Bathing through the ages

Bathrooms have never been more comfortable but it wasn’t so long ago that only the homes of the very wealthy and powerful even had one.
Before the 20th century, bathing and using the lavatory were communal experiences in many parts of the world and running hot water was the stuff of dreams.

 

Evidence of early bathrooms dates back to the third millennium BC. In 2800BC, in the region now called Pakistan, Western-style toilets made
from brick with timber lids were attached to the exterior walls of houses. Evidence of alabaster tubs was found on a Greek island in the Aegean, dating from 1500BC.

During the Roman period, from 753BC to AD540, bathing was as much about socialising and doing business as actually getting clean. Purpose-built bathing houses, often supplied by thermal springs, were popular throughout the empire.

 

In Europe in the Middle Ages bathing went out of fashion. Ironically, cleanliness was considered a health risk at a time when plagues raged.

 

During the Byzantine and then Ottoman empires people bathed and socialised in Turkish baths called hamams, which remain an important part of Turkish culture.

In Scandinavian countries the earliest bathing rituals involved saunas and spas, while in Japan the onsen public baths took advantage of natural hot spring water and became a way to relax.

 

By the early 1500s cleanliness was again in vogue in Europe and the rich began including bathrooms inside, usually as a space with a bath that
was filled with hot water poured over the bather by a servant or two.

As early as 1500BC the Egyptians made soap from animal and vegetable oils combined with alkaline salts.

But historical legend has it that Cleopatra, queen of ancient Egypt, eschewed soap in favour of asses’ milk to cleanse her royal skin.

 

Soap was apparently named after Mount Sapo in ancient Rome, where animals were sacrificed. Rain washed a mixture of melted animal fat and ash into the clay on the banks of the Tiber River and the mixture was found to have a cleansing effect.

Europeans were making soap by the seventh century, mixing vegetable and animal oils with ash and various perfumes.

During the 1800s, when daily bathing came to be regarded as essential to good hygiene, a private room for it became more common.

Showers began to gain favour by the 19th century as advances in plumbing led to the possibility of a reliable supply of running hot water.

The first hot water cylinders were heated directly from kitchen ranges and appeared around 1860. As the industrial revolution created a middle
class, indoor bathrooms were found in more and more ordinary homes.

 

Timber floors made way for decorative tiles and the idea of a bathroom as a space designed for comfort and indulgence took hold.