Free Baths

[nokhor]

One of the stipulations of a treaty between the Byzantines and the Rus in either 907 or 911 depending on the source was that when the Rus came to Byzantium, they could have as many baths as they wanted. Different priorities for different times i guess. It's near the bottom of the page.

http://www.netwizards.com/~eeliag/CHAP3.html

[Pablo Sanchez]

Considering that the Rus were barbarians, they were most likely very dirty folk. Meanwhile, the Byzantines were possibly the only remaining Christians who bathed on a regular basis. Anyone who's ever been really, really dirty over a long period of time can sympathize.

...

Right?

[lonewolf371]

Kiev at the time was about 1/2 the size of Constantinople, full of roughly civilized Russians. Although at the time much of Kiev would have been populated by Vikings it still maintained a measure of dignity. The Russians are often presumed to be barbaric (in the stereotype way) due to their ruthless conquests in Eastern Europe. It was not so, and the Russians were better than most think. Although I do believe that bathing wasn't truly practiced in any part of Europe save by the nobility until the time of the Renaissance.