Sponge On A Stick Roman Toilet

Roman public toilets consisted of a long marble bench with holes at the top to sit on and holes at the front for the sponge sticks.

Sponge on a stick roman toilet.

In absence of toilette paper the butts cleaning device was a wooden stick with a sponge attached at one of the ends often literally a sea sponge or some type of cloth or animal wool. In ancient rome these were used to wipe yourself after going to the toilet. Toilet paper did not exist in roman times so the romans used a spongia instead. After the collapse of the roman empire toilet technology came to a bit of a standstill the book reads.

When you finished doing your business you took the sponge on a stick wet it in the fresh water that flowed in that channel we spoke of on the floor. The stick has a loop of leather at one end. Here is a picture of an ancient roman restroom to help with the imagination and here is a 2 minute smithsonian video with some riveting information and visuals you will notice that the roman toilet opening extended downward in a keyhole shape which allowed for insertion of the famed sponge on a stick for wiping. The stick was long because of the design of roman toilets.

Horrible histories if you owners want to removed this video please contact us directly. σπόγγος spongos fixed at one end. One of the things they used to wipe themselves was a sponge on a stick which was. The xylospongium or tersorium also known as sponge on a stick was a hygienic utensil used by ancient romans to wipe their anus after defecating consisting of a wooden stick greek.

But what most romans used was something called a spongia a sea sponge on a long stick. You had a sponge that was on the end of a stick. Sponge on a stick the roman toilet paper. ξύλον xylon with a sea sponge greek.

We will respectfully remove it. The tersorium was shared by people using public latrines. Here s how it worked. But instead of reaching for a roll of toilet paper an ancient roman would often grab a tersorium or in my technical terms a toilet brush for your butt.

To clean the sponge they simply washed it in a bucket with water. The most famous example of ancient toilet paper comes from the roman world. Among tools people used in the past were moss sponge on a stick ceramic pieces and bamboo spatulas. Well you could use a leaf a handful of moss or your left hand.

A tersorium is an ingenious little device made by attaching a natural sponge from the mediterranean sea of course to the end of a stick.