ABSTRACT
Focussing upon the campaigns waged by central and local government to eliminate the perceived hazards posed by butchers and butchery, this chapter examines the ways in which a growing corpus of sanitary measures promulgated throughout England from the 1350s onwards can extend our knowledge of late medieval responses to plague. Derived in part from vernacular plague tracts produced for a popular audience, the belief that pestilence was spread by miasmatic air had widespread practical implications for a trade that generated large quantities of noisome waste and frequently stood charged with environmental pollution. Medical theories concerning the crucial role of diet in strengthening (or weakening) an individual’s ability to resist infection, along with ideas regarding the transmission of toxins through the gaze as well as in the air, also inspired the many regulations concerning butchers that feature so prominently in the surviving records. These efforts to protect the public against plague had a striking impact on the urban landscape, as new, purpose-built slaughterhouses were constructed on hygienic principles, and the worst aspects of butchery were increasingly confined to peripheral areas. The disposal of offal and other noxious waste posed a particular challenge, and led to the development of special facilities for removal, which were designed to protect the urban water supply and keep the streets free of filth. At the same time, markets became cleaner and better organised with improved standards of supervision in order to ensure that poorer citizens could obtain uncontaminated cuts of meat in sanitary conditions.
