --> 00:18:11,320
And they came up with
three professions, without which
no modern city could survive.

278
00:18:12,320 --> 00:18:15,880
'For years, muck rakers
have been on the city's books,

279
00:18:15,880 --> 00:18:18,400
'gathering filth and rubbish
from the streets

280
00:18:18,400 --> 00:18:22,440
'and taking it by cart, or boat,
beyond the city walls.

281
00:18:22,440 --> 00:18:24,960
'They were the first
street cleaners.'

282
00:18:24,960 --> 00:18:28,040
By the turn of the century,
surveyors of the pavement

283
00:18:28,040 --> 00:18:30,800
were added to the payroll,
paid for by each ward.

284
00:18:30,800 --> 00:18:34,800
They were there to preserve
the pavement and remove all
nuisances of filth.

285
00:18:34,800 --> 00:18:36,680
The bin men had arrived.

286
00:18:38,880 --> 00:18:40,880
It all seems rather obvious.

287
00:18:40,880 --> 00:18:44,040
I mean, London would grind to a
halt today without these guys.

288
00:18:44,040 --> 00:18:47,600
But, of course, that's exactly what
was happening in medieval London.

289
00:18:47,600 --> 00:18:50,160
It was grinding to a halt
under its own grime.

290
00:18:50,160 --> 00:18:53,960
And the task of cleaning London
700 years ago was so massive

291
00:18:53,960 --> 00:18:57,360
that it would become one of the
most disgusting jobs in history.

292
00:18:57,360 --> 00:19:01,160
I'm going to find out exactly what
they were up against,

293
00:19:01,160 --> 00:19:03,640
by having a go at
the worst job of all,

294
00:19:03,640 --> 00:19:08,240
the third and final role
created in medieval London.

295
00:19:08,240 --> 00:19:10,800
The inventively named gong farmers.

296
00:19:10,800 --> 00:19:15,160
They were early drain cleaners,
I suppose, and they had to go
round cleaning out

297
00:19:15,160 --> 00:19:20,360
cesspits and privies, which meant
using one of these and one of these,

298
00:19:20,360 --> 00:19:22,720
you had to clean up a lot of that.

299
00:19:30,320 --> 00:19:32,360
That smells appalling.

300
00:19:32,360 --> 00:19:34,800
It's also really warm.

301
00:19:48,720 --> 00:19:49,960
HE COUGHS

302
00:19:49,960 --> 00:19:52,280
Oh! I gag every time it does that.

303
00:19:52,280 --> 00:19:56,920
If you're wondering why
we're dumping horse manure on
a street in the city of London,

304
00:19:56,920 --> 00:20:01,560
it's because we have a record
of one particular gong farmer,
a guy called Thomas Mason.

305
00:20:01,560 --> 00:20:05,640
Now, this superhuman gong farmer
managed to clean up, on this street,

306
00:20:05,640 --> 00:20:10,240
six tonnes of human and animal waste
in one night,

307
00:20:10,240 --> 00:20:14,320
so that's one man,
one street, six tonnes.

308
00:20:14,320 --> 00:20:18,160
Thomas Mason,
just how tough are you?

309
00:20:18,160 --> 00:20:20,960
The gong farmers
faced a mammoth task.

310
00:20:20,960 --> 00:20:26,000
Medieval Londoners produced around
50 tonnes of excrement every day.

311
00:20:26,000 --> 00:20:29,200
There were no proper sewers, so
all of it had to be removed by hand,

312
00:20:29,200 --> 00:20:33,680
dug out of the cesspits,
of all the privies and
public latrines in London.

313
00:20:33,680 --> 00:20:36,920
Inhaling all that horse poo

314
00:20:36,920 --> 00:20:39,040
is getting a little boring.

315
00:20:39,040 --> 00:20:43,600
They had to be emptied regularly to
stop the build up of noxious smells,

316
00:20:43,600 --> 00:20:46,800
and often at night, to make sure
they could be kept open all day.

317
00:20:51,800 --> 00:20:52,880
Evening.

318
00:20:52,880 --> 00:20:57,600
'Not only was the work disgusting,
it was also fraught with danger.

319
00:20:57,600 --> 00:21:02,000
'It's hard enough shifting a pile
that's sitting on the street.

320
00:21:02,000 --> 00:21:07,000
'Down in the cesspits,
filled with thousands of litres
of raw excrement,

321
00:21:07,000 --> 00:21:11,200
'there was a chance of being
asphyxiated by the fumes, or worse,

322
00:21:11,200 --> 00:21:14,640
'picking up a lethal disease
lurking in the rotting faeces.'

323
00:21:14,640 --> 00:21:16,080
Not very efficient.

324
00:21:16,080 --> 00:21:18,840
'As one celebrated case illustrates,

325
00:21:18,840 --> 00:21:22,200
'medieval cleaners could
come to a sticky end.'

326
00:21:23,160 --> 00:21:25,880
FARTING

327
00:21:25,880 --> 00:21:30,360
Richard, a successful muck raker,
was fortunate enough to own

328
00:21:30,360 --> 00:21:34,120
his own privy, in his house in the
parish of Little Saint Bartholomew.

329
00:21:34,120 --> 00:21:38,520
According to the coroner's roll
of 1326, despite slaving away

330
00:21:38,520 --> 00:21:45,440
cleaning up other people's filth,
it appears that Richard had a rather
unfortunate accident in his own.

331
00:21:45,440 --> 00:21:50,280
The floorboards of his privy
had become so rotten they could
no longer take his weight.

332
00:21:53,120 --> 00:21:57,920
Richard dropped into his
own excrement and died,

333
00:21:57,920 --> 00:22:03,560
only for his body to be discovered
by fellow muck raker, William Scott.

334
00:22:05,440 --> 00:22:11,320
But the gong farmer's revolting
and hazardous profession
wasn't without its perks.

335
00:22:11,320 --> 00:22:14,000
The reason they did this

336
00:22:14,000 --> 00:22:16,920
frankly awful work
was because, actually,

337
00:22:16,920 --> 00:22:19,080
it was very well rewarded.

338
00:22:19,080 --> 00:22:22,480
The average wage for a normal
labourer doing anything else

339
00:22:22,480 --> 00:22:28,920
was about six pence a day,
but a gong farmer could get 18 pence

340
00:22:28,920 --> 00:22:31,480
for clearing away
one tonne of waste,

341
00:22:31,480 --> 00:22:35,720
so he's earning several times that
of an equivalent labourer.

342
00:22:35,720 --> 00:22:39,320
In fact we know that what a gong
farmer could earn in just 11 nights,

343
00:22:39,320 --> 00:22:42,960
it would take a skilled labourer
six months to earn.

344
00:22:42,960 --> 00:22:47,720
Where there's muck, there's brass,
and London had plenty of muck.

345
00:22:47,720 --> 00:22:54,080
'So much of it, in fact, that the
city's army of cleaners found
themselves fighting a losing battle.

346
00:22:54,080 --> 00:22:59,800
'London, like Richard the raker,
continued to flounder
in its own waste.'

347
00:22:59,800 --> 00:23:03,800
So what did the gong farmers
do with all this mess once
they'd collected it up?

348
00:23:03,800 --> 00:23:09,520
Well, they were supposed to
take it far outside the city walls
and dump it.

349
00:23:09,520 --> 00:23:12,920
Some of them could make extra
money selling it as fertiliser.

350
00:23:12,920 --> 00:23:17,160
But truth be told, a lot of them
just got rid of it inside the city,

351
00:23:17,160 --> 00:23:20,280
on someone else's patch,
or, of course,

352
00:23:20,280 --> 00:23:23,280
they just threw it in the Thames.

353
00:23:24,160 --> 00:23:26,520
Take her away.

354
00:23:27,920 --> 00:23:32,040
So it wasn't just the streets
that were beginning to
overflow with filth.

355
00:23:39,080 --> 00:23:43,000
Well, I've been up all night
shovelling horse poo.

356
00:23:43,000 --> 00:23:47,480
The smell's still in my nose, I've
got poo on my clothes, on my skin.

357
00:23:47,480 --> 00:23:50,880
What I need is a bath.

358
00:23:51,920 --> 00:23:55,760
Despite the common use of London's
waterways for dumping waste into,

359
00:23:55,760 --> 00:23:59,440
they were also the place
many people went to bathe.

360
00:23:59,440 --> 00:24:03,760
In the middle ages,
from king to commoner, you'd have
stunk to the 21st century nose.

361
00:24:03,760 --> 00:24:07,240
But it's a common misperception
that they were all dirty people.

362
00:24:07,240 --> 00:24:10,800
They weren't, they used to wash
their hands and their faces,

363
00:24:10,800 --> 00:24:14,280
and they associated
cleanliness with godliness.

364
00:24:14,280 --> 00:24:16,400
Dirt was for the devil.

365
00:24:16,400 --> 00:24:19,520
They wouldn't have had that
much chance to wash, of course.

366
00:24:19,520 --> 00:24:21,840
In the winter,
the rivers all froze over,

367
00:24:21,840 --> 00:24:25,880
so it would have been limited
to a few baths every summer,

368
00:24:25,880 --> 00:24:27,600
in the Thames.

369
00:24:29,640 --> 00:24:32,400
Pretty chilly,
given it's the height of summer,

370
00:24:32,400 --> 00:24:35,600
but like the gong farmers,
I'm going to wash in the Thames.

371
00:24:35,600 --> 00:24:38,880
Like them, of course,
I don't have any soap.

372
00:24:40,920 --> 00:24:44,320
The trouble is, as the population
of medieval London expanded,

373
00:24:44,320 --> 00:24:48,000
this river became a dumping ground
for all their waste.

374
00:24:48,000 --> 00:24:51,000
So whilst some people tried
to bathe in it, even drink it,

375
00:24:51,000 --> 00:24:54,240
just up the way, there might be
people pooing in it.

376
00:24:54,240 --> 00:25:00,560
By 1345, one Thames dock had become
so corrupted by dung and other filth

377
00:25:00,560 --> 00:25:04,400
that the city's government insisted
on a tax on all boats using it -

378
00:25:04,400 --> 00:25:09,080
a tax which, in turn, was used to
pay five carters to cleanse it.

379
00:25:09,080 --> 00:25:13,480
If the water remained foul, the
men were to be thrown into prison.

380
00:25:14,680 --> 00:25:18,400
The rising tide of excrement
wasn't the only dirty problem

381
00:25:18,400 --> 00:25:20,800
the mayor and the alderman
had on their hands.

382
00:25:20,800 --> 00:25:24,720
London's commercial success
had created great wealth and power

383
00:25:24,720 --> 00:25:28,000
and that brought a different kind
of filth to the city.

384
00:25:36,320 --> 00:25:38,800
Like it or not,
putting up with the grime

385
00:25:38,800 --> 00:25:42,400
was the price Londoners had to pay
to be close to the action.

386
00:25:43,920 --> 00:25:47,480
By the 14th century, the kings
of England had decided they needed

387
00:25:47,480 --> 00:25:50,880
a permanent seat for royal
government, and chose Westminster,

388
00:25:50,880 --> 00:25:53,600
about a mile up river
from the City of London,

389
00:25:53,600 --> 00:25:55,800
where the river water
was a lot fresher.

390
00:25:55,800 --> 00:25:58,400
And they built
this magnificent palace,

391
00:25:58,400 --> 00:26:00,880
designed to overawe their subjects.

392
00:26:00,880 --> 00:26:05,360
The palace of Westminster occupied
a prime riverfront location

393
00:26:05,360 --> 00:26:10,600
to the west, and up wind
of the busy, dirty city of London.

394
00:26:10,600 --> 00:26:14,440
And around it
formed a more upmarket community,

395
00:26:14,440 --> 00:26:17,560
a magnet for nobility,
courtiers and the rich.

396
00:26:19,360 --> 00:26:22,240
Now one of London's
wealthiest areas,

397
00:26:22,240 --> 00:26:25,240
back then,
Westminster was a separate town,

398
00:26:25,240 --> 00:26:28,920
and over the centuries, it became
the political heart of the country,

399
00:26:28,920 --> 00:26:31,320
a role it still plays today.

400
00:26:31,320 --> 00:26:35,160
This giant Westminster hall
is the oldest surviving part
of that palace.

401
00:26:35,160 --> 00:26:38,440
Anyone who wanted to be close
to royal power,

402
00:26:38,440 --> 00:26:41,320
to come to the Courts of Justice
held in this hall,

403
00:26:41,320 --> 00:26:43,680
or the coronation banquets
also held here,

404
00:26:43,680 --> 00:26:45,920
or attend Parliament,
that was next door,

405
00:26:45,920 --> 00:26:48,280
needed to have a house nearby.

406
00:26:48,280 --> 00:26:51,360
And that new class of people
brought with them great wealth

407
00:26:51,360 --> 00:26:54,040
and an insatiable appetite
for luxury goods,

408
00:26:54,040 --> 00:26:59,640
and the City of London was ideally
placed to meet those demands.

409
00:26:59,640 --> 00:27:03,880
Many London merchants grew rich
furnishing this extravagance,

410
00:27:03,880 --> 00:27:07,120
and they in turn wanted to emulate
the luxury lifestyle.

411
00:27:10,720 --> 00:27:14,200
The word was out, there was money
in these filthy streets

412
00:27:14,200 --> 00:27:16,080
and fortunes to be made.

413
00:27:16,080 --> 00:27:19,600
As more and more people flocked to
London to get a slice of the action,

414
00:27:19,600 --> 00:27:24,120
London experienced the growing pains
of a city that was forced to exist

415
00:27:24,120 --> 00:27:27,120
in an area barely larger
than that of a village.

416
00:27:29,520 --> 00:27:32,600
By the 14th century,
the overcrowded capital

417
00:27:32,600 --> 00:27:35,280
had become filthier than ever,

418
00:27:35,280 --> 00:27:38,760
thanks to a mini medieval
industrial revolution.

419
00:27:38,760 --> 00:27:42,440
Foul chemicals
from leather-tanning factories,

420
00:27:42,440 --> 00:27:45,760
putrid run-off from brewers
and fishmongers

421
00:27:45,760 --> 00:27:48,280
spilled into the street and rivers.

422
00:27:48,280 --> 00:27:51,560
But there was one profession that
saw London sink to new depths

423
00:27:51,560 --> 00:27:53,400
when it came to industrial waste.

424
00:27:55,840 --> 00:28:00,000
London's mercantile elite were keen
to show off their wealth,

425
00:28:00,000 --> 00:28:03,120
and what better way to do it
than to eat the food of kings?

426
00:28:03,120 --> 00:28:04,880
They demanded meat and lots of it.

427
00:28:04,880 --> 00:28:08,080
Lift at the end. Getting round
that corner was interesting.

428
00:28:08,080 --> 00:28:10,560
'700 years ago,
without refrigeration,

429
00:28:10,560 --> 00:28:14,600
'preserving meat meant
drying, salting or pickling it.

430
00:28:14,600 --> 00:28:16,480
'But to provide fresh meat,

431
00:28:16,480 --> 00:28:20,400
'the only way was to walk a live
beast into town, kill it...'

432
00:28:20,400 --> 00:28:24,680
First, we've got to shave him.
We need hot water, so we've got
a big copper on the go.

433
00:28:24,680 --> 00:28:27,520
'..and butcher it at
the point of sale.

434
00:28:27,520 --> 00:28:29,440
'But butchery was a messy business.

435
00:28:29,440 --> 00:28:32,040
'Records show that dealing
with butcher's waste

436
00:28:32,040 --> 00:28:35,000
'was an ongoing problem
for the city's authorities.'

437
00:28:35,000 --> 00:28:36,320
Whoa, so scald him?

438
00:28:36,320 --> 00:28:40,080
'First-hand experience
gives you some idea of
what they were up against.'

439
00:28:40,080 --> 00:28:42,280
Then we get the knives. There we go.

440
00:28:42,280 --> 00:28:45,680
Now just imagine you're... Shaving.
Doing your shaving, yep.

441
00:28:45,680 --> 00:28:50,080
'It wasn't just butchers clogging up
the streets with foul animal
remains.

442
00:28:50,080 --> 00:28:54,600
'Furriers and tanners
also plied their filthy trades
inside the city walls.'

443
00:28:54,600 --> 00:28:57,720
So they'd do this out in the street,
or in the cellar in the house?

444
00:28:57,720 --> 00:29:00,800
You wouldn't want to do it
indoors, cos it's pretty messy.

445
00:29:00,800 --> 00:29:04,760
You've got all this outer layer skin
and some of the less useful hair.

446
00:29:04,760 --> 00:29:08,880
So the best thing to do is just
do it out in the alley. Agh...

447
00:29:08,880 --> 00:29:11,040
So much waste was being dumped,
that in 1310,

448
00:29:11,040 --> 00:29:15,040
the scouring of furs
was banned in the main streets.

449
00:29:15,040 --> 00:29:17,800
A year later the flaying,
or skinning, of horses

450
00:29:17,800 --> 00:29:20,280
was also completely outlawed
in the city.

451
00:29:20,280 --> 00:29:22,600
We are creating a lot of mess here.

452
00:29:22,600 --> 00:29:26,240
It's all the stuff you exfoliate
when you get your pumice stone out.

453
00:29:26,240 --> 00:29:29,480
I'm not a regular exfoliator myself.
I'm constantly amazed,

454
00:29:29,480 --> 00:29:32,080
why did people go to the cities
in the first place?

455
00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:34,840
Fame, money, opportunity.

456
00:29:34,840 --> 00:29:37,840
Why do they do it now?
It's still a nasty hell hole.

457
00:29:39,440 --> 00:29:41,240
Cos this is lovely.

458
00:29:42,560 --> 00:29:46,200
There was some regulation. Butchers
had specific areas of the city

459
00:29:46,200 --> 00:29:48,360
where they were allowed
to do their work.

460
00:29:48,360 --> 00:29:52,760
There were three open-air
slaughter houses, known as
shambles in medieval London,

461
00:29:52,760 --> 00:29:55,560
where the blood of countless animals
flowed into runnels

462
00:29:55,560 --> 00:29:58,680
directed towards
the city's clogged gutters.

463
00:29:58,680 --> 00:30:02,800
Right, there's your spine,
and without my fingers in the way,

464
00:30:02,800 --> 00:30:05,920
you're going to smash straight
through that. Feeling accurate?

465
00:30:05,920 --> 00:30:07,800
Yeah, pretty... Go for it.

466
00:30:09,400 --> 00:30:12,720
That's better, that's sounding good.
Oh, straight in.

467
00:30:12,720 --> 00:30:15,640
Just get sprayed
with bone fragments.

468
00:30:15,640 --> 00:30:20,560
The smell is making me slightly
queasy. It will get a lot worse
when we open the insides up.

469
00:30:20,560 --> 00:30:22,400
Good.

470
00:30:24,640 --> 00:30:28,080
Pork was a popular favourite
with medieval diners.

471
00:30:28,080 --> 00:30:32,000
A pig's ability to eat pretty much
anything and turn it into protein

472
00:30:32,000 --> 00:30:34,720
meant that many people
kept their own pigs.

473
00:30:36,280 --> 00:30:39,040
Is that enough? If you're not sure,
stick your finger in

474
00:30:39,040 --> 00:30:42,880
and see if you can pop through into
the space. I think I can feel it...

475
00:30:42,880 --> 00:30:45,160
You're in. Hook the point
then pull it down?

476
00:30:45,160 --> 00:30:47,680
Work it down
until you hit the breast bone,

477
00:30:47,680 --> 00:30:49,760
then you can't go
any further that way.

478
00:30:49,760 --> 00:30:51,680
HISSING

479
00:30:51,680 --> 00:30:54,800
That's a definite puncture,
that's the gas coming out.

480
00:30:54,800 --> 00:30:57,800
Starting to get that little whiff
about it. Oh, my God!

481
00:30:57,800 --> 00:31:00,000
That is disgusting.

482
00:31:00,000 --> 00:31:02,720
'Domestic pigs were supposed to be
penned up,

483
00:31:02,720 --> 00:31:06,440
'but records show regular complaints
of them roaming the streets

484
00:31:06,440 --> 00:31:07,960
'or breaking into gardens.'

485
00:31:07,960 --> 00:31:10,320
Oh, man, this is just disgusting.

486
00:31:10,320 --> 00:31:13,560
'At one stage, there were so many
escaped pigs fouling the city

487
00:31:13,560 --> 00:31:17,120
'that killers of swine were
appointed to keep the numbers down.'

488
00:31:17,120 --> 00:31:20,160
Drop them into the bowl there.
Let's let that knife down.

489
00:31:20,160 --> 00:31:23,880
'The most disgusting part of
my medieval butchery adventure...'

490
00:31:23,880 --> 00:31:25,600
Oh, God. Oh...

491
00:31:25,600 --> 00:31:28,080
'..is taking out
the steaming entrails.'

492
00:31:28,080 --> 00:31:29,640
This is extraordinary.

493
00:31:29,640 --> 00:31:32,800
'Around five kilos of organs
and stinking poo,

494
00:31:32,800 --> 00:31:35,040
'wrapped in slimy membrane.'

495
00:31:35,040 --> 00:31:39,920
I will never, ever, ever
eat pork again, in the same way.

496
00:31:39,920 --> 00:31:41,960
'But in a time
when meat was expensive,

497
00:31:41,960 --> 00:31:44,600
'no part of the animal
went to waste.'

498
00:31:44,600 --> 00:31:49,160
I think I've got the heart - it's
like a muscle. Yep. Big...muscle.

499
00:31:49,160 --> 00:31:52,680
And they'd have eaten this?
Absolutely, roast heart's lovely.

500
00:31:52,680 --> 00:31:55,200
'The prime cuts were destined
for the wealthy.

501
00:31:55,200 --> 00:31:58,720
'And for those less well-off,
they got the rest.'

502
00:31:58,720 --> 00:32:00,000
That's a heart. Yep.

503
00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:04,000
'The offal, head and trotters -
even the entrails - have their use.'

504
00:32:04,000 --> 00:32:07,080
If you want to have sausages,
the next thing we've got to do

505
00:32:07,080 --> 00:32:09,400
is find the right-sized
bits of tubing,

506
00:32:09,400 --> 00:32:12,360
which we've got down the bottom...
This is quite warm still.

507
00:32:12,360 --> 00:32:15,200
That's ideal for sausage skins,
you can just split it off

508
00:32:15,200 --> 00:32:19,040
away from the back there,
you've got a nice bit of piping.

509
00:32:19,040 --> 00:32:22,680
And all of that, you can smell the
excrement in it, can't you? Yep.

510
00:32:22,680 --> 00:32:25,920
Yep. Well, you've got to
wash that out next. What?

511
00:32:29,080 --> 00:32:32,120
It's amazing what you get used to
in this life.

512
00:32:32,120 --> 00:32:35,200
I've never butchered an animal
before, and now I'm squeezing poo

513
00:32:35,200 --> 00:32:37,240
out of it's not-long-dead intestine.

514
00:32:37,240 --> 00:32:41,200
You wonder how people lived
amongst the excrement and mess,
and here we are,

515
00:32:41,200 --> 00:32:46,440
within a day, I'm getting quite used
to it. This seems normal. Yeah.

516
00:32:46,440 --> 00:32:51,240
Everything we've done today
has involved pouring huge amounts
of muck onto the streets.

517
00:32:51,240 --> 00:32:53,480
You wouldn't want it
in the house, would you?

518
00:32:53,480 --> 00:32:57,400
So what happens to it there?
Ah, a simple solution.

519
00:32:57,400 --> 00:33:01,000
Bucket of water,
send it downhill to the neighbours.

520
00:33:01,000 --> 00:33:02,840
There you go, just flush it away.

521
00:33:02,840 --> 00:33:04,960
You always want to live uphill,
don't you?

522
00:33:04,960 --> 00:33:07,480
As long as your house is clean,
you're fine,

523
00:33:07,480 --> 00:33:09,560
it's now somebody else's problem.

524
00:33:14,160 --> 00:33:17,640
London was producing
gigantic amounts of animal waste,

525
00:33:17,640 --> 00:33:20,120
streets were overflowing
with the stuff.

526
00:33:20,120 --> 00:33:22,560
The city had to act.

527
00:33:24,080 --> 00:33:27,760
The way the medieval authorities
tackled the butcher's
discarded offal

528
00:33:27,760 --> 00:33:31,160
is a great example of
their trial-and-error approach.

529
00:33:31,160 --> 00:33:35,240
So much animal waste was now being
produced, that the age-old solution

530
00:33:35,240 --> 00:33:38,360
of just dumping it in the streets
was no longer acceptable.

531
00:33:38,360 --> 00:33:41,000
The sights and smells
of all those animal entrails

532
00:33:41,000 --> 00:33:43,040
running down the middle
of the street

533
00:33:43,040 --> 00:33:46,680
was driving even the most
filth-hardened Londoners crazy.

534
00:33:46,680 --> 00:33:50,880
The authorities came up
with a new solution,
and that lay under my feet.

535
00:34:00,400 --> 00:34:03,760
This is what's left of the
Fleet River - it's now a sewer -

536
00:34:03,760 --> 00:34:08,040
which is pretty much what it
ended up being seven centuries ago.

537
00:34:08,040 --> 00:34:10,280
So somewhere round here, in 1343,

538
00:34:10,280 --> 00:34:13,960
the butchers were told to come
and dump all their waste,

539
00:34:13,960 --> 00:34:19,040
as it was said at the time, for the
cleanliness and decency of the city.

540
00:34:19,040 --> 00:34:23,360
And they did so, and the price
they paid was, appropriately enough,
a boar's head.

541
00:34:23,360 --> 00:34:26,320
But soon even the fast-flowing Fleet
was overwhelmed,

542
00:34:26,320 --> 00:34:29,440
it became a putrid sewer
and absolutely stank,

543
00:34:29,440 --> 00:34:34,120
so much so that it was
said to be injurious to the health
of prisoners in a nearby prison.

544
00:34:34,120 --> 00:34:38,000
The authorities needed another plan,
they needed a bigger river.

545
00:34:38,000 --> 00:34:40,920
London's biggest river, in fact.

546
00:34:40,920 --> 00:34:43,640
The butchers were sent,
with their waste,

547
00:34:43,640 --> 00:34:45,840
to the banks of the mighty Thames.

548
00:34:45,840 --> 00:34:48,680
Right near this spot
was St Nicholas Shambles,

549
00:34:48,680 --> 00:34:50,560
where animals were slaughtered.

550
00:34:50,560 --> 00:34:53,880
All that needed to be done was to
transport the unwanted parts

551
00:34:53,880 --> 00:34:55,400
down to the Thames - simple.

552
00:34:55,400 --> 00:34:58,200
But there was one flaw
in this brilliant plan,

553
00:34:58,200 --> 00:35:01,080
and that is that the Thames
is a long way over there.

554
00:35:04,480 --> 00:35:09,120
In fact, the Thames
was a bumpy 10-minute walk
through London's busy streets.

555
00:35:09,120 --> 00:35:11,800
The plan was that they
would dump all this offal

556
00:35:11,800 --> 00:35:15,000
off a long wooden pier that
was built out into the Thames,

557
00:35:15,000 --> 00:35:16,680
where Blackfriars is today.

558
00:35:16,680 --> 00:35:19,960
It was known as Bocker's Brigga -
butcher's bridge.

559
00:35:19,960 --> 00:35:23,760
The trouble was, of course, after a
long day of butchery and slaughter,

560
00:35:23,760 --> 00:35:26,880
safe waste disposal
was the last thing on your mind,

561
00:35:26,880 --> 00:35:30,160
and all too often, a lot of this
fell out along the way.

562
00:35:32,560 --> 00:35:36,880
The excessive amount of
bloody remains being dropped
in the streets and the river

563
00:35:36,880 --> 00:35:39,440
became so bad
that even the King complained.

564
00:35:39,440 --> 00:35:43,240
He said, "From the putrefied blood
running in the streets

565
00:35:43,240 --> 00:35:46,560
"and the entrails thrown
into the water of the Thames,

566
00:35:46,560 --> 00:35:49,880
"the air in the city has been
greatly corrupted and infected."

567
00:35:49,880 --> 00:35:51,520
Neither solution was perfect -

568
00:35:51,520 --> 00:35:54,960
you either had rotting flesh,
entrails and waste products

569
00:35:54,960 --> 00:35:58,080
clogging up the streets of London,
or the Thames.

570
00:35:58,080 --> 00:36:02,320
So as a result, after years of
dithering and indecision,

571
00:36:02,320 --> 00:36:05,080
butchers were banned from the city.

572
00:36:05,080 --> 00:36:08,600
And there's another way in which
modern butchers are a world away

573
00:36:08,600 --> 00:36:10,320
from those in the 14th century.

574
00:36:12,400 --> 00:36:17,080
These days, butcher's shops are
models of antibacterial cleanliness.

575
00:36:18,960 --> 00:36:22,000
700 years ago,
what you found on a chopping block

576
00:36:22,000 --> 00:36:24,320
could be rather more hit-and-miss.

577
00:36:26,280 --> 00:36:29,560
In 14th century London, the Guild
of Butchers did what they could

578
00:36:29,560 --> 00:36:31,080
to provide quality control.

579
00:36:31,080 --> 00:36:34,200
They appointed master butchers
to regulate the industry

580
00:36:34,200 --> 00:36:36,200
and try and enforce some standards.

581
00:36:36,200 --> 00:36:39,000
But there's evidence
that even the Guild of Butchers

582
00:36:39,000 --> 00:36:42,400
struggled to control
some Londoners who were on the make.

583
00:36:44,800 --> 00:36:48,360
Protected by the anonymity
of a big city,

584
00:36:48,360 --> 00:36:52,120
some saw the chance to make
a quick buck by flogging manky meat.

585
00:36:52,120 --> 00:36:56,160
Records described how one makeshift
butcher, John Jarlson,

586
00:36:56,160 --> 00:37:00,520
was found guilty of selling
"putrid and stinking meat
to the peril of lives",

587
00:37:00,520 --> 00:37:04,800
after he tried to sell the flesh of
a dead sow he'd found in a ditch.

588
00:37:04,800 --> 00:37:08,360
Cracking down on butchers trying
to use the cloak of night

589
00:37:08,360 --> 00:37:10,920
to hide the quality of their wares,

590
00:37:10,920 --> 00:37:13,560
the city authorities
ordered that butchers,

591
00:37:13,560 --> 00:37:18,080
"shall sell no meat by the light of
candle, but by clear daylight only."

592
00:37:20,080 --> 00:37:24,160
And it seems they made
the punishment fit the crime.

593
00:37:24,160 --> 00:37:27,680
Anyone caught breaking the law
was tied to a pillory,

594
00:37:27,680 --> 00:37:30,320
to have the dodgy meat
burnt under their nose.

595
00:37:32,120 --> 00:37:36,200
With the streets and rivers full
of excrement and rotting carcasses,

596
00:37:36,200 --> 00:37:39,640
and no real understanding of
the link between disease and filth,

597
00:37:39,640 --> 00:37:42,080
it's not surprising
that sickness was rife.

598
00:37:42,080 --> 00:37:44,960
But if the diseases
were dangerous enough,

599
00:37:44,960 --> 00:37:47,240
the treatments were often worse.

600
00:37:49,360 --> 00:37:51,400
Many sick people
were treated by barbers,

601
00:37:51,400 --> 00:37:59,320
hairdressers, who had the skills
and tools to cut and chop, so were
allowed to pull teeth, or let blood.

602
00:37:59,320 --> 00:38:05,240
With the discovery of microbes not
due for another three centuries,
there was no scientific knowledge

603
00:38:05,240 --> 00:38:09,560
of how illness could be linked
to the unhygienic conditions
in the streets.

604
00:38:09,560 --> 00:38:11,760
Hiya.

605
00:38:11,760 --> 00:38:13,680
'And, as I'm about to find out,

606
00:38:13,680 --> 00:38:18,480
'the tools and techniques used
to treat illness were
just as filthy and dangerous.'

607
00:38:18,480 --> 00:38:23,480
What chance did medieval medicine
have of curing what ails you?

608
00:38:23,480 --> 00:38:25,960
Mmm, not very good -
it depends how ill you were.

609
00:38:25,960 --> 00:38:27,760
If I went to a medieval doctor,

610
00:38:27,760 --> 00:38:29,320
what principles would they use

611
00:38:29,320 --> 00:38:32,480
to treat me? Firstly,
it's to get things OUT of the body.

612
00:38:32,480 --> 00:38:37,120
For example, if you had a very bad
eye infection, what I would do is,

613
00:38:37,120 --> 00:38:43,760
I'd get dry dog poo, grind it up,
put it in a piece of folded paper
and literally blow it into your eye.

614
00:38:43,760 --> 00:38:46,600
We believe
this would irritate the eye,

615
00:38:46,600 --> 00:38:53,080
make the eye water, and bring out all
the impurities of the eye at
the same time, so cure the eye.

616
00:38:53,080 --> 00:38:56,400
So the idea is to remove these
evil things from your body.

617
00:38:56,400 --> 00:38:58,800
What other kind
of techniques would they use?

618
00:38:58,800 --> 00:39:02,680
If you suffer from a slight madness,
what we would do is,
is we'd actually...

619
00:39:02,680 --> 00:39:04,960
Well, get on your knees
and I'll show you.

620
00:39:04,960 --> 00:39:08,240
What I'd do is
I'd get a knife like this one here,

621
00:39:08,240 --> 00:39:10,440
I would make

622
00:39:10,440 --> 00:39:14,640
a Y-shaped cut into your skull.

623
00:39:14,640 --> 00:39:16,440
We would pare back the skin.

624
00:39:16,440 --> 00:39:19,800
Now, you're quite lucky,
that's the only bit that hurts.

625
00:39:19,800 --> 00:39:27,080
'The invisible cause of some illness
was put down to evil spirits
and called for radical intervention.

626
00:39:27,080 --> 00:39:29,840
'Trepanning,
an ancient technique of drilling'

627
00:39:29,840 --> 00:39:35,760
or scraping a hole in the skull,
thought to release the spirit, was
still practised in medieval times.

628
00:39:35,760 --> 00:39:39,720
'It was more likely to cause
a nasty infection and
indeed, records detail

629
00:39:39,720 --> 00:39:44,200
'many cases of barber surgeons
maiming, or even killing,
their patients'

630
00:39:44,200 --> 00:39:46,640
with their questionable techniques.

631
00:39:46,640 --> 00:39:49,000
I'm not looking forward
to my treatment.

632
00:39:49,000 --> 00:39:53,880
Imagine I went to a medieval
doctor, were they good at diagnosis?

633
00:39:53,880 --> 00:39:58,160
They would do a diagnosis, they
would look at you, they would see
what's wrong with you,

634
00:39:58,160 --> 00:40:03,160
as like we do nowadays, but for
internally, what they would
do is, a bit like today,

635
00:40:03,160 --> 00:40:04,880
they'd like a bit of your wee.

636
00:40:04,880 --> 00:40:06,440
Is that an invitation?

637
00:40:06,440 --> 00:40:11,160
Well, if you want to get some,

638
00:40:11,160 --> 00:40:14,160
and then we'll see how you are.
I'll be back in a sec.

639
00:40:14,160 --> 00:40:17,040
Sorry, it's not much, you
caught me by surprise a bit there.

640
00:40:17,040 --> 00:40:22,240
No, that's fine, that's fine.
I'm very pleased, it's clear, that's
very good. That is very, very good.

641
00:40:22,240 --> 00:40:24,680
I'd hope so. But I am a bit
concerned about the colour.

642
00:40:24,680 --> 00:40:27,440
Really? Yes. It's golden!

643
00:40:27,440 --> 00:40:30,320
I find that, to me it's
got a green tinge. What?

644
00:40:30,320 --> 00:40:36,560
If you hold up the jar,
I would look at the colour and decide
how well or unwell you are.

645
00:40:36,560 --> 00:40:38,600
The darker it is,
the more unhealthy you are.

646
00:40:38,600 --> 00:40:42,520
Basically there'd be a lot of blood
in the urine, and at that point,

647
00:40:42,520 --> 00:40:46,920
you'd be very, very unwell, and what
you need to do is to be bled.
You're a sadist.

648
00:40:49,240 --> 00:40:53,360
I think this is really taking
the idea of getting things
out of me to the extreme.

649
00:40:53,360 --> 00:40:58,360
You'd be bled at least once a year,
if you're high ranking, because
it was felt it was good for you.

650
00:40:58,360 --> 00:41:02,640
Several leeches were typically
applied to the prescribed body part,

651
00:41:02,640 --> 00:41:09,200
and each leech can absorb
four to six times its own
body weight in human blood.

652
00:41:09,200 --> 00:41:12,680
No wonder they only feed about
once a year. Is it hungry?

653
00:41:12,680 --> 00:41:14,560
Yes, it should be hungry.

654
00:41:16,480 --> 00:41:18,520
I'm sure it's in my head,
but I can sort of...

655
00:41:18,520 --> 00:41:21,320
I'm imagining it just draining
all the blood out of my arm.

656
00:41:21,320 --> 00:41:26,120
Such was their enthusiasm
for bloodletting that some
barber surgeons used knifes,

657
00:41:26,120 --> 00:41:30,040
and sometimes accidentally cut into
arteries and killed their patients.

658
00:41:30,040 --> 00:41:32,640
Eventually the authorities
stepped in. That is really

659
00:41:32,640 --> 00:41:36,760
wriggling around now, it's
having a great feed at my expense.

660
00:41:36,760 --> 00:41:39,760
Master surgeons were ordered
to oversee their juniors

661
00:41:39,760 --> 00:41:42,800
in cases where their clients
were in peril of death.

662
00:41:42,800 --> 00:41:48,960
Even so, records show
barber surgeons continued to kill
and maim their patients.

663
00:41:48,960 --> 00:41:53,320
14th century England was a pretty
dangerous place - the average

664
00:41:53,320 --> 00:41:58,440
life expectancy was 35,
so at 31 years old,
I wouldn't have much time left.

665
00:41:58,440 --> 00:42:02,320
There was a lack of understanding
about hygiene and medicine
and filth everywhere.

666
00:42:02,320 --> 00:42:07,800
People found it hard to even work
out what the problem was, let alone
come up with any solutions.

667
00:42:07,800 --> 00:42:14,560
It would only take one more
ingredient to tip London over
the edge into total catastrophe.

668
00:42:17,600 --> 00:42:21,960
By the middle of the 14th century,
London was as densely-populated
as it had ever been.

669
00:42:21,960 --> 00:42:27,400
The authorities' attempts to
clean up were piecemeal, reactive

670
00:42:27,400 --> 00:42:30,120
or, all too often, simply ignored.

671
00:42:30,120 --> 00:42:33,720
Despite the squalor,
London continued to boom.

672
00:42:33,720 --> 00:42:39,440
Since the Norman conquest,
international trade had expanded,
and so too had the city.

673
00:42:39,440 --> 00:42:41,920
The port of London
went into overdrive.

674
00:42:41,920 --> 00:42:46,280
In one year alone, the records show
that 20,000 tonnes - that's about

675
00:42:46,280 --> 00:42:50,240
18 million litres of wine -
were imported here.

676
00:42:50,240 --> 00:42:55,440
To meet this bulging demand, new and
bigger merchant ships were built.

677
00:42:55,440 --> 00:43:00,080
And of course, as fast as London
grew, so did the rubbish and filth.

678
00:43:00,080 --> 00:43:04,120
But in the docks, resourceful
Londoners found a use for it.

679
00:43:04,120 --> 00:43:08,560
With all that merchandise
getting shifted, space on the
docks really was at a premium.

680
00:43:08,560 --> 00:43:11,920
Then the merchants came up with
an idea that solved two of London's

681
00:43:11,920 --> 00:43:16,680
most pressing problems -
that lack of space
and the over-abundance of waste.

682
00:43:16,680 --> 00:43:23,600
They drove piles out there, in the
river, boarded them up and filled up
this space with thousands of tonnes

683
00:43:23,600 --> 00:43:29,480
of London's waste, thereby
reclaiming land that could be
used as walks, sometimes stretching

684
00:43:29,480 --> 00:43:32,080
as far as 100 metres
out into the river.

685
00:43:32,080 --> 00:43:36,680
London became bigger
and busier than ever.

686
00:43:36,680 --> 00:43:41,120
London's port was flooded with goods
and people from around the world,

687
00:43:41,120 --> 00:43:48,000
which was great for business,
but left London wide open to
other less desirable visitors.

688
00:43:48,000 --> 00:43:51,360
When reports of a terrible disease
spreading across Western Europe

689
00:43:51,360 --> 00:43:56,000
reached Britain, international
trade continued virtually unchecked.

690
00:43:56,000 --> 00:44:01,680
And filthy London was defenceless
against a new and deadly import.

691
00:44:01,680 --> 00:44:07,360
The rubbish-filled streets may
have been wretched for humans,
but they were paradise for these.

692
00:44:09,640 --> 00:44:13,960
Rats pretty much had
the run of the place.

693
00:44:13,960 --> 00:44:17,920
Black rats are different
from their modern brown cousins,
who like the low life.

694
00:44:17,920 --> 00:44:23,120
These black Asian rats were tree
dwellers, and they liked to climb.

695
00:44:28,560 --> 00:44:34,800
Preferring the high life, these rats
moved into the rafters of houses,
along with their fleas.

696
00:44:34,800 --> 00:44:38,640
And in the autumn of 1348,
they brought with them an epidemic

697
00:44:38,640 --> 00:44:44,960
so catastrophic it would ultimately
redefine the political and social
structure of the entire country.

698
00:44:44,960 --> 00:44:50,920
In busy London, they were
brought in to close contact
with humans, rich and poor alike.

699
00:44:52,720 --> 00:44:56,800
Records show that very near this
spot, the artist John De Mims lived

700
00:44:56,800 --> 00:45:00,720
with his wife Matilda and
his daughters Isabella and Alice.

701
00:45:00,720 --> 00:45:02,640
They would have been
completely unaware

702
00:45:02,640 --> 00:45:07,720
that their furry house guests
were more than an inconvenience,

703
00:45:07,720 --> 00:45:13,040
because circulating in their blood
was one of the deadliest bacteria
known to man, Yersinia pestis,

704
00:45:13,040 --> 00:45:15,720
the bubonic plague.

705
00:45:15,720 --> 00:45:19,800
As the rats succumbed to disease,
their resident fleas hopped off

706
00:45:19,800 --> 00:45:23,440
to find a new home,
with devastating effect,

707
00:45:23,440 --> 00:45:28,360
because a single flea carries around
100 plague bacteria in its guts.

708
00:45:28,360 --> 00:45:30,840
One bite can be lethal.

709
00:45:30,840 --> 00:45:35,720
London and the De Mims soon
found themselves in the grip
of a cataclysmic plague.

710
00:45:38,440 --> 00:45:43,440
On 19th of March 1349, just five
months into the plague epidemic,

711
00:45:43,440 --> 00:45:48,040
he decided to prepare for the worst,
and wrote a will in which he left
all his property to his wife.

712
00:45:50,280 --> 00:45:53,440
The bubonic plague
is still deadly today.

713
00:45:53,440 --> 00:45:57,640
As many as 3,000 cases are
reported worldwide every year.

714
00:45:57,640 --> 00:46:02,520
Scientists are still struggling
to defeat this age-old enemy.

715
00:46:04,720 --> 00:46:10,640
This is the Ministry of Defence's
state-of-the-art, Defence Science
and Technology Laboratory.

716
00:46:10,640 --> 00:46:13,040
Behind these two-metre
thick concrete walls,

717
00:46:13,040 --> 00:46:17,720
lie some of the deadliest
microorganisms on the planet.

718
00:46:19,520 --> 00:46:23,800
Bubonic plague is so lethal
that this is one of only a handful

719
00:46:23,800 --> 00:46:27,800
of labs anywhere in the world that's
secure enough to study it.

720
00:46:30,560 --> 00:46:37,160
Here, I'm about two metres away from
Petra, who's working on it now, and
it's very sobering being this close.

721
00:46:37,160 --> 00:46:39,280
She's holding it up
to the window now.

722
00:46:39,280 --> 00:46:41,800
It's amazing to think
that even though this

723
00:46:41,800 --> 00:46:47,240
is one of the most sophisticated
containment facilities in the world,
I'm still feeling this nervous.

724
00:46:47,240 --> 00:46:49,920
Back then, of course, there
wouldn't have been these walls

725
00:46:49,920 --> 00:46:52,600
and these doors separating
me from that disease.

726
00:46:52,600 --> 00:46:58,080
Back then, it was on your street,
it was in your house and it was
killing members of your family.

727
00:47:03,000 --> 00:47:04,720
To give me an idea

728
00:47:04,720 --> 00:47:08,480
of the extreme precautions that
are taken when handling the plague,

729
00:47:08,480 --> 00:47:10,920
I've been allowed
into an ultra-secure lab.

730
00:47:10,920 --> 00:47:15,240
So the last time I touched a Petri
dish was when I did GCSE chemistry,
and that was a long time ago.

731
00:47:15,240 --> 00:47:19,720
I never thought that my pursuit
of history would take me
to a high-security

732
00:47:19,720 --> 00:47:25,600
military technology lab,
dealing with dangerous pathogens.

733
00:47:25,600 --> 00:47:30,080
But Yersinia pestis is far
too dangerous for an amateur
like me to get anywhere near.

734
00:47:30,080 --> 00:47:32,320
That's E-coli there?

735
00:47:32,320 --> 00:47:36,320
That's E-coli, and plague looks a bit
like that. It's a relative of E-coli.

736
00:47:36,320 --> 00:47:38,560
Really? A bit of a bad boy, though.

737
00:47:38,560 --> 00:47:40,520
It's worse than E-coli?
Just a bit worse.

738
00:47:40,520 --> 00:47:43,440
And you wouldn't let me
touch plague like this? No.

739
00:47:43,440 --> 00:47:47,520
Say a healthy person develops
plague, what happens to them
and how quickly does it happen?

740
00:47:47,520 --> 00:47:52,320
Bubonic plague,
so that's after you've been bitten by
an infected flea, after several days

741
00:47:52,320 --> 00:47:58,360
you would develop the bubo,
which is a swelling of the lymph node
draining the site of the bite.

742
00:47:59,600 --> 00:48:06,440
Bubonic plague gets its name from
the bubos, or pus-filled swellings
which form at the lymph node

743
00:48:06,440 --> 00:48:09,760
nearest to the site of a bite
from an infected flea.

744
00:48:09,760 --> 00:48:15,720
But it would come to be known
by a simpler name - the Black Death.

745
00:48:15,720 --> 00:48:21,840
Why was it known as the Black Death?
There's so many bacteria in the blood
that your body can't cope with it,

746
00:48:21,840 --> 00:48:27,480
and it triggers coagulation in the
blood vessels, and that tends to
collect at the fingers and toes.

747
00:48:30,200 --> 00:48:33,880
It takes about two weeks for bubonic
plague to kill its victims.

748
00:48:33,880 --> 00:48:37,400
But the bacteria can go airborne

749
00:48:37,400 --> 00:48:40,400
and go straight into
someone else's lungs.

750
00:48:40,400 --> 00:48:44,560
That's called pneumonic plague,
and it's much more deadly.

751
00:48:44,560 --> 00:48:48,240
Trouble is, before the study
of microbiology, no-one knew
how it spread

752
00:48:48,240 --> 00:48:53,560
or how to deal with it, as
records from later outbreaks show.

753
00:48:53,560 --> 00:48:58,160
Pneumonic plague
has a death rate of 100%.

754
00:48:58,160 --> 00:49:03,960
Everybody dies.
If you had one case in the house,
they would shut the house up.

755
00:49:03,960 --> 00:49:08,200
So it wasn't a case of saying
goodbye to your father
and leaving because you were healthy.

756
00:49:08,200 --> 00:49:14,760
You had to be locked in the house
with this person that you know
is your death sentence.

757
00:49:14,760 --> 00:49:17,240
Why do you crazy people
keep things like plague?

758
00:49:17,240 --> 00:49:19,320
Why not just destroy it all?

759
00:49:19,320 --> 00:49:25,320
You need to understand your enemy,
so we spend a lot of time here
understanding plague, understanding

760
00:49:25,320 --> 00:49:29,480
how it causes disease,
so we can test antibiotics.
And there's a need for a vaccine.

761
00:49:29,480 --> 00:49:33,600
The only way you can protect
large populations of people,
really, is with a vaccine.

762
00:49:33,600 --> 00:49:36,640
We are just as vulnerable to plague
now as we've ever been?

763
00:49:36,640 --> 00:49:38,320
As individuals, yes.

764
00:49:38,320 --> 00:49:43,000
I would hope that in the developed
world we would be somewhat better
equipped than medieval London,

765
00:49:43,000 --> 00:49:49,640
although the impact would still be
massive if you had a similar outbreak
like you had in the 1300s.

766
00:49:49,640 --> 00:49:55,680
Seven centuries later,
we're still working on a vaccine
that's effective against the plague.

767
00:49:55,680 --> 00:49:59,720
14th century medicine
stood no chance.

768
00:50:02,000 --> 00:50:05,640
Three weeks after Mims
wrote his will, he was dead.

769
00:50:05,640 --> 00:50:08,600
When his widow came to make her
will, she made no mention of her

770
00:50:08,600 --> 00:50:13,160
two daughters, and we can only
assume that they too had perished.

771
00:50:14,680 --> 00:50:20,720
Swift, virulent and incurable,
the Black Death wiped out
entire families in days.

772
00:50:26,880 --> 00:50:31,120
In London's dirty,
overcrowded streets,
the spread was irresistible.

773
00:50:32,720 --> 00:50:37,360
The city's authorities were
powerless to contain the outbreak.

774
00:50:37,360 --> 00:50:42,440
All they could do was try to deal
with the accelerating death toll.

775
00:50:42,440 --> 00:50:47,640
Contemporary accounts
reported that over 200 bodies
a day were being buried.

776
00:50:47,640 --> 00:50:52,360
The Black Death gripped London
for up to two years.

777
00:50:52,360 --> 00:50:58,800
It claimed the lives
of half the city's population,
maybe as many as 50,000 people.

778
00:51:00,960 --> 00:51:05,560
With half its workforce gone
and a third of its civic
government wiped out,

779
00:51:05,560 --> 00:51:08,880
you might think that London would
have descended into total chaos.

780
00:51:08,880 --> 00:51:12,160
But in fact,
something quite surprising happened.

781
00:51:12,160 --> 00:51:15,000
One of the most revealing insights
into the way

782
00:51:15,000 --> 00:51:17,880
London's authorities coped with
the epidemic, was the way

783
00:51:17,880 --> 00:51:20,080
they dealt
with the huge number of dead.

784
00:51:23,440 --> 00:51:26,840
Wow. So this
is a plague victim, is it, Jelena?

785
00:51:26,840 --> 00:51:28,400
This skeleton is a male skeleton,

786
00:51:28,400 --> 00:51:30,240
and he was found
from East Smithfield,

787
00:51:30,240 --> 00:51:31,880
which is the catastrophe cemetery

788
00:51:31,880 --> 00:51:35,840
just near the Tower of London. It's a
unique site, there isn't another site

789
00:51:35,840 --> 00:51:42,120
like it in Great Britain,
and it's because it has such
tightly-dated parameters

790
00:51:42,120 --> 00:51:46,800
for 1348/1350, that
we know the individuals buried there
died from the plague.

791
00:51:46,800 --> 00:51:49,400
So this was a special cemetery
just for plague victims?

792
00:51:49,400 --> 00:51:55,440
It was, yes. It was actually
planned and thought out and prepared
in trying to cope with the amount

793
00:51:55,440 --> 00:51:58,800
of people that were dying so quickly.
So how exactly were they all buried?

794
00:51:58,800 --> 00:52:03,880
There were individual burials,
and then also there were
these mass trenches,

795
00:52:03,880 --> 00:52:11,120
that were very long lines,
and within that you had people that
were just neatly placed out in rows.

796
00:52:11,120 --> 00:52:16,320
In the spaces in between the adults,
they often would find children.

797
00:52:16,320 --> 00:52:21,520
The people, as they were buried,
were in the orientation that we
would expect, on an east to west,

798
00:52:21,520 --> 00:52:26,640
very carefully, in nice, neat rows,
and not just thrown in rather
randomly, as you would think,

799
00:52:26,640 --> 00:52:30,840
when you were faced with
a catastrophe like that and people
are dying very, very quickly.

800
00:52:30,840 --> 00:52:33,880
You imagine the plague as sort
of anarchy or social breakdown,

801
00:52:33,880 --> 00:52:37,200
but it sounds to me like if they're
setting aside bits of land,

802
00:52:37,200 --> 00:52:41,320
digging neat trenches,
that someone's still in charge,
that the systems are in place?

803
00:52:41,320 --> 00:52:44,520
Yeah, it is remarkable, because
if we think of the amount of people

804
00:52:44,520 --> 00:52:48,840
that were dying, the rapidity of it,
everything really is sort
of falling apart almost,

805
00:52:48,840 --> 00:52:50,320
but they were able to carry on,

806
00:52:50,320 --> 00:52:57,760
put things into place, prepare
an area and try to cope with all of
those people dying, and so quickly.

807
00:52:57,760 --> 00:53:00,800
It's very sobering. It makes you
think whether modern government,

808
00:53:00,800 --> 00:53:04,160
even with all its resources would be
able to cope in the same way.

809
00:53:04,160 --> 00:53:08,200
Yes, I'm not quite sure whether they
would. I always hope they would.

810
00:53:08,200 --> 00:53:10,040
They don't like an
inch of snow, do they?

811
00:53:11,640 --> 00:53:17,960
It seems the city strove to bury
its dead with dignity, even during
the horror of the plague years.

812
00:53:17,960 --> 00:53:24,920
This refusal to submit
is an indication of 14th century
Londoners' astonishing resilience.

813
00:53:26,480 --> 00:53:30,720
The city kept going,
in some ways, it was reborn.

814
00:53:30,720 --> 00:53:33,600
The records show that despite
devastating fatalities,

815
00:53:33,600 --> 00:53:37,000
the growing civil service
managed to hold things together.

816
00:53:37,000 --> 00:53:40,560
This magnificent guildhall
was built just after the plague,

817
00:53:40,560 --> 00:53:44,640
by the government of London, to show
off their power and prestige.

818
00:53:44,640 --> 00:53:48,240
London was beginning to function
like a proper city.

819
00:53:51,000 --> 00:53:54,160
The number of civil servants
tripled from just eight

820
00:53:54,160 --> 00:53:55,720
at the start of the 1300s,

821
00:53:55,720 --> 00:53:58,320
earning a total of £20 per year,

822
00:53:58,320 --> 00:54:04,040
to 24, with an annual income of up
to £200, by the following century.

823
00:54:04,040 --> 00:54:06,360
With a bigger,
better-funded civil service,

824
00:54:06,360 --> 00:54:08,720
looking after
a greatly-reduced population,

825
00:54:08,720 --> 00:54:12,840
London's government launched an
all-out assault on the city's grime.

826
00:54:12,840 --> 00:54:17,520
The plague had focused Londoners'
minds on the filth around them.

827
00:54:17,520 --> 00:54:25,000
A link between dirt and disease was
made, even if it was understood from
a distinctly medieval point of view.

828
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:30,960
The foul smells themselves,
evil miasmas, were thought
to be the cause of sickness.

829
00:54:30,960 --> 00:54:37,200
Taking no chances after the
catastrophic scale of the plague,
London began to clean up its act.

830
00:54:37,200 --> 00:54:44,440
The role of Sergeant of the Channels
was created, the first civil servant
charged with keeping the city clean.

831
00:54:44,440 --> 00:54:48,880
The number of city cleaners
was ramped up, and the fine
for illegally dumping waste

832
00:54:48,880 --> 00:54:55,880
shot up to a staggering £20, the
equivalent of over £10,000 today.

833
00:54:55,880 --> 00:55:01,520
It didn't happen overnight,
but a cleaner London
was beginning to emerge.

834
00:55:01,520 --> 00:55:06,880
But most crucially of all,
a new civic pride was borne
on London's grimy streets.

835
00:55:06,880 --> 00:55:09,960
People were learning that
co-operation and collective action

836
00:55:09,960 --> 00:55:15,120
were a necessity of urban life,
and the arrival of one man
would come to encapsulate the idea

837
00:55:15,120 --> 00:55:19,760
of common good that was penetrating
to the heart of London's government.

838
00:55:22,000 --> 00:55:25,480
When Dick Whittington first arrived
in London, he was a young man

839
00:55:25,480 --> 00:55:28,760
with one thing on his mind -
making lots of money.

840
00:55:28,760 --> 00:55:35,200
And indeed, he did make
a fortune in filthy London
and became lord mayor three times.

841
00:55:35,200 --> 00:55:38,800
But he also embodies the new
collective, responsible spirit

842
00:55:38,800 --> 00:55:41,680
of the age which followed
the catastrophe of the plague.

843
00:55:41,680 --> 00:55:44,440
He spent his life
supporting charitable works.

844
00:55:44,440 --> 00:55:46,480
He founded this church, for example.

845
00:55:46,480 --> 00:55:50,600
And when he died, he left nearly all
of his money to improving the city,

846
00:55:50,600 --> 00:55:55,280
building free toilets for the public
to use, and hospitals for the poor.

847
00:55:55,280 --> 00:56:00,240
In the mid-20th century,
they tried to dig up his body,
which was buried in this church.

848
00:56:00,240 --> 00:56:01,960
And they discovered no body.

849
00:56:01,960 --> 00:56:05,240
What they did find
was a mummified cat.

850
00:56:12,080 --> 00:56:14,440
'And the legacy lives on.'

851
00:56:14,440 --> 00:56:18,440
First formed in the medieval period,
the governing body
of the square mile

852
00:56:18,440 --> 00:56:23,080
is the City of London Corporation,
the oldest of its kind in the world.

853
00:56:23,080 --> 00:56:30,560
And one of its key roles has always
been organising the collection and
disposal of its citizens' waste.

854
00:56:30,560 --> 00:56:34,240
I've tried to catch a glimpse, and
hopefully that's all I've caught,

855
00:56:34,240 --> 00:56:37,320
of how the muck and grime
that nearly destroyed London

856
00:56:37,320 --> 00:56:45,160
seven centuries ago, in fact
laid the foundations on which
the modern metropolis was built.

857
00:56:45,160 --> 00:56:52,000
Rubbish then, like now, was taken
outside the city and disposed
of away from the homes of Londoners.

858
00:56:52,000 --> 00:56:58,600
It's amazing to think that so much
of London's waste is still moved
in an organised way by river.

859
00:56:58,600 --> 00:57:04,920
It's a system
that really is the descendant of the
14th century's fight against filth.

860
00:57:07,240 --> 00:57:12,400
And it's this ability to co-operate
and take collective action, even in
the face of a catastrophe

861
00:57:12,400 --> 00:57:16,320
like the plague,
that would prove vital
to the expansion of urban life.

862
00:57:17,240 --> 00:57:22,040
And London, once a filthy city,
would in time become the centre

863
00:57:22,040 --> 00:57:25,720
of the richest and most
powerful empire in history,

864
00:57:25,720 --> 00:57:29,960
and remains to this day,
one of the greatest cities on earth.

865
00:57:35,160 --> 00:57:38,800
Next time on Filthy Cities,
revolutionary Paris.

866
00:57:38,800 --> 00:57:45,240
Just 200 years ago, Paris was
famously one of the foulest
and smelliest cities in Europe.

867
00:57:45,240 --> 00:57:51,880
I'll be sniffing out the rotten
story of how filth and squalor
drove Parisians to revolution.

868
00:57:51,880 --> 00:57:57,440
I'll experience the most stinking
of Paris' gruelling industries,

869
00:57:57,440 --> 00:58:02,240
recreate the foul smell
that choked the streets,

870
00:58:02,240 --> 00:58:06,760
and come face to face with the
ultimate killing machine. Yikes!

871
00:58:06,760 --> 00:58:13,520
All to understand how ordinary
Parisians fought to clean up their
ancient cesspit from the bottom up.

872
00:58:13,520 --> 00:58:17,120
And you can join me in
my immersive journey online.

873
00:58:22,080 --> 00:58:25,520
You can find out where to
get your scratch and sniff card,

874
00:58:25,520 --> 00:58:30,960
then you'll be able to really
experience stinky Paris during its
most disgusting period in history.

875
00:58:45,000 --> 00:58:48,040
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

876
00:58:48,040 --> 00:58:51,080
E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk