When I hear and read about people during this era, it is said that they smelled really bad, and rarely took a bath. Is this really documented and true, and is there any documentation from the time where someone actually complains about another persons odor? And if so - if people were aware of the bad smell - why didn't they just wash themselves? There must have been lakes and rivers close to towns, weren't there?
I'm not able to give a full response at the moment, leaving this here to remind me. Very quickly, this is a popular myth started by the fact that people did not "bathe" before running water made the process easy to fill a large tub with warm/hot water. However, this does not mean, as you mentioned, that the did not wash themselves. They did every day, as well as change out their underclothing at least once a day (it covered most of the area between skin and clothing). Cleanliness has been understood as healthful for a very long time.