One of the most popular features of SCUM is the numerous private servers that exist. Don’t expect to find legendary sniper rifles sitting on the ground to get the best weapons you need to put time and effort into the game…but by doing this, you’ll be rewarded for your commitment with highly customizable weapons that hit hard. This is a tough, but fair game, where you’ll need to gather and craft to survive. Its complex and dynamic features, such as needing to eat a balanced diet of food to survive, and its expansive open world means that for many people it’s become their go-to survival experience. But the reaction to their pollution shows us that, even in a time with limited alternatives, this scenario was not simply accepted without complaint.SCUM is an early access game released in 2018 that has revolutionized the survival genre. In a world without permanent sewage or waste disposal systems, it is perhaps unsurprising that some early modern rivers ended up in the state they did despite legal protections. You might think that this was as bad as it could get, but a 1696 pamphlet suggested that the Thames was actually better off than most English rivers, which enjoyed fewer protections and in contrast were "choaked up with Filth." Perhaps a more effective response than the UK manages today. Alum, as it is known today, was produced through the "boiling of urine" and the complaints were aimed at the "noisome stinking scum of a frothy substance" that it was dumping into the water.īoth the smell and contamination were claimed to have "cast many of into extremity of great sicknesses" and the building was shut down. In 1627, a case was brought by London residents against a house that made "allom". There was the waste that ended up in the river, and the smell that resulted from it.īoth dangers appeared in those scenarios where authorities did step in and take action against polluters. The threat of pollution therefore took two forms. If "corrupt" or "putrid" air was key to the spread of illness, the stench of the River Fleet was not only unpleasant-it was life threatening. Part of the complaint was the damage that Evelyn claimed polluted air was doing to the water both in the city, and to those who lived downstream who he said emerged after bathing covered in a "web" of dust and grime.Įvelyn's issues with the air highlight the importance of smell in early modern understandings of disease. John Evelyn's 1661 work Fumifugium criticized the polluted air in the capital. There were also specific health concerns. "The Thames brings us in our Riches, our Gold, Silks, Spices: and we throw all our filth into the Thames." Thomas Powell lamented the river's treatment in a 1679 religious work, suggesting people treated God in a similar way to the river: poorly. Increasingly however, the state of rivers like the Thames came under criticism. "Your dainty Nostrils (in so hot a Season, When every Clerk eats Artichokes and Peason, Laxative Lettuce, and such windy Meat) Tempt such a passage? when each Privies Seat Is fill'd with Buttock? And the Walls do sweat Urine, and Plasters? When the Noise doth beat Upon your Ears, of Discords so unsweet?" Credit: wiki / Saunders and Schofield (eds), Tudor London: a map and a view (2001) When challenged on his right to the river by later kings in the 1500s, the then mayor pointed out that " conservation and correction" of the Thames had fallen to city leaders since at least 1407.ĭetail from the 'Copperplate' map of London in the 1550s, showing the River Fleet flowing through London to the Thames. This usage in the context of the Thames represents, according to academics Keith Thomas and Bruce Boehrer, the first use of the idea of "conservation" in the English language in relation to protecting the natural world.īut this was far from a new idea. An act from the first years of Henry VII's reign made the Thames and its protection the domain of the mayor of London as its "conservator." Precisely when the first river protection laws emerged in Britain is not clear, though we know that Roman law contained regulations with fines for polluting water, so early ideas may have been brought over through their occupation.įrom as early as 1489, protections for rivers were starting to take on language that made clear that preservation was a chief concern. ![]() ![]() focused on attitudes to water in England between 15, a period historians refer to as "early modern." My research shows that, even in the era of Shakespeare's " filth-clogged" Thames, river pollution was far from acceptable. This is something I have uncovered while doing a Ph.D. While a recent flurry of stories and reports could make this crisis feel very new to us, river pollution and concerns over it have a long history.
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