If I was in 1000 AD, how could I treat an infection with modern knowledge?
I got into a really long conversation with some people about this on Reddit so I figured I'd do a full write up.
There were a lot of suggestions in the thread like honey, garlic, wine, onions and so on but that's using knowledge of the time.
Plus honey was really expensive and a very seasonal item.
You can way more easily turn wood ash into lye/strong base, use that as a bleach to disinfect cloths, make soaps, and clean working surfaces and it'll be way more effective than the poultices and home remedies you're thinking of in your head currently.
The general process would be, burn hardwoods to create ashes, sift the ashes so it's all an even texture, wash the ashes in copious amounts of charcoal filtered, boiled, and settled water (use more water than ashes as to not give yourself lye burns) then filter through a cloth to get the non dissolved particulates out.
You can then boil off the water to get a powder and mix it in measured proportions to get a highly diluted bleach analog and use it in whatever soap making or cleaning processes you want.
Find tree nuts like acorns to press into usable oil, or barter for grain oils and animal fats to make soaps. Buy some vinegar to use as a direct antiseptic (better than nothing), wax to impregnate cloths for water resistant bandages/wound sealant, and some copper plates or pans so that you avoid having your gauzes, packings, and bandages touching dirty porous surfaces and you're practically off to the races.
I can go into more depth about actually how to make the soap, make rudimentary pH testing strips, and all that but this post is already getting long.
If you have some input I'd love to read it!
Reddit thread if anyone wants to read the original discussion: https://www.reddit.com/r/HistoryWhatIf/comments/1kil0hs/if_i_was_in_1000_ad_how_could_i_treat_an/
#alt-history #thought-experiment #alternate-history #what-if
2025 Sep 07 
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