5 ms·

Sincere question: why do we assume people in the past were so filthy? I'm sure there are notable examples of unhygienic cities or buildings (I've read about a

by Osmium 6y ago

Sincere question: why do we assume people in the past were so filthy? I'm sure there are notable examples of unhygienic cities or buildings (I've read about a few) but in general one suspects there may be a tendency to exaggerate the "uncivilized" nature of people from the past. Romans clearly put a lot of values in their baths, for example, which suggests a people who value cleanliness. Uninformed on this, so interested to hear a perspective!

rsynnott 6y ago
It’s often exaggerated (as you say, bathing was popular in the Roman world, and also in the medieval Islamic world and even in many parts of medieval Europe), but ultimately they did not have sanitation (as in sewers, etc) to the same extent we do, and they had beasts of burden. That said, I’m not sure to what extent this applies to Ancient Rome (as in Republic to fall of western empire). They _did_ have sewers, with public toilets attached to them, and they probably didn’t have that many horses wandering the street, as the horse collar hadn’t been invented yet. Ancient Rome presumably wasn’t as bad as a large medieval city (which wouldn’t usually have had proper sewers), and things may even have gotten worse later on, because at a certain point bathing really did become a lot less common in much of Europe (due to weird medical beliefs and religious objection to public bathhouses).
deleted 6y ago
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throwaway2245 6y ago
The great horse manure crisis of 1894 happened (primarily in London) when horse manure was no longer valuable enough to pick up for a profit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_horse_manure_crisis_of_1894 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_horse_manure_crisis_of_1... It seems highly unlikely to me that this would have been a problem in Ancient Rome.
- 5h 6y ago
  That was a hypothetical problem, as per that link
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]

by Osmium 6y ago

rsynnott 6y ago

It’s often exaggerated (as you say, bathing was popular in the Roman world, and also in the medieval Islamic world and even in many parts of medieval Europe), but ultimately they did not have sanitation (as in sewers, etc) to the same extent we do, and they had beasts of burden. That said, I’m not sure to what extent this applies to Ancient Rome (as in Republic to fall of western empire). They _did_ have sewers, with public toilets attached to them, and they probably didn’t have that many horses wandering the street, as the horse collar hadn’t been invented yet. Ancient Rome presumably wasn’t as bad as a large medieval city (which wouldn’t usually have had proper sewers), and things may even have gotten worse later on, because at a certain point bathing really did become a lot less common in much of Europe (due to weird medical beliefs and religious objection to public bathhouses).

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

throwaway2245 6y ago

The great horse manure crisis of 1894 happened (primarily in London) when horse manure was no longer valuable enough to pick up for a profit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_horse_manure_crisis_of_1894 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_horse_manure_crisis_of_1... It seems highly unlikely to me that this would have been a problem in Ancient Rome.

5h 6y ago
That was a hypothetical problem, as per that link
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]