In today’s life, the toilet can be said to be an indispensable sanitary facility. It is comfortable and convenient, and there are also smart toilets that can be electrically flushed and dried. So how did the ancients use the toilet?
If you have experience in rural life, then this problem is very simple, it’s a dry toilet. It is difficult to examine the shape of toilets in ancient times. If we speculate based on existing documents, it is likely that there was no separate toilet in their living area. When you need convenience, just find an open space or dig a hole. Therefore, the most traditional and common toilet is a pit with a cover with a rectangular hole on it for people to squat on. This form has been preserved from ancient times to the present.
At the end of the Warring States Period, people discovered that pig manure and human feces could be mixed and fermented in pig pens to form very effective farmyard manure. Therefore, in order to facilitate cleaning and fertilization, people would put toilets and Pig pens put together are called "溷". In the pre-Qin era, the word "溷" generally referred to the pig pen, but later it began to refer to both the pig pen and the toilet. In the Han Dynasty, it was important to treat people as they lived, and people who died should be treated as living people. Therefore, many things related to life would be buried in their tombs. Among them, there is a model of a toilet.
This kind of toilet is built next to the pig pen. During the construction, the toilet is elevated and has a ladder ramp for people to go up and down, so that the feces can fall into the pig pen below for the pigs to eat. In this way, the source of pollution can be reduced, cleaning is easier, and it helps to reuse resources. In addition, there were separate toilets for men and women.
However, people at that time "squatted in pits", and this squatting method was not the same as it is now. There is a "green glazed pottery pigsty" in Xi'an Museum. If you look closely, you will find that there are two thin grooves under the window, which are parallel to the window. In other words, people squatting in pits today straddle both sides of the pit; while people squatting in pits at that time squatted on the front side of the trough, and could also hold on to the window to stabilize their center of gravity and exert force. Some people think that this habit may be related to the clothing of people at that time. The wide robes and long sleeves may not be suitable for squatting?
By the way, talking about this kind of toilet with a pit, we must mention it The most undignified monarch in Chinese history——Jinggong of Jin. He was the 26th generation king of the Jin Kingdom during the Spring and Autumn Period, 2,600 years ago. In his later years, Duke Jinggong of Jin fell seriously ill and had nightmares, so he asked a wizard to interpret his dreams. The wizard was very honest and said: "Your Majesty, you can't eat the newly-launched wheat."
The meaning of these words is to make it clear that Jin Jinggong will not live until the wheat harvest. In a blink of an eye, it was harvest time, and the servants presented meals made from new wheat. Jin Jinggong ordered the wizard to be captured, intending to let him watch him eat new wheat with his own eyes, and then kill him to relieve his resentment.
However, just when Jin Jinggong was about to eat, he suddenly felt his stomach was a little bloated, so he decided to go to the toilet first. This is an extraordinary incident. The majestic king of a country actually fell into a manure pit and drowned. It can be called a highlight in the history of toilets in China and the world. In the end, Jin Jinggong still failed to eat the new wheat. The toilet he went to probably had a large hole and a deep pit, which is why this happened.
When did the comfortable and convenient toilet appear in ancient China? In fact, in the late Warring States Period more than 2,000 years ago, a toilet with a shape very similar to the current one already appeared.
In 2006, a very well-preserved lacquer toilet seat was unearthed from a Chu State tomb in Wufu Village, Anji County, Zhejiang Province. It consists of three parts: seat board, foot and foot base. Connect with mortise and tenon. The so-called toilet rack is a rack that can be placed on top of the toilet. Although it does not have as many functions as today's toilets, it can make people more comfortable when going to the toilet without having to squat until their legs are numb. The shape of this toilet seat is narrow in the front and wide in the back, a bit like a horse's hoof. The inside of the seat plate is also specially made with a downward concave arc, which should be very comfortable.
In the Han Dynasty, the earliest flush toilets appeared in the lives of nobles.
In Mangyang Mountain, Shangqiu City, Henan Province, there is the largest stone chamber tomb discovered in China so far. It is the tomb of King Xiao and Queen of Liang.
Who is King Xiao of Liang? His name is Liu Wu. He is the second son of Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty and the half-brother of Emperor Jing of the Han Dynasty. In the tomb of his wife Li, there are living rooms, bedrooms, ice cellars, stables, granaries, toilets, etc., the most commendable of which is a complete set of stone toilets.
Under this stone toilet, a stone pit was cut out as a cesspit, and a flushing pipe was cut out on the wall behind it. The seat cushion of the toilet is two stone slabs placed vertically. The top of the stone slab is curved. There is also a stone slab behind the seat cushion that you can lean on. There are footrests in the front that are low in the front and high in the back. When people sit down, they can lean on the backrest and let their feet hang naturally on the footrest. The toes are low and the heels are high. It is very user-friendly. It is also engraved with exquisite patterns, which is beautiful and non-slip. In addition, there are wide armrests on one side of the toilet to prevent falling when getting up, which is very thoughtful and considerate.
So, ancient Chinese people more than 2,000 years ago began to use more comfortable toilets. Of course, these are all used by nobles. Well, what did the ancients use to wipe themselves after going to the toilet?
Today, there are toilet paper and wet toilet paper. In the early Western Han Dynasty, paper also appeared in our country. However, the efficiency of the papermaking method at this time was very low. Fine-textured paper was scarce and expensive, making it unworthy of being used as toilet paper. However, cheap paper was rough in texture and loose in structure, making it a poor experience to use. So what did the ancients use? We speculate that for the people at the bottom, the most basic aspects of life may not have changed much over the generations. Therefore, the poor people may also use things like leaves and soil lumps. Do people with slightly better conditions have special toilet paper?
In 1979, some wooden slips from the Western Han Dynasty were unearthed at the Maquanwan site in Dunhuang, Gansu Province, and they turned out to be like feces*** It seems that the scraps are used as toilet paper - perhaps it is more appropriate to call them toilet paper. This is the ancient toilet paper. Li Yu, the empress of the Southern Tang Dynasty, once cut toilet chips for the monks with his own hands in order to show his piety, and even used his own face to test the smoothness. It can be said that he worked very hard. A large number of Han bamboo slips unearthed at Maquanwan, Xuanquan and Hanju Yanjiaqu Houguan Site in Dunhuang contain a lot of valuable and precious information, but most of them were taken out of the pits. Think about the smell...archaeologists have it really hard. Perhaps people at that time also had the idea of ??using waste?
When did the ancients start using paper? At present, it is probably in the Tang Dynasty. It is recorded in the "Records of China and India" written by Arabs that "the Chinese (Tang people) do not pay attention to hygiene. They do not wash with water after defecation, but use Chinese-made paper to wipe." However, despite this situation, the use of paper It was not popular at the time, and it took a long time for paper to completely replace toilet chips, probably after the Yuan and Ming Dynasties. This may be related to two reasons. Firstly, the ancients had the custom of "respecting writing paper", and secondly, the price of paper at that time was still relatively expensive.
Of course, all the above situations are exceptions for the royal family. They are very particular about everything, and toilet paper can also be made of silk. There are documented records that during the reign of Emperor Xiaozong of the Ming Dynasty, the emperor used silk and threw it away after use. A palace eunuch collected them, washed them, and sewed them together into something like a curtain. When Emperor Xiaozong of the Ming Dynasty saw it, he didn't know what it was. When he was told that it was used silk, he thought it was too wasteful and ordered that it be forbidden to use silk instead of papyrus in the future.
"Palace Records" also mentioned that the papyrus used by the Empress Dowager Cixi had to undergo various processing. First of all, the palace maid needs to cut a large piece of white cotton paper. Considering that the paper without hair is too slippery and the paper with hair is too astringent, she needs to spray water on the paper until it becomes damp and wilted, then put it on a damp cloth and use it. Iron it twice with a hot iron before it's complete, fold it up and set aside.
After solving the above problems, there is still another trouble when going to the toilet, which is the bad smell. How did the ancients remove the smell?
The first method is to start with yourself and block your nose with something like dried dates so that you can’t smell it. There is a famous allusion in history about this. During the Western Jin Dynasty, an important figure in the Langya Wang family was named Wang Dun, who married the daughter of Sima Yan, Emperor Wu of Jin Dynasty.
"Shishuoxinyu" records that when Wang Dun first married a princess, he once went to the toilet and saw some dried dates in the lacquer box in the toilet, which were used to plug his nostrils. But Wang Dun was a rough man. He thought he could still eat fruits in the toilet, so he ate all the dried dates in one go, causing quite a joke.
The second method is to start from the outside and find ways to eliminate the odor. The simplest thing is to ventilate and add spices. In addition, there is another method, which is to put something in the toilet, such as incense ash. Friends who raise cats this way should be very happy, because it has the same effect as the cat litter in the cat litter box. For those with mysophobia, they may need to be more particular, such as Ni Zan, one of the "Four Yuan Painters". In his toilet, the floor was not incense ash, but pure white goose feathers. "Whenever you defecate, the goose feathers will rise up and you won't smell any foul smell."
Ni Zan of the Yuan Dynasty (1301-1374) )
After learning about all aspects of ancient people going to the toilet, I can’t help but sigh, modern life is so convenient. Assuming that one day "time travel" can come true, going to the toilet will probably be a headache.