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The Bad Water Myth

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One persistent history myth is that in the Middle Ages people didn’t drink water because it was unsafe and instead they only drank beer, wine, and ale.

I don’t know where it came from but it has entered “common” knowledge along with defending spiral staircases, horns on Viking helmets and so forth. One reason that this particular myth persists may be that there is a lot less written about people drinking water than drinking beer. Water was common place so they didn’t record it in the same way. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

The 9th century Abbott Lupus Servatus wrote, 

“Let us make use of a healthy natural drink, which will sometimes be of benefit to both body and soul…if it is drawn not from a muddy cistern, but from a clear well or the current of a transparent brook.”

The Venerable Bede wrote that in 

“627: [King Edwin] took such care for the good of his nation, that in several places where he had seen clear springs near the highways, he caused stakes to be fixed with copper drinking  vessels hanging on them for the refreshment of travelers.”

It was often considered that drinking water was a sign of piety or penance for monks in the early Middle Ages, despite their reputation for brewing.

People did generally prefer to drink wine or ale or beer, it was tastier for one thing. It would also have provided additional calories for those involved in hard labour. It would, however, have been costlier even if you brewed it yourself. In the 10th century, there was a colloquy or a conversation meant for language studies that was written down by Aelfric of Eynsham.

Teacher: “And what do you drink?
Student: “Ale, if I have any, or water, if I have no ale. “
Teacher: “Don’t you drink wine?”
Student: “I am not rich enough to buy myself wine; and wine is not a drink for
children, nor for the stupid, but for the old and wise men.”

This is not to say that there weren’t problems with water…

“It is necessary to know that the best water is wholly  devoid of taste and smell, is most pleasant to drink and clear to the sight… but waters which contain impurities, have a feted smell, or any bad quality may be so improved by boiling as to be fit to be drunk; or by mixing them with wine…
Some kinds of water it may be expedient to strain, such as the marshy, saltish, and bituminous.”
– Paul of Aegina, 7th Century

…and a good source of water was always considered valuable. In the 14th century,  Boccacio wrote in ‘The Decameron’ that

“When they descended to inspect the huge, sunlit courtyard, the cellars stocked with excellent wines, and  the well containing abundant supplies of fresh, ice-cold water, they praised [their lodgings] even more.”

It’s also why in addition to wells being present at almost every medieval archaeological site, nearly every village, town, and city was founded in a place with clean drinking water, whether that were a stream or a river or near a natural spring.

There were a lot of laws on the books relating to the water supply, especially keeping places like slaughterhouses and tanneries well away from the water supply to avoid pollution, usually downstream of where people were gathering their clean drinking water.

In 1180, William Fitz Steven wrote that

“There are also in the northern suburbs of London springs of high quality, with water that is sweet, wholesome, clear, and whose runnels ripple amid pebbles bright.”

This was probably the Tyburn Spring. In 1236, construction of the Great Conduit was authorised to connect that spring via pipes to the Great Conduit House in Cheapside, which delivered water to many of the cisterns in the city.

In 1345 London introduced regulations preventing brewers from using so much of the water from the Great Conduit as it was interfering with the drinking supply of the poor, people who couldn’t afford to just drink wine and ale. For centuries until 1666 when it was destroyed in the Great London fire, this system provided the population with a plentiful supply of clean drinking water that didn’t usually even need to be boiled before actually drinking it.
Though on occasion it actually allowed another  liquid to flow freely through the city.

“1274: This year came King Edward I from the Holy Land and were crowned at Westminster… The Conduit in Chepe ran all the day with red and white wine to drink, for all such who wished.”

Similarly, in Bristol in 1376, a plumber named Hugh White was required at his own expense to maintain the supply of water to the Quay Pipe, All Saints’ Pipe and St. John’s Pipe and provide one thousand feet of strong new pipe per annum. He was then to be paid ten pounds per year, for his term of life, with the proviso that if the supply failed for more than six days, he would be fined a year’s fee.

St John's Conduit and Tower Lane - George Delamotte, 1825
St John’s Conduit and Tower Lane – George Delamotte, 1825
© Bristol, Museums, Galleries and Archives

There were also directions on exactly how much water one should drink and if that water should be cold or hot. At this point in history medicine was based on the theory of the four humours, the four fluids in your body, which were thought to control every aspect of your health. People with certain ailments were instructed to stay away from cold water or from hot water or to only drink one cup of water a day and make sure it was in the morning.

The 16th century physician Andrew Boorde instructed people on how to make sure the water they were drinking was safe.

“Water is not wholesome sole by itself, for an Englishman… Water is cold, slow, and slack of digestion.
The best water is rain water, so be it that it be clean and purely taken. Next to it is running water, the which doth swiftly run from east into the west upon stones or pebbles…
But standing waters, and well-waters to the which the sun hath no reflection… they be not so commendable.”

Cheers!

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