We have just discovered an intact medieval notebook in a latrine

You know it and I know it: those few minutes we spend with our butts on the toilet are ideal for catching up on Instagram, sending a WhatsApp or even answering the email. Although there are some people who have gotten out of hand about using their cell phones in the toilet, which can end hemorrhoids or with company measures to minimize losses. Nowadays it is the mobile phone, but before it was a book or a magazine.

And if today we talk about the toilet, in the past they were latrines. Of course, that winning combo of reading or writing in the bathroom has a dangerous B-side: you wouldn’t be the first or the last person whose cell phone has fallen from their pocket into the toilet. In fact, someone dropped a notebook into a latrine 700 years ago and now a team of archeology professionals just found it. The curious thing is not that the notebook is very old, it is its state of conservation: it is intact.

The discovery. In excavations led by the Westphalian-Lippe Regional Association in the historic center of Paderborn, the team has found a notebook made of wood, leather and wax that dates back to between the 13th and 14th centuries and which, as you can see below, is in a magnificent state of preservation. In fact, archaeologist Barbara Rüschoff-Parzinger confirmed It is the only complete specimen of its characteristics in the entire region.

The piece measures 10 by 7.5 centimeters, has ten double-sided wax pages and is protected by a leather bag with a lid. The cover retains a lily printed motif in its entirety, medieval symbol of purity and authority. As for the text, it is written in Latin, so as point the archaeologist responsible for the excavation, Sveva Gai, its possible owner was probably someone well-versed, a merchant from the city. In fact, short notes talk about commerce, finances or personal matters. Be careful because more than a notebook for writing with a pen, it was like a reusable waxed blackboard: the stylus had a sharp tip to engrave letters and a flat end to smooth the surface and erase. This erasure process left remains of other previous writings.

A wood, leather and wax notebook in unbeatable condition… for being 800 years old and having been in a latrine. LWL

Context. The notebook did not appear alone: ​​among the medieval objects recovered in one of the five latrines discovered during the excavation, they found barrels, a knife, complete medieval ceramic vessels, remains of fabrics and fragments of basketry. The set is what helps confirm the dating of the book. According to Gaithe area adjacent to the Abdinghof monastery was in the Middle Ages a neighborhood of the urban gentry of Paderborn.

Knowing that it was a good neighborhood helps to better contextualize the objects, as Gai points out of the remains of fabric found: “The remains of silk fabric from the latrine were partially torn into rectangular pieces, some of them of extremely fine fabric and decoration. Perhaps it was toilet paper after the once elegant fabric was discarded.” Yes, they probably used silk as toilet paper.

Why did he survive so well?. Incredible as it may seem, what saved that notebook was ending up at the bottom of a latrine in conditions of high humidity and without oxygen, a combination where the microorganisms responsible for decomposing materials such as wood or leather cannot survive. If this had not been the case, the notebook would have fallen apart in a few decades. In short: anaerobic preservation, one of the phenomena that have converted the sealed latrines in valuable deposits.

Susanne Bretzel was the first person to examine the notebook and stands out that beyond giving off an unpleasant smell, it was barely necessary to clean the outside of the notebook: the wood held up without deforming and the interior pages were so adhered that no sediment had entered, which allowed the wax to remain intact and the manuscripts to be read.

The unsolved mystery. No one knows how a notebook ended up inside a latrine, but Sveva Gai da the most likely explanation: that it fell by accident. What we do know is that this fate, no matter how fortuitous or deliberate, is precisely what allowed it to survive more than 700 years. The team has outlined a profile of the possible owner, but his name remains a mystery.

There is, however, a way to discover it: if that latrine could be linked to a specific plot through the historical archives of Paderborn, the notebook could have a first and last name. In parallel, the team works to recover the layers of erased writing under the wax, where previous annotations, still unread, may be stacked.

In Xataka | In medieval Europe, not only humans ended up on the gallows. Other criminals were also executed: the “murderer” pigs

In Xataka | In the Middle Ages it was common to sleep inside wooden closets. The big question is why we stopped doing it.

Cover | LWL