The Holy Soap of Sternberg (3)
Time flowed on, and by the time the scent of soap had drifted beyond Prague and across all of Bohemia, the season had reached the heart of July, where the greenery had deepened until it burned with a dark, verdant intensity.
The scorching midday sun showed no mercy. Hanging high in the heavens, it baked the earth, and the heat haze rising from the ground distorted the horizon, dizzying to the eye.
Piercing through the suffocating heat and thick clouds of dust, a long procession was crossing the Bohemian border.
Clatter, clatter—
The crest of a winged lion was engraved on the side of the carriage.
Their identity was none other than the masters of the Mediterranean and the queens of the Adriatic: the diplomatic delegation of the Republic of Venice.
The journey northward, crossing the eternal snows of the Alps, had been nothing short of a penance. When crossing the mountain range, they had to fight the bone-chilling cold, and as soon as they descended to the highlands and entered the interior, a sweltering heat, as if waiting for them, engulfed them.
Inside that oven, the Venetian special envoy, Francesco Foscari, never stopped fanning himself.
“Hoo….”
He irritably tugged at the collar of his linen shirt, which was soaked in sweat and clinging to his neck. He was used to the humid heat of Venice, but the dry, scorching heat of the inland heartland was a different kind of agony.
‘If it weren’t for those damned cannons, I wouldn’t have had to come to a place like this…’
Foscari’s mission was of grave importance. With the coronation of the new Sultan, Murad II, tensions with the Ottoman Empire were rising, and what they needed now was not faith.
Steel that could deflect all the enemy’s spears, blades, and arrows. Powerful cannons that could shatter fortress walls. Rumor had it that the heretic King of Bohemia held both in his hands.
‘If I can extract the steel technology, that would be best. If not, I must at least buy the goods.’
His destination was Prague. It was the stronghold of Ulrich von Sternberg, the heretic King pointed at by all of Europe. Of course, Venice was a place that would join hands with heathens if necessary. Dealing with a heretic was not something that would prick his conscience in the slightest.
Clip-clop, clip-clop—
Foscari scanned the peaceful, pastoral landscape passing by the carriage window with sharp eyes. The excommunication by the Papal See, the charges of heresy, and the containment by the Empire. Despite all those adverse conditions, Bohemia was growing strangely quiet and rapidly.
‘For a country that recently fought a war… it is excessively peaceful.’
Screech—
The carriage slowed down.
“My lord, we have arrived in Kuttenberg.”
Kuttenberg, the second city of Bohemia and the city of silver mines. Foscari opened the carriage door and stepped out. His assumption that he would find ruins devastated by war was proven wrong in the most pleasant way.
A bustling market, well-maintained roads. Above all, there were no shadows on the people’s faces. The clothes of the passersby on the street might have been shabby, but there was a strange vitality in them.
‘Is it because it’s a city overflowing with silver?’
He pretended to be composed and headed to the Emperor Karl Inn, said to be the largest and most expensive in the city. His body, exhausted from the long journey, felt heavy as lead. He wanted to throw off his clothes, which were caked with sweat and dust, immediately.
Foscari tossed a Venetian ducat gold coin to the innkeeper and commanded, “The best room you have. And prepare a bath immediately. I am suffocating from the heat.”
“Yes, my lord! I shall prepare it at once!”
At the appearance of a wealthy Venetian noble, the innkeeper bowed until his back nearly snapped.
A moment later, a large wooden tub was brought into the room. The young maid filled the tub with cold water, then placed a small basket on the table along with a towel.
Foscari sat on a chair, taking off his boots, and glanced at the basket. Then, he furrowed his brow.
“Hey.”
“Yes, my lord?”
“What is this?”
What he pointed at with his finger was an ivory-colored, square object inside the basket. A luster flowed over its smooth surface, and it was emitting a subtle, sweet fruit scent that filled the room. It was clearly a top-tier soap. A luxurious item that even the noblewomen of Venice would use.
Foscari’s eyes narrowed.
‘These people are trying to overcharge me because I’m a foreigner.’
He glared at the maid and snapped coldly, “I never ordered such an expensive item. I told you to bring only bathwater, didn’t I? Are you planning to sneak it into the bill and charge me extra?”
To think they would try to pull a fast one on a Venetian merchant—they had knocked on the wrong door entirely.
However, the maid’s reaction was unexpected. Instead of being flustered or scared, she burst into a giggle.
“Oh my, my lord. You do love your jokes.”
“Jokes?”
“We aren’t charging for this. It’s a service we provide to guests staying at our inn.”
Foscari doubted his own ears.
“Service…? You mean it’s free?”
“Yes, that’s right. It’s all included in the bath fee.”
Foscari picked up the soap from the basket. It was heavy and solid. The texture against his fingertips was as smooth as marble. When he brought it close to his nose, the fresh scent of apples penetrated deep into his lungs. A scented soap of this quality would cost at least half a gold ducat even at the Rialto Market in Venice. Yet, they were giving it away for free at a backwater Bohemian country inn (from his perspective)?
“Don’t lie to me. How much is this worth, and you’re giving it away for free? Is it perhaps just shiny on the outside and rotten on the inside?”
“Oh, you really are suspicious.”
The maid put her hands on her hips as if she found it ridiculous.
“These are everywhere in the market. You can buy one for a single groschen, so why would I try to scam a guest?”
The soap nearly slipped from Foscari’s hand.
“……How much did you say?”
“One groschen. Bohemia isn’t so poor that we’d struggle to buy a single bar of soap.”
The maid hummed a tune and left the room. Left alone, Foscari stared blankly at the soap.
One groschen.
For that pittance, one could buy a scented soap fit for royalty?
‘That’s impossible.’
With trembling hands, he took the soap and stepped into the tub. He wet the soap in the water and rubbed it on his body.
Bubbling—
A rich, dense lather formed in an instant. The foam wrapped around his skin as softly as whipped cream, and the subtle apple scent filled the room. Foscari let out a dry laugh.
“Ha….”
It was good.
He didn’t want to admit it, but it was far superior to the top-tier Castile soap he used at home. The cleansing power was perfect, and his skin felt squeaky clean yet moisturized after washing.
After finishing his bath, Foscari got dressed, feeling a shock even greater than the refreshment. He roughly shook out his wet hair and went downstairs, where the innkeeper was organizing his ledger at the counter.
“Innkeeper.”
“Oh, my lord. Do you feel refreshed? Did you like the soap?”
“Yes, it was excellent. But I have something to ask.”
Foscari took the soap from his pocket and placed it on the table.
“What exactly is this item? Where was it made?”
“Ah, that?”
The owner gave a good-natured smile and pointed to a portrait hanging on the wall. It was a portrait of a young man. It was Ulrich, the King of Bohemia, with sharp eyes and an intellectual impression.
“It was made by our King. The city folk call it Royal Soap, or Apple Soap.”
“The King… makes soap?”
“Yes. His Majesty cares terribly for the health of his people. Do you know what happened to our city after this soap appeared?”
The owner lowered his voice and whispered secretly.
“Do not be surprised. The Black Death has disappeared.”
“……Ha?”
Foscari scoffed.
“Listen here, innkeeper. I admit the quality of the soap is good, but you are exaggerating. A plague like the Black Death wouldn’t retreat just because of a bit of soap. That is the realm of God.”
Foscari’s reaction was perfectly logical. To Europeans of the time, the Black Death was the very embodiment of an irresistible terror that human power could not overcome. It was a plague that could not be stopped by the earnest prayers of the Pope or all the herbs prescribed by the best doctors of the age. In Venice, they had even tried to purify the air by sealing the entire city and burning spices, but even that could not stop the death.
To eliminate such a catastrophe with a mere cleansing agent made by mixing oil and lye? To him, it was nothing more than the absurd nonsense that a third-rate quack would spout when trying to scam people under the Rialto Bridge.
“You must have just been lucky. Bohemia was already famous for not having much Black Death, wasn’t it?”
Foscari’s words were a historical fact. During the mid-14th century, when the Black Death swept across Europe, Bohemia had strangely escaped the worst of it, even as half the population of Western Europe, including France and Italy, was dying in that living hell. Later historians and medical scholars analyzed that Bohemia was able to minimize the damage thanks to its low population density and the swift, thorough border-sealing measures of Charles IV.
But at the time, people didn’t know the reason. They simply believed that the plague had bypassed them because God’s grace rested on Bohemia, or because the virtue of Charles IV had reached the heavens. This was one of the reasons why the Bohemian people still revered and missed the late Emperor Charles IV.
“It must be the same this time. The wind direction must have been good, or God must have had mercy on this land. Not because of soap.”
“……Well, as you say, my lord, the Black Death is invisible, so that could be it. Who knows if it’s God’s will or the soap?”
“If you know, then that’s enough. The product is good, so there’s no need to add such lies…”
“But, my lord.”
The owner cut off Foscari’s words, leaned in close, and whispered cautiously.
“Then what about this? Would you believe it if I said puerperal fever has disappeared?”
Foscari’s brow twitched.
“……Puerperal fever, you say?”
“Yes. That terrible fever where the mother burns like a fireball and dies while giving birth.”
The owner pointed out the window with his finger.
“Until a month ago in this city, there were countless mothers who died giving birth. Everyone lived in resignation, saying the devil was jealous and taking them away. But His Majesty issued an edict. He ordered that midwives must scrub their arms thoroughly with soap before delivering a baby. He threatened to strip them of their midwife qualifications if they didn’t wash until the soap lathered white.”
“And?”
“Do not be surprised. It has only been a few weeks since that order was given, and since then, not a single mother in this city has died giving birth.”
Foscari shut his mouth.
“……Is that true?”
“I swear it. In the last few weeks, undertakers haven’t sold a single coffin for a mother. If this isn’t a miracle, what is?”
A cold shiver ran down Foscari’s spine. Puerperal fever. The shadow of death that every woman in Europe feared. Even the noblewomen of Venice wrote their wills before entering the birthing chamber. Yet, with a single bar of soap, in just a few weeks, he had controlled that catastrophe?
‘Is it a coincidence? Or…’
The King called a heretic was saving the lives of his people more surely than the Papal See. And he was doing it not with prayers, but with mere soap bubbles.
“…….”
Foscari looked down at the soap he was holding once more. The technology to grasp and control the causal relationship of death. That was the realm of challenging the power of God. He felt as if this one-groschen ivory brick had suddenly become heavier than gold.