In a similar vein, when Queen Elizabeth II visited Australia many
years ago, she was to meet some Aborigines. They had a socially
acceptable way of having a poop while maintaining conversation with
the group. They were given a "suggestion" that it was not the done
thing when conversing with QEII.
Social customs and the inadvertent crossing of cultures are wonderful
things.
Lyle Browning
On May 17, 2008, at 2:22 AM, Stephan A. Schwartz wrote:
> At Versailles the clothing women wore to social events at the
> palace was so complex that during a ball there were servants with
> chamber pots covered with towels, who would pass through the
> ballroom, catch a signal from a lady, and thrust the chamber pot up
> under their gown so they could urinate. There are accounts of this
> happening while the lady in question continued to participate in an
> ongoing conversation.
>
> -- Stephan
>
>
> On 16 May 2008, at 23:44, Lyle E. Browning wrote:
>
>> On May 16, 2008, at 10:44 PM, Elizabeth Whitaker wrote:
>>
>>> Even at the highest ranks of European society, personal
>>> cleanliness as we define it was somewhat lacking. For instance,
>>> the royal palace at Versailles had no ...ah... restrooms as such.
>>> There must have been chamberpots in the bedrooms, but the hordes
>>> of nobles, servants, etc. at the palace couldn't and didn't spend
>>> all their time in and near their sleeping places.
>> Queen Elizabeth I was reckoned in her time a clean freak because
>> she bathed 2x/year.
>>
>> Versailles has, from the tour I had and from other folks who had
>> the tour in different years, a remarkable oral history to be
>> related. There were no restrooms as that concept was a couple of
>> hundred years in the future. What they did have was chamberpots,
>> which were placed behind doors that were open, creating a small
>> triangular space. That was where all did their business and it was
>> judged quite normal. So, apparently there was a protocol for
>> determining if the space was occupied or not. Probably not on the
>> order of "Yo, Louis, you back there" but something a bit more
>> refined. A chamber pot with the lid on is not exactly an airtight
>> container so the combined pong at the end of the day must have been
>> amazing. No wonder perfume was invented by those worthies. And no
>> wonder the handkerchief was the first gas mask, doused in perfume
>> and held close to mask said pong.
>>
>> As an oral history, this one would at least be verifiable. If the
>> original floorboards, skirting boards, or frames are still in
>> place, then testing for uric acid would find spatter patterns
>> merging into one pungent disk of material.
>>
>> That was done on soil samples for a tavern for which, if memory
>> serves, had been reduced to rubble in a plowed field. Soil tests
>> showed high concentrations of phosphates at the front corners of
>> the buildings, corresponding to recorded practice of gents
>> relieving themselves around the corners on the walls. The modern
>> concept of privacy while performing natural functions is definitely
>> not the historic mode. In the medieval period, it was apparently
>> considered perfectly normal for gents to turn to a wall along a
>> busy street, or at least there are illustrations of the top 2%
>> doing that (of course those folks are aberrations anyway so who
>> knows;)
>>>
>>>
>>> I'm a member of that age cohort who hit the teen years in the
>>> early '70s. I remember how odd our parents thought we were for
>>> washing our hair _every_ day! "Older ladies," for instance,
>>> usually had their hair washed and set once a week at the local
>>> "beauty parlor."
>> I got the same thing in Britain in the 70's because I took a daily
>> bath. The Brits thought that was odd. They also did not wear
>> deodorant, nor did about half the ladies shave their armpits, nor
>> did they shave their legs. Now all that is commonplace (daily
>> baths, deodorants and shaved pits and legs). Most of the time, one
>> simply did not notice anyway as only a few folks were decidedly off
>> in their personal hygiene. We did have kids who'd grown up so poor
>> that they were allowed baths once a fortnight (2 weeks) due to the
>> cost of heating water and who did laundry once a month. Those we
>> set straight as to what was expected, but politely. Personal habits
>> in group dynamics were an interesting conflict to watch and to have
>> to deal with.
>>
>> Lyle Browning, RPA
>>
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Elizabeth Whitaker
>>>
>>> Melinda Skinner wrote:
>>>>> From my readings and research about colonial Virginia and 16th
>>>>> and 17th-century England,
>>>> most people were pretty filthy and smelly. I would think that
>>>> any household slaves/servants
>>>> would be about as clean as their employers/masters.
>>>> --
>>>> Melinda C. P. Skinner
>>>> Richmond, VA
>>>
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