Starting from 1200 AD the need arose to regulate the problem of domestic and productive waste in the cities

Starting from the Middle Ages, the urban agglomerations that grew on the back of commercial, religious, productive or political interests, began to face the problem of waste management, in small but very populous cities. In “do it yourself” it was no longer an acceptable solution.

When we talk about waste , images like plastic, paper, glass, metal of cans and food waste immediately come to mind, which make up the mix of modern packaging consumption.

None of this in the Middle Ages, because, for the types of raw materials available and for the habit of using a circular economy model, which we are rediscovering only now, which aimed to reuse everything that could be reused, the waste was different.

Very little was thrown into the kitchen, both as fresh raw materials and as advanced foods, which were cleverly recomposed in other forms of nutrition. 

Hence the characterization of the “poor cuisine” made of fresh elements that came from the countryside, which followed the seasons, with which unrefined but essential dishes are made.

The raw materials available to people were mainly made of wood, ceramic, fabrics, earthenware, copper for the pots and iron for other equipment. All these types of materials, at the end of life we had to be eliminated.

Furthermore, in that period, there was also the problem of the disposal of manure , which constituted a danger mainly of a sanitary type as well as of decorum.

In the cities, for a certain period, products such as leather and leather were also produced which created highly polluting and foul-smelling solid and liquid waste which created great hygienic-sanitary problems, so much so that, as we will see later, it was decided to relocate these activities outside the urban centers.

All this solid waste was abandoned along the roads , day after day, creating problems for the health of the resident population and of decorum for the cities that began to attract travelers for business or pilgrims for religious activities.

Liquid waste from artisanal activities was disposed of directly in the ditches, rivers or fields without too much concern.

From the twelfth century AD the population and craft growth of the cities gave birth to the desire to excel from the point of view of social importance and architectural beauty, putting one city in competition with another.

The improvement of the aesthetic aspect of the inhabited centers had to pass also on the redevelopment of the city streets which could no longer host all sorts of sewage, waste and waste which the citizens wanted to dispose of.

Thus was born in Siena, for example, the office of the ”Public Waste“, located in Piazza del Campo which, starting from 9 October 1296, began to contract the cleaning of the city areas for the duration of a year.

The contract consisted not only of the cleaning of the streets with the right to retain all the waste considered in some way reusable, but also the cleaning of the market areas with the acquisition of ownership of the waste grains.

In addition, the municipality entrusted the contractor with a sow with her offspring, to help him clean up what was edible for the pigs.

As far as artisanal activities are concerned , the first form of regulation of the management of productive waste is found in the Constitutions of Melfi , issued in 1231 by Federico II, which constituted the first collection of health laws.

In particular, it required the movement of products harmful to the population, such as the tanning of leather or the production of leather, outside the inhabited areas.

In other geographical areas, such as in Freiburg , a medieval city founded in 1120 , an important center of the Germanic area, numerous canals were built in which it was strictly forbidden to dump garbage from citizens. 

The solid waste, produced by the houses and the craft activities, had to be sent to the collection centers established by the authorities who then disposed of them by throwing them in the Dreisam river.

The system, however, did not seem to really work, as citizens, more often than not, threw waste into the various canals, avoiding the road to the collection centers.

Automatic translation. We apologize for any inaccuracies. Original article in Italian.