You might think that the only sensible countermeasure against drowning would be to teach people how to swim. But in the 1530s, German schools and universities decided that the best remedy would be a total ban on swimming, which, in the university town of Ingolstadt on the Danube, was punishable by the whipping of the drowned offender before burial. A similar ban on swimming in the Cam came into force in Cambridge in 1571, with severe punishments for infringements: two public whippings, a fine of ten shillings and a day in the stocks for a first offence and expulsion for the second.
WE USED TO WHIP THE SHIT OUT OF SWIMMERS