What Jim has learned today … I learned boiling people in oil is bad … very bad … don’t boil anyone in oil. I learned this by reading a book. You too can learn to stop boiling people in oil by simply by reading a book. Not a self-help book like, “How to Stop Boiling People in Oil” by Eli Tist, Phd., but a novel … any novel. The more novels a person reads, the lower their propensity to boil people in oil.

During the period between the collapse of the Roman Empire and the 15th century, people were cruel to others; heartless and downright sadistic, almost … almost … Medieval. And it was accepted behavior, the rule rather than the exception. Setting cats on fire was considered wholesome neighborhood entertainment. But we shouldn’t judge the people of the Middle Ages too harshly. They didn’t have novels. Sure, they had books like the Epic of Gilgamesh, The Confessions of Saint Augustine and the Septuagint. But they were precious things; hand copied treasures one wouldn’t find on the butcher’s or thatcher’s nightstand. Few could read anyway.

Medieval culture was tough on crime. Being homeless could land you in the public square bound in wooden stocks, sometimes for hours, sometimes for days. Children would gather and throw excrement into the homeless person’s face. Townspeople would throw rocks or beat him. These actions were not considered crimes. Often the homeless person would die of his wounds or from exposure. There was a high rate of recidivism. When set free of the stocks, guess what, he was still homeless.

Punishments for crimes were inhuman. Gossiping could get your tongue cut out. An adulteress was likely to lose both her ears and her nose. Insulting a noble could get you torn apart on the rack. Being suspected of heresy could get you disemboweled and then burned alive. Finding yourself in debt meant you may find yourself missing your hands and feet. But not to worry…the accused were more likely to die during the trial.

The justice system relied on ‘trial by ordeal.’ The accused, and that is all it took to land you at trial, an accusation, might have his hands and feet bound and the tossed in a deep pool of water. If the accused floated and survived, he was guilty and could now be tortured. If the accused drowned, he was innocent … dead … but innocent. Sometimes the accused was forced to reach into a pot of boiling oil and retrieve a stone from the bottom. After doing so, if your arm was unscathed, you were considered innocent. This particular form of trial had a built-in appeal process. Your arm would be wrapped up for three days and then re-inspected. If there were signs of healing, which there wouldn’t be with this sort of wound, you must be innocent.

Throughout the Middle Ages these cruelties were accepted and commonplace. For a thousand years, from the middle of the 5th century to the beginning of the 15th century, incidents of torture steadily rose. Torture became a public event. Families, including children, would pack lunches and vendors would hawk their wares.

Life was cheap. Foreigners, odd children, poor people, people too smart, people too dumb, the deformed, the too weak, the too strong, the too ugly, the too pretty, anything that set one apart could land one in a public square being ripped apart, eviscerated or set on fire while others cheered. Then around the middle of the 1400s, something happened, incidents of torture began to rapidly decline. This decline began shortly after Johannes Gutenberg assembled his printing press.

In 2014, researchers Maha Djikic and Keith Oatley of the University of Toronto published a paper entitled “The Art of Fiction: From Indirect Communication to Changes in the Self” The gist of their research suggest that reading fiction changes us. Reading romance novels, science fiction and historical novels makes us better people by teaching our brains to empathize, to get inside the head of others, to understand and relate to others, making us more compassionate and considerate of others, less likely to want to boil another in oil because we wouldn’t want ourselves to be boiled in oil … empathy.

Guttenberg is best known for printing the Guttenberg Bible. But it was a version of the Latin Vulgate. Few could read at all and even fewer could read Latin. Use of the printing press spread over Europe. More books were being printed in local languages. More people were learning to read. Along with Beowulf, Divine Comedy and The Canterbury Tales, more works of fiction were being printed. Readers were experiencing the experiences of fictional characters, walking figurative miles in the shoes of others. And the use of torture faded.

Of late I have been reading more history and science. And I wonder … could this be why I have been so grumpy? Maybe I should read a good novel. This is all I have learned today.

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James Wares lives in Marshalltown and can be reached at whatjimhaslearnedtoday@yahoo.com