Population History of Britain and Ireland 1500-1750 Book

Loved this book. It was not all that well written but it shed light on a lot of aspects of human civilization.

The disposal of human...let's call them what they are...feces has been a major problem since civilization began. All those ancient cities stank. More soldiers died from disease from lack of sanitation than from fighting with the enemy up until maybe WWII. People, even kings and princes and great ladies, defecated and urinated in the halls and rooms of the great palaces.

The author brought out examples from all ages. How feces clogged the sewers of ancient Rome causing the feces to back up in the streets. Piles of feces often became permanent landmarks. The most common solution was to empty them into rivers. Imagine. And people used those same rivers for drinking and cooking water oftentimes. The English dumped into the Thames so much excrement that in the summer heat many times Parliament was dismissed because people couldn't stand the stench coming from the river.

That was Western civilization. The Chinese took a more practical approach. They not collected feces, but used them for fertilzer. Life still stank, but they didn't have the disposal problem as much.

It makes me look at all those neat, clean medieval fantasy novel and wonder where the you-know-what went.

Around the 1600s they started having these decorated boxes to hide the chamber pots. Did you realize that until Victorian times people didn't consider going to the toilet (which they didn't have) not to be a private matter? People had chamber pots in the dining room and people dining would use them in full sight of everyone!

Toilets are wonderful inventions. I'm so glad I was born after they were invented.

This was an interesting and fun read. I highly recommend it.