Records: the World Microscopic

## **Massive Tiny Discovery***– **and the** **Rise of Sanitation***

It was acknowledged that many of them were likely responsible for a great deal of disease and death (including the amoebic dysentery that nearly killed his father). There was suspicion that this was the way of the plague.

In a way, they were now targeting the Black Death itself; a foe far greater than Scotland ever had been. The news of the plague was enough to get attention, not just in England, but France and around the world.

Just a month later, the Royal Academy announced the discovery the presence of another tiny creature that was responsible for the plague – a discovery that raced through a devastated Europe to a surprisingly mixed reception.

* First, it was nearly heretical to some that the young King and his scientists utterly rejected occult and metaphysical pathologies. It was like taunting the malevolent mystical. Concurrent with the newly printed textbooks making the circulation, it marked the beginnings of the Enlightenment, the Age of Reason – though not everybody had reason to celebrate (especially the Church).
* Second, the possibility that there could be such a kind of life was utterly unbelievable to many others. To the educated courts, the news was received with guarded optimism. Few wanted to give credit to England for the discovery though over the next few years, the reticence of other courts leaked into the populace, creating a pro-English underground (in a sort of "they actually told us and we didn't listen" sort of fashion).

In England, sanitation became an instant matter of survival. Boiling water, flushing toilets and clean, responsible disposal became England's much-celebrated contribution to the world. Further, they begin looking at how to treat infections – and have solutions from the ancient Egyptians and Greeks, who used specially selected mold and plant materials and extracts to treat infections.

It helped move things along that there was an accidental proof of concept. Many abbeys in Britain had piped water before 1200 [C.E.]. The Christchurch Monastery at Canterbury had running water, purifying tanks, and wastewater drainage from toilets, and the monastery was spared from the Black Plague in 1349 (Kahn, 2000:122). Once the word was spread, everybody wanted that system...

Potable water was the first concern, and was immediately implemented, with plans being drawn up to create a system to ensure clean water to every subject. The cost of the London aqueduct was at first absorbed by the crown, but the mortality rate dropped with three months of the water measures. This allowed the creation of the Sanitation Tax, passed and applied during the third meeting of Parliament, which greatly expanded the measures being considered and implemented.

The sewage system had first been brought to England between 46 BC and 400 AD by the Romans. Richard looked to renew and expand the concept – and the Royal Academy started working out the math for an underground sewage system to separate the disease-causing elements from people and their drinking water alike.

The flushing toilets weren't new, in the largest sense, but the technology had been lost to the west and only marginally adopted in the east. The Royal Academy went to work on the engineering problems, eventually bringing forth various designs to be standardized, all of which utilized some sort of water trap.

Finally, sewage treatment was an important consideration. There was no point in shunting it away from one place, just to get another place sick down the river. The impact of sewage was already known, even rising to policy level in 1372, when Edward III proclaimed that “throwing rushes, dung, refuse and other filth and harmful things into the [Thames] shall no longer be allowed” (Savas, 1974:15).

Between this and Richard's discovery, Parliament immediately “forbade the throwing of filth and garbage into ditches, rivers, and water”. This, of course, left the question of exactly what to do with it – and the Royal Academy was working on that, too. There were already examples and London was ready to follow suit. Near Milan, the Cistercians introduced the use of city refuse and sewer water as fertilizers on their land about 1150 C.E. (History of Technology Vol. II, 1956:681-690).

The first septic sewers began construction by July and were in operation by November. The cesspools were heavily utilized, not just as the dumping point (so to speak), but rather for harvesting ammonium nitrate for gun powder and fertilizer.

Over the course of the year, further discoveries were made as they traced the path of the creatures back from the blood, into fleas and onto the rats that carried them. Cats had an instant reverence among the English culture.