View source for Jokes/1400s Alpine mead monastery

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Do you know the story of the monks who made mead in the alps in the 1400s? It was in the Sacra di San Michele outside of Turin. The situation was that there was this abbey that produced this amazing mead from the honey of the wildflowers that grew in the area.

Their mead was so popular that the monastery became famous as a sort of raucous tavern in the mountains. People would travel great distances to visit, and people on trips would go out of their way to pass through Turin. This didn't sit well with everyone.

So for whatever reason, probably more to do with politics or the mead market more than christian doctrine, the pope issued an edict that effectively outlawed the production of mead by imposing strict rules on what could be produced and sold as alcohol.

You still see vestiges of this in German beer purity laws, etc - lots of requirements of what is and isn't allowed to be used if you want something to be called beer. It's a way to indirectly control markets and economies by constraining the supply artificially.

Anyway, yeah - the pope basically says "Look, you can use God's grapes to make god's wine, you can use God's barely to make God's beer, but this mead, that's not what God's beautiful flowers are for." And now the abbey is suddenly in trouble, because abbeys are expensive.

So they need to suddenly pivot, to use today's phrasing, in a way that'll preserve as many of their assets as possible while still keeping within the letter of the pope's law. They have a big meeting and talk about what to do.

There's a large faction of monks that wants to plant grapes and turn the large fields of mountain flowers into a vineyard. It would take many years to replace the revenue of the meadery, but mountain wine would eventually be just as popular surely!

A lot of monks agree with this, because when you're living in a monastery you think in terms of decades and centuries, not in terms of weeks and days, and it seems to be in keeping with the alcoholic traditions of the place, and it seems like it's going to be a done deal.

But a young monk in the order, an orphan who had been raised by the monks and taken his own vows only years before, had a wildly different idea. He couldn't bear the thought of losing all of these flowers, tearing out god's glorious rainbow for row upon row of grape vines.

He made an impassioned case to the abbot that the wildflowers used by the bees in their apiaries had been planted by god, and that the monks had no right to tear them up just to pursue earthly profit.

Further, he argued, just because the abbey's past was tied up with the production of alcohol it didn't mean the future had to be. Flowers are their own reward, and the abbey could survive by selling honey and wildflowers themselves. There was plenty of booze in Turin anyway!

This didn't sit well with the older monks, but the abbot was savvy. He recognized that if the pope wanted to curtail the abbey's ability to make a profit from alcohol he could just as easily pass a wine purity decree in a few years and destroy all of their progress.

He'd secretly been hoping for an alternative to the wine plan, and the young monk's idea helped him to consolidate his thinking on the matter. He convened a gathering of all of the monks and told them that moving forward theirs would be an abbey of flowers and honey.

This upset some of the monks but ultimately everyone accepted it - they could always buy their ale and wine from town like everyone else, after all. The loss of the mead meant the local economy would take a hit, of course, but everyone would get by.

Meanwhile, Turn was entering the renaissance and seeing the emergence of a rising class of rich merchants and tradesmen, as well as new artisans and new kinds of art. Now, we think of the renaissance as a period of painting and sculpture and music, but that's limited.

Those are just the artifacts that were left behind - in reality, the period was a flourishing of art and expression across all domains of human life. Dance, street performance, pantomime, pottery, and even *flower arrangement* became major avenues of expression.

In other words, at the time that the monks of St. Michele decided to pivot to flowers and honey as their primary products there was already a booming trade in both of those things in Turin. The city was particularly famous for its flowers, because of the rich local variety.

Now, the Piedmont region where all of this takes place was pretty contentious in the 15th century. Turin itself was sacked in 1453, though, you know, that was more or less how things went. It didn't stop them from establishing a university or finishing the local cathedral.

The people here were hardy mountain people, a mix of french and italian with loyalty to the pope and a lot of confusion as to the exact chain of command to get there. 
The people here were hardy mountain people, a mix of french and italian with loyalty to the pope and a lot of confusion as to the exact chain of command to get there.

You might be tempted to see the popularity of flower arrangement as evidence that these were foppish folk -- Quite the contrary! The delicacy of the flowers stood out among the harsh conditions of the mountain environment, and were prized specifically for their ability to thrive and bloom amidst challenge and conflict.

So picture Turin, an aspiring cathedral and college town, torn between France and Italy, a harsh, rugged, beautiful mountain environment wracked by war where the one thing everyone can agree on is that a specific arrangement of flowers can be as breathtaking as a mural.

("Flower Arrangement" is such a weird term, it's really the phrase we use because we don't have a more concrete term like they do in some languages. Flowers are often filled with symbolism and used to express complex ideas, and different cultures have their own languages. Look at, for instance, Japanese flower arrangement - called Ikebana, which means "To make flowers live" - and the thousand year tradition that underlies it. Every flower, every position, every absence has meaning. Don't laugh at this!)

So, that's the context. The monks at St. Michele, outside of Turin in the Piedmont region of Italy have a long tradition of making and selling mead, but the pope has intervened in a way that makes that impossible. So they're going to sell honey and flowers instead.

So, there's this rich merchant Odo, he's like a younger son of the d'Onocrio family which controls various aspects of Turin society at the time, and he's all-in on flowers. Odo d'Onocrio is the guy who can get you beautiful flowers, AND he employs all the great arrangers.

He's got this market cornered - until suddenly the local abbey starts competing with him. And what sucks for Odo is that the abbey has access to all of the best flowers, because of course it owns all of the land where the gorgeous wildflowers grow.

He was fine when the abbey was converting their flowers into honey and mead -- hell, he'd even be fine if the abbey stuck to honey. But that they're selling flowers -- including hiring their own church-backed arranging artisans - is directly interfering with his business.

So, he goes to the monks and he says haha, come on guys, very funny, but you're really hurting my business and because you're the church I can't just crush you with local politics.

Can we come to a deal? What if you resell my flowers, and let my guys arrange them?

But the abbot is wary of this passing fad of a "rich merchant class", doesn't want to enmesh the abbey into unnecessary external entanglements. They've got the flowers, they've got the artisans, if this guy can't compete that's kinda god's call, right?

You've got to understand that back then they didn't have market economics like we understand them. They had cartels and exclusive deals upheld at the ends of armies, which were loyal to individual powerful people and not to cities (or countries, which didn't even exist).

So the Abbot is backed by the church, which is the most powerful cartel there is, and even though they've gotten on the pope's bad side with the mead somehow they're still confident of papal support. They are, after all, the church.

So the Abbot thanks Odo for raising the issue and sends him home with a second-rate bouquet of flowers and a few bottles of now-bootleg mead from the abbey's cellars, and thinks that'll be the end of it. He has vastly at this point underestimated the d'Onocrio clan, however.

So the first thing Odo does is write to the Pope, basically saying "Hey man, I thought we were buds, why are your guys cutting in on my turf? I need to call in a favor and have you rein them in a bit!" and while he's waiting for a reply the monks are doing better and better.

This sets off some red flags for Odo, because if the monks are starting to be this profitable with their flowers-and-honey operation they'll be able to send enough money back to the pope to buy his loyalty. So he knows he can't wait for the pope to come through for him.

So he goes to the French! Again, this isn't really "treason" per se because there aren't really "countries" per se, but The French have been eyeing Turin for a while and have a lot of power in the region. (They will eventually take over Turin in the 16th century).

But the thing about the french is that they are really impressed by Italy's culture. They're still shitting in their own drinking water in Paris at this point, the French are not the bearers of culture you may I guess currently see them as.

So Odo's got this really strong case - "Hey Pierre, you like culture, right? I know you like flower arrangement! And hey, everyone likes money! Will you help me by putting some pressure on this abbey to stop selling flowers?"

Unfortunately for Odo, however, this particular Pierre is incredibly Catholic, with a fierce loyalty to the church and each and every one of its representatives, even the ones who can't get along. And so he nods along until Odo gets to the point, then he shows Odo the door.

Now, you have to understand Odo's position here. He's a minor member of a powerful family. He'll always be powerful in Turin, he'll never go hungry, and he'll never be powerful within his family - unless he can make enough money to buy their respect.

This is the emerging value system of the new merchant class, and it's *REALLY FUCKING WEIRD* to everyone else. You don't lol change your status what are you doing you fuggin nut? You're already rich and powerful just die mad about the flowers, right?

But Odo is consumed by this. Things are starting to get bad, because some of his artisans are starting to take commissions from the monks. And because the monks have access to more and better flowers they're able to do better work. Not looking good!

And Odo can't let it go. The Pope writes back unwilling to intervene, whether because he likes the flowers or because they're sending him money or because he doesn't like the d'Onocrios or maybe he just ate some bad cheese, who knows, but Odo's on his own.

Desperate, he is able to secure an investment from his family and starts hiring some of the more famous flower arrangers from around italy to come and work in his shop. (These are not names you would have heard of, but at the time they would have been very well received!)

This is effectively a marketing campaign in renaissance Piedmont, part of an arms race between a rich individual and the church. You can see how Odo is scrambling and trying everything he can while the church just, like, made a decision and is done thinking about it.

This absolute disparity in the power between the two factions is always really interesting to me. To a single individual on the street in Turin each is unfathomably powerful - the church versus the d'Onocrios, it's like unstoppable force meets immovable object.

It's a bit like we think about corporations versus governments today, right? They're both huge, unfathomable, massive. Until you look at their numbers and realize that very few corporations in their wildest dreams have anywhere near the budget of a small town.

(Total parenthetical here, but one of my all-time favorite explorations of this theme is the movie Gangs of New York by Martin Scorsese. It's this two-and-a-half hour build-up of tension between two characters and their respective groups of backers... and then the final showdown happens and it's during a military attack on the city and the military is so utterly overwhelmingly huge and powerful that both gangs round out to zero in the big picture, and that has always stuck with me.)

So Odo d'Onocrio is doing everything he can to remain relevant, but his merchandise is second rate and at this point the art his workshops produce is second rate. Turin, to his shame, is starting to become known as the place for Flower Arranging - and his name isn't attached.

This is the part in the story where we can speculate as to Odo's real motivations, because I've never been fully satisfied with "He just wanted to be the only person selling flowers" - it doesn't make sense, and it's not like there's not room for two flower shops, right?

Anyone else at this point would have just taken the L, if that's what you can even call it, and been happy as the second-rate flower shop in a town known for their flowers.

And for a time it looked like that's what Odo was going to do.

There were a number of events over the coming years - a mysterious fire was started in the monastery's apiary, a fungus tore through the local wildflower population, various things were blamed on Odo without evidence.

What we do know is that in 1452, shortly before the French sacked the city, Odo d'Onocrio vanished for a few years - and then came back to town as a representative of the French government. For a time it looks like he put aside his grudge as he worked to develop the city.

We know from the record of his correspondence that he worked to maintain a close relationship with the pope, and he did eventually rise up within his family. He never became patriarch, but he diversified his investments and became quite powerful throughout Italy.

What nobody realized is that this power was driven by underground connections that he'd made while abroad. A competent local administrator by day, Odo d'Onocrio was involved in everything from smuggling to counterfeiting by night.

And hilariously, he never forgot the monks.

There's nothing in the record to back this, but I am picking up hints of Alcibides in this guy who ran and joined the French shortly before they sacked the town he resented over *flower arrangements*.

Because the monastery of St. Michele was not spared in the sacking.

But if Odo thought that would stop the competition he was dead wrong - everyone simply rebuilt and carried on as before.

(How many times have we met this guy? How many times have we, any of us, BEEN this guy? I wish I could give old Odo a huge and tell him it's okay, that he has value and his life has meaning whether he's the number one flower arranger hirer in italy or not, you know?)

So anyway, at this point Odo is not the young man he used to be and the old Abbot is long since dead and the bootleg mead in the abbey's basement is running low and there's a new pope and and and and Odo gets to thinking "Huh, maybe things have changed."

So he writes a letter to the new pope, not yet a close friend but Odo is at this point powerful enough that he knows the Pope will take his letter. And he asks for permission to sell mead the old-fashioned way, to undo this purity decree from a few decades before.

And the pope says "Oh, is that all? Sure! No problem! Why on earth was that even on the books? Make all the mead you want, monks!"

Odo is overjoyed, and he takes this letter to the monastery to meet with the new abbot.

The new abbot, though, is a bit confused by this excited old businessman barging in yammering about mead. Sure, the monastery used to produce mead, but that was years ago and few monks remain from that time. They can't just *pivot*, you know?

Odo says "No don't worry, I can help you cover the costs and we'll get some mead makers in here to teach you how to do it, don't sweat it!" and there you have it, done deal, right?

The monks go back to making mead -- AND selling honey, and flowers.

See, the best flower arrangers in Italy have now been coming to the abbey for years to study under, well, the best flower arrangers in Italy. There's a whole economy for it, but more importantly there's a culture behind it. This workshop is unwilling to close, period.

Now Odo is livid, because he'd invested in the abbey's meadery *as a charitable donation to god*, not as a business investment, so he's out that money; and it didn't have the desired effect, so his precious floral workshops are still second rate. Oh no, Odo!

You've got to picture this guy, fuckin' Palpatine of petunias, scheming to shut down these monks who just want to glorify god with their craft. It's like a comic book villain, if you squint, but this guy really just wants to be taken seriously as a patron of flower arranging.

Imagine the life he's lived, the things he's seen. He was born to wealth and power, got the best education available, recognized a booming new art form and did his best to elevate it -- but he never quite got his ego out of control, and it undid all of his great work.

So after spending decades exhausting every legal, commercial and ethical option he finally decides to call in some of his black market colleagues and ask for help.

First, he tries to put economic pressure on the monastery by flooding the market with flowers. He stops caring about quality and simply imports as many flowers as he can, which has the hilarious effect of making the monastery's flowers stand out even more for their quality.

Second, he offers the Pope a generous donation and requests that the pope shut down the offending floral operation. The pope gratefully accepts the donation and replies that he'll think about it. He never gets around to it.

Finally, Odo turns to his trusted lieutenant Hugh Boddick, a broke English nobleman who runs the smuggling operation, and he asks Hugh to take care of it. Hugh brings some goons with him, ambushes the abbot in the middle of the night, and beats the shit out of him.

This is a drastic move, all the moreso because when Odo visits the abbey the next day he has to make clear that he was responsible for the beating and that next time will be worse. The abbey MUST stop selling flowers, MUST close the workshop.

So, what happens?

Well, the abbot agrees, obviously. He says he's going to need some time to make the adjustments, and to find a new workshop for his artisans. Odo offers to take them off his hands and put them to work under his own patronage. The abbot has lost, and he knows it.

The moral of this story, of course, is that Only Hugh Can Prevent Florist Friars.