ADULTERATED MILK

Taranaki Daily News, 11 September 1934, Page 17 (Supplement)

ADULTERATED MILK

PENALTY IN MIDDLE AGES. Dr. H. A. Schuette, University of Wisconsin Department of Chemistry, recently gave the following history on adulteration of foodstuffs in a speech made in the University radio studio. This instance occurred in Germany, in 1481:—

“Any man or woman who sells watered milk shall have a funnel thrust into his or her mouth and "be compelled to drink so much watered milk as- in the judgment of the surgeon can be borne without danger to life. / “Or, any man .or woman who sells butter mixed with bets, stones, or other objects with the' object of increasing the weight, shall be arrested and put in the pillory. The butter shall be placed on his or her head and there remain until it shall have been melted by the heat of the sun. The dogs shall be allowed to lick them, and the people may scold them with any words it pleases them, provided that neither God, the King, nor any person be thereby libelled. If the weather is cold a fire shall be built in front of the guilty one. “Any man or woman who sells rotten eggs shall be bound to the. pillory and to the street urchins shall be given rotten eggs, that they therewith pelt the offender, to the amusement of the people. It shall be forbidden to throw at them any other object than rotten eggs.”