p-hygiene-msg - 6/26/04 Period bathing, hygiene, teeth brushing, menstrual care. NOTE: See also the files: p-dental-care-msg, bathing-msg, p-privies-msg, perfumes-msg, cosmetics-msg, soap-msg, soapmaking-msg, shaving-msg, Roman-hygiene-msg, Mouthwash-art, Handcream-art. ************************************************************************ NOTICE - This file is a collection of various messages having a common theme that I have collected from my reading of the various computer networks. Some messages date back to 1989, some may be as recent as yesterday. This file is part of a collection of files called Stefan's Florilegium. These files are available on the Internet at: http://www.florilegium.org I have done a limited amount of editing. Messages having to do with separate topics were sometimes split into different files and sometimes extraneous information was removed. For instance, the message IDs were removed to save space and remove clutter. The comments made in these messages are not necessarily my viewpoints. I make no claims as to the accuracy of the information given by the individual authors. Please respect the time and efforts of those who have written these messages. The copyright status of these messages is unclear at this time. If information is published from these messages, please give credit to the originator(s). Thank you, Mark S. Harris AKA: THLord Stefan li Rous Stefan at florilegium.org ************************************************************************ From: jliedl at nickel.laurentian.ca Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: The old bathing saw... Date: 7 Oct 93 14:51:51 -0500 Organization: Laurentian University Greetings from Ancarett Nankivellis! Some recent posts have resurrected that old myth, that people didn't bathe in the Middle Ages. FYI: "Clean, smooth, brilliant skin was the result of repeated baths and much diligent care. . . . By the late Middle Ages monastic moralists had ceased to warn about the dangers of bathing. Bathing and steaming were so widespread at all levels of society that it no longer seemed appropriate to question the practice of washing the body frequently from head to toe. . . . the Dominican Felix Faber enthusiastically approved of bodily cleanliness and stressed the importance of regular changes of body linen. In the minds of many people frequent washing may have assumed the same spiritual value as frequent confession." - - - Georges Duby & Philippe Braunstein, "The Emergence of the Individual" in _A History of Private Life_ Volume II: _Revelations of the Medieval World_ ed. Georges Duby, Cambridge & London: Belknap Press, 1988 ISBN0674399765. While I will concede that washing went out of fashion in the sixteenth century, considered by some fashionables as a medical threat, and was somewhat replaced by perfuming, don't confuse, as many do, the decline of _public_ baths with a decline in _washing_. Many cited passages of medieval moralizing against bathing was aimed at stopping the use of public baths, some of which were mixed-gender affairs, and the social use of the bath. Ancarett Nankivellis Janice Liedl Laurentian University, Canada JLIEDL at NICKEL.LAURENTIAN.CA From: fnklshtn at axp2.acf.nyu.edu Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Thought Experiment Date: 15 Oct 1993 04:09:17 GMT Organization: New York University, NY, NY >Let me say another one: Dysetary (From not washing your hands after visiting >the privy) Handwashing is a modern custom that has a MAJOR impact on the >spread of disease. Lies! Dirty Lies! Read "The Knight of the Cart" by Chretien de Troyes (12th century): Lancelot was welcomed into the house they were getting ready for dinner but, as soon as they *washed their hands* some knight came who wanted to fight with Lancelot... Long fight... Lancelot comes back, they help him out of his armour, everyone *washes their hands* again and they sit to dinner. Peace! Nahum From: jliedl at nickel.laurentian.ca Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: why not bathe? Date: 1 Nov 93 09:54:31 -0500 Organization: Laurentian University Greetings on All Saints' Day from Ancarett Nankivellis! Some recent speculations have been posted on the idea that bathing fell out of favour in late period. Some have argued to the contrary, citing woodcuts of bathers as evidence to the contrary. Well, historians of custom and manner don't contend that nobody bathed in the Renaissance, but that it simply fell out of favour. Medical reasons argued that water was a dangerous agent for immersion--the fear was that its penetrative power would carry disease everywhere. Thus, the fashion arose of personal dry cleaning. Dirt was wiped off and perfumed away, rather than washing. Underwear (body linen) was changed frequently, and anyone who appeared with soiled cuffs and collars was suspect. People still "bathed" but only infrequently (consider Queen Elizabeth I's famous boast on the matter)-- when thoroughly dirty or for leisure and relaxation. Please remember that above comments apply chiefly to the aspiring artisan, merchant and gentle classes who would hear and be interested in "current medical wisdom". I make no claims about bathing practices and beliefs amongst the "great unwashed"! (Tee hee, I couldn't resist the pun!) (Note: many of the bathing woodcuts served the same purpose in period as do our "girlie" magazines today--visual titillation and entertainment. By 1500, public bathing was a byword for immorality.) Bathing did not make a comeback as a regular part of hygiene until about 1740. But people were cautioned to not look at their body while bathing--heaven knows what that might lead to! Ancarett Nankivellis Janice Liedl Laurentian University, Canada JLIEDL at NICKEL.LAURENTIAN.CA Newsgroups: rec.org.sca From: tbarnes at silver.ucs.indiana.edu (thomas wrentmore barnes) Subject: Re: why not bathe? Organization: Indiana University Date: Tue, 2 Nov 1993 16:30:57 GMT mittle at watson.ibm.com (Arval d'Espas Nord) writes: >Does anyone know more precisely when bathing fell out of fashion in western >Europe? As a matter of pure speculation: Did it happen in the wake of the >Black Plague? Greetings from Lothar, As far as I know the Plagues of 1348-52, 1356, etc. didn't have much effect on bathing either way. The physicians of the time were in disagreement about what caused the plague and advocated many remedies. Popular theories were that the disease was spread by the "bad air" of cities, swamps, and moist places, bad water, or divine retribution. Guy de Chuliac and the other Paris physicians promulgated a remedy against the plague that consisted of mostly dietary restrictions, and instructions about how to sleep and excercise. The pope at Avignon spent the plague sitting between 2 fires - presumably to "purify" the "bad humors" in the air. Other people reacted to the plague, by praying, flagellating themselves in penance, or attacking Jews and "outsiders" who were suspected of either starting the disease, or spreading it. People in the 14th c. DID bath. There are illuminations of 14th c. people in bath tubs (usually in connection with an Authurian romance or the story of David and Bathsheba, admittedly, but there are also some contemporary literary references to bathing.) I suspect that, at least for the nobility, in clement weather, that 14th c. people bathed about as often as modern Europeans - e.g. every 2-3 days, or more often if the weather or activity demanded it. I don't have any proof for this though. So, the summary is that I don't think that the plague influenced people's bathing habits one way or another. I have heard that bathing declined for several reasons in the 15th to 18th century: a) increasingly limited fuel for fires due to deforestation. b) effects of the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation. c) custom and fashion. d) changes in medical practice. Lothar \|/ 0 . Newsgroups: rec.org.sca From: dillon at world.std.com (John T Dillon) Subject: Bathing, period sources of documentation Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA Date: Sat, 30 Oct 1993 21:33:31 GMT Contrary to the belief that bathing was not common in the 15th and 16th centuries, I offer up the following woodcuts and paintings as documentation that it did indeed occur. Reference The History of Sex ------------------ Reay Tannahill Steinn and Day p#280 Fifteenth Century bath house, from a French manuscript of Valerius Maxinus. Staedtisches Bibliothek, Leipzig. Multiple two person baths seperated by curtains with a table of food placed in front of each tub. p#281 "The baths at [?] Leuk," by Hans Bock the Elder 1597 Kunstmuseum Basel, Inv.8.7 A large rock sided pool with submerged seats with about 14 people (half men half women) seated or standing in waist deep water. Food is placed on a table in the middle of a pool. Two couples are flirting/fondling while the others are eating, playing musical instruments or reading. Period woodcuts of various armies, Quite often you will see a stream/pond being used for bathing, mixed sexes, especially for Landsknecht armies encampments. There are also a large number of period laws regarding bath houses/brothels. If the activity was not going on, why put a law into affect concerning it. I know I have more woodcuts in my reference collection, I will post them as I find them. John McGuire From: shick at europa.eng.gtefsd.com (Steve Hick) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Bathing, period sources of documentation Date: 31 Oct 1993 13:30:56 GMT Organization: GTE GSC FSD dillon at world.std.com (John T Dillon) wrote: > Contrary to the belief that bathing was not common in the 15th and 16th > centuries, I offer up the following woodcuts and paintings as documentation > that it did indeed occur. There is a complete section of 'swimming' as well as other sports (fencing, wrestling, flag twirling, vaulting,horsemanship, etc..) from the 15th c to the 18th c in Bascetta's Sport e giuochi Bascetta, Carlo ; Sport e giuochi : trattati e scritti dal XV al XVIII secolo a cura di Carlo Bascetta; Milano : Il Polifilo, 1978 Among the treasures in these books is part of Vadi's ca 1492 fencing manual (MS) which is comparable to Flos Duellatorum, all of a MS version of Pietro Monte's La Lotta from De dignoscendis hominibus (published 1492) and portions of the flag waving of Alfieri from his La picca e la bandiera ( 1641). I didn't record the info on the swimming or vaulting (or other stuff) 'cause that's outside my primary area of research. ST From: djheydt at uclink.berkeley.edu (Dorothy J Heydt) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Rags Date: 17 Nov 1993 22:46:59 GMT Organization: University of California, Berkeley Chandra L. Morgan-Henley wrote: >Would fabric scraps have been used in period for "feminine >hygiene"? Not only in period, but up into the beginning of this century. There's a passage in (I think) Simone de Beauvoir about a young woman washing out her menstrual rags and hanging them up (in the bathroom? someplace) to dry, and her father coming in and raising hell because the sight of them offended his sensibilities. There *are* things to be said for modern times, when such matters can be discussed on the Internet and there's at least a good chance that its male readers will say "Gee, I didn't know that" rather than "yuck". I would use only linen and ... waitaminnit, let me make it clear. If I were still of reproductive age and still living in the late twentieth century, I would use the materials that come from the drugstore. Like Petrog, I believe in authenticity up to the point beyond which lie public health problems. But if I _had_ to use rags for such a purpose, I'd pick out the linen and cotton ones, which are absorbent, rather than the synthetic ones, which are less so. Dorothea of Caer-Myrddin Dorothy J. Heydt Mists/Mists/West UC Berkeley Argent, a cross forme'e sable djheydt at uclink.berkeley.edu From: djheydt at uclink.berkeley.edu (Dorothy J Heydt) To: Mark S. Harris Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Rags Date: 3 Dec 1993 Organization: University of California, Berkeley Yes, linen is the most absorbent, with cotton running a close second; other vegetable fibers trailing; I'm not sure how absorbent animal fibers like silk or wool would be. Yes, silk would be more expensive, but you understand we're talking about _rags_. Even so, I don't think I would want woollen pads in that part of my anatomy. dcm From: dnb105 at psu.edu (Ferret) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: The Top 10 Anti-Vampire Plans for Pennsic (was Re: Vampires) Date: Tue, 29 Mar 1994 08:46:17 GMT Organization: Penn State University Dottie writes: >Ok, ya'll are picking on the vampires but really >how do you feel about ELF EARS!??? THEY drive me CRAZY at Pennsic! >Lets get rid of the elf ears too! >*I can handle anything (well almost) execpet Elf ears* What bugs me is people who wear clothes in the water. In Rubens' (1577- 1640) "The Bathers" the aquarian participants are nude. Any further documentaion on this subject? -Frettchen von Rheinpfalz- From: gfrose at cotton (Terry Nutter) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Questions about Medival Underclothes Date: 16 Jul 1996 13:34:26 GMT Greetings, all, from Katerine Rountre. : This is totally un-documented but I have heard or was under the : assumption (don't really know which) that when a lady was experiencing : "THE CURSE" she isolated herself in her chambers or confined herself : within her domicile until said curse had been lifted. Were this true, there would be a huge record of it. As one single example, the rules of all the cloistered orders of women would need allowance for every woman to be so isolated a full quarter of the time, arrangements for getting food to her since she would not be siting at board, arrangements for others to carry on her work (especially in the cases of, for instance, the abbess, the cellaress, and so on); and on and on. Does anyone really believe that Elizabeth the First vanished for one week out of four, and nobodya mentioned it? Look at a modern sanitary pad. Make it one of (say) four layers of linen with the center padded with lint, so that it is both absorbent and washable (and reusable). Make it a little longer, and a little wider at the ends. Add strings to the four quarters. Put it between your legs, and tie the strings around your hips. This solution took me a minute flat to come up with. Do people honestly believe that what I can think of in a minute flat, medieval women couldn't come up with in _literally_ a thousand years? Does anyone _really_ believe that a modern sanitary napkin is so very different from a historic bandage that it provides the unthinkable key to this construction? Does anyone out there still believe that menstruation was a problem that medieval women could not overcome without drastically altering either their normal clothing or their normal lifestyle? Geesh. -- Katerine/Terry From: Lissa & Eric McCollum Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Questions about Medival Underclothes Date: Tue, 16 Jul 1996 17:20:08 -0400 Organization: Alliance Network, Inc. (GRR MI) (616-774-3010) Gary J. Wolverton wrote: > This is totally un-documented but I have heard or was under the > assumption (don't really know which) that when a lady was experiencing > "THE CURSE" she isolated herself in her chambers or confined herself > within her domicile until said curse had been lifted. I don't know one way or another, but that doesn't really make sense. I mean, that is a great way to get a week off every month, but what if that wasn't possible? Field workers, women on pilgrimage and the like. I can't imagine that every woman in our time frame spent a week each month lying on absorbant sheets somewhere. They had too much to do. > As far as underwear -per-se- (this tidbit is semi-documented, I just > don't remember which book of mine it's in) some gentlefolk, both men > and women, wore a loincloth of sorts that I am assuming was of the > wrap and tuck variety. Unless of course you happened to be higher up > in the food chain and had available a pin or brooch of sorts. I'll try > and find the documentation and post it if this thread is still around > when I find it. I was leafing through the book "A History of Private Life", and came across a wood cut from 1574. (p. 586) It shows the 'master of the baths', dressed in what looks suspiciously like bikini bottoms, tied on the side. (I know they're not speedos, but still...) I can't tell for sure, but I think the woman seated behind him is wearing something similar. Now, this is a bathing situation, and not specifically underwear, but I would guess that something like this could have been used. Gwendolen Wold From: sclark at chass.utoronto.ca (Susan Carroll-Clark) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Questions about Medival Underclothes Date: 18 Jul 1996 17:31:02 -0400 Organization: University of Toronto -- EPAS Greetings! > Has anyone else found references to anything remotely like this? I've looked at bishops' visitation records to monasteries and nunneries, as well as confessors' handbooks and basic theology manuals, and it's never come up. The two references to menstruating women in the text I'm editing involve whether they can take the Eucharist (yes, but if they wish to abstain, this is regarded as good) and whether it's OK to seek the "marital debt" when one's wife is menstruating (no). I'll check my sources for more detail. Cheers! Nicolaa de Bracton sclark at chass.utoronto.ca From: moondrgn at bga.com (Chris and Elisabeth Zakes) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Questions about Medival Underclothes Date: Thu, 18 Jul 1996 04:47:52 GMT Organization: Real/Time Communications Internet customer posting Kim Pollard wrote: >On 16 Jul 1996, Terry Nutter wrote: >> Greetings, all, from Katerine Rountre. >> >> Someone whose name I have lost writes: >> >> : This is totally un-documented but I have heard or was under the >> : assumption (don't really know which) that when a lady was experiencing >> : "THE CURSE" she isolated herself in her chambers or confined herself >> : within her domicile until said curse had been lifted. (massive snippage) >I would think evidence of this should be located in church documents. The >church, after all, set the rules for so much of the peasant class's >conduct that something as common as "the curse" <- also possibly a church >term?) would surely be mentioned in at least one text involving the >conduct of women. Does anyone out there know where one might find church >documents that could be researched (in the US)? Has anyone else found >references to anything remotely like this? Philip Stubbes writes in "The Anatomy of Abuses" in 1583: "King Pirrus sent rich attire to the matrons of Rome, who abhorred them as menstruous clouts." "Clout" is a variation on "cloth", as in "breechclout" or "dishclout". Therefore, presumably such things were being used, at least in England, by 1583. -Tivar Moondragon C and E Zakes Tivar Moondragon (Patience and Persistence) and Aethelyan of Moondragon (Decadence is its own reward) moondrgn at bga.com Date: Fri, 23 May 1997 14:18:55 -0400 (EDT) From: Rooscc at aol.com To: sca-arts at raven.cc.ukans.edu Subject: underthings thread Don't forget that cloth can be used in ways that don't count as *clothing*--i.e., constructed garments. A menstrual clout would be one example, but it may well be that women bound their breasts for certain activities or to accommodate certain fashions. References to the monthly use of rags--which were washed and reused--appear in modern literature up until very recently, but I have not found a medieval reference per se. I have found curious mention of the use of herbs as a "bed" for women--this is in Albert for example--in a context that makes me suspect that the Latin term should not be taken literally (that is, not the "bed" a person sleeps on). The herbs in question would not be absorbent but may indicate a deodorant or hygiene consideration. [My Latin just isn't strong enough to figure some of this out.] I also wonder if references to the "weakness" of women refers to menstrual cycles specifically. I read a polemic about women as university teachers which rested solely on this weakness, while admitting full competency in the subject matter to a particular woman scholar. A good bet for finding more on this would be rules for convents, but I don't know of any right off. Alysoun Middle Date: Wed, 28 May 1997 10:44:47 -0400 (EDT) From: Rooscc at aol.com To: sca-arts at raven.cc.ukans.edu Subject: re: woman's wear Gerard in the late sixteenth discusses the use of herbs as vaginal suppositories and in describing how to make the thing makes statements like "as every woman knows." This implies the use of tampons, probably for menstrual flow, but possibly as a form of douche or birth control. Alysoun Middle Date: Wed, 28 May 1997 18:39:11 -0400 (EDT) From: Rooscc at aol.com To: sca-arts at raven.cc.ukans.edu Subject: Re: woman's wear & Gerard I didn't mean to imply that the herbs *were* the tampon, but that the reference seemed to imply than tampons were known. On my 34th try (how many plants are in that book?), I found an example under Willow herb: "The same taken in a mother suppository of wooll or cotton, bound up with threads (as the manner thereof is well known to women) stayeth the inordinate flux or overmuch flowing of women's terms." Gerard is giving a medical use, but doesn't the parenthetical clause sound like he is referring to a common practice? Alysoun Middle Date: Fri, 30 May 1997 13:34:35 GMT From: "Kirsten Garner at Archaeology" To: sca-arts at raven.cc.ukans.edu Subject: Re: Period underthings... Seems like this is my source day! I've come across a book and I was wondering if anyone knew anything about it. Rowland, B, 1981. Medieval Woman's Guide to Health. (MS Sloane 2463) Croom Helm, London. Has anyone heard anything about this book? I thought it sounded possibly relevant to the discussion about "women's problems" and suchlike. I've not been able to get a copy directly from the library here and was just wondering if it would be worth ordering on ILL. Thanks...Julian Date: Wed, 28 May 1997 22:38:51 -0400 (EDT) From: Rooscc at aol.com To: sca-arts at raven.cc.ukans.edu Subject: more woman's wear & Gerard Lady Carllein wrote: >>Am wondering if what they are describing is a tampon as we understand it, or something more like our sanitary pads<< Could be, but he calls it a suppository. Under Gumm Succory he gives another description for a definitely inserted item, but doesn't make the same sort of reference to common practice: "and put into a linnen cloath and a pessarie made thereof like a finger and put up, bringeth down the terms in young Wenches and such like." The index has nearly 150 references to herbs used to provoke or stay menses (called women's flowers or terms) and I don't have the time just now to check them all. One reason there are so many is that herbs which affect fluids were assumed to also affect menses, that includes expectorants, diuretics, etc. Sorting out specifics is a little more medical than I usually work. I have been curious about the number of food plants included for provoking terms--I don't know if this was just the fluid association or whether there was a real phenomenon at work. Menses would halt in cases of malnutrition--a tonic that upped the nutritional intake would restore the cycle. Many of Gerard's prescriptions are inherited--not a contemporary concern. (For example all the cures for scorpion bites: how many 16th century Englishmen suffered that?) Could this concern with restoring menses be an indication that medieval women were more in danger of malnutrition than men? Early skeletal remains have indicated a significiant size difference in the genders. Another possibility is that it is related to abortion, and some of the plants are noted for uterine reactions, but not mustard greens, radishes, etc. I haven't explored this area--sometimes ignorance is bliss. Alysoun Middle From: Glenda Robinson Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: shaving Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 15:38:29 +1000 Organization: Flamberge Computer Services Mark Cote wrote: > When did it become "the right thing to do", > culturally, for European women to start shaving? Althoughs shaving is relatively new, depilating is rather older. The Romans depilated regularly. I'm not sure if they just used the plucking method or a wax or similar as well. The hairless bodies helped the oil-and-strigil cleaning method used. Imagine trying to scrape the oil off the hairy parts of the body with a strigil. Ouch. Glenda. Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: shaving From: jongleur at netcon.net.au (Martin Hungerford) Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 07:58:54 +1000 Ghazallah wrote: > I have heard that shaving was a way for ...err... women of purchasable > virtues... to keep lice-free and to prove it to customers. I was told this > started in the 1800s in the french island-colonies, along with those > horrible wide leather belt things which are so prevalent (and so wrong) in > our Society. > Ghazallah al-Badriyyah um... there is a reference to shaving the genital region of men and women from the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. The source is the memoirs of Usamah (sp?) I found it in Gabrielli's "Arab Chroniclers of the Crusades". Martin o' Lyos From: paximus at aol.com (PAXIMUS) Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: shaving Date: 20 Aug 1997 00:35:43 GMT Deloris Booker wrote: >But I remember reading somewhere that Turkish women shaved all their pubic hair off, and then dyed the area with henna to amuse their husbands.<< I don't know about the Henna part but the shaving is very true for Turkish women of the Harems. There is a fantastic book called "Harems" (cant remember the author right now) that gives recipes for the process of removing the hair. In the book the main reason given is cleanliness and that having an unshaven body is just dirty and socially unacceptable. By the way the author of whose name I will find, also wrote a book called" Taking the waters" about the history of Bathing also a great book. Don Giulio d'Medici G.M. Cavalieri Dell"Ordine de Santo Stefano Date: Tue, 24 Oct 2000 19:14:15 -0700 (PDT) From: Karen Subject: SC - Clean Vikings -- OT Good Gentles, Previously on Cooks list . . . (was it only yesterday? I've gotten 4 digests since then!!) I commented to someone that the "dirty viking" image was not specifically correct because of their love of steam baths and washing. His Grace gently asked why I believed such a notion, as he knew of no mention of "steam lodges" in the sagas, and I found myself in a quandry (as I often do when making idle comments in his presence). After spending several hours on the internet looking at web pages and sources, I did what any frustrated Dane would do, I sent a frantic e-mail to the Viking Answer Lady, Mistress Gunnora, from here in Ansteorra. For those slightly interested, I have included her reply as : >>>>>>>> Start with my article on Viking Grooming (http://www.realtime.net/~gunnora/hairstyl.htm) There are certainly terms for bath-house and steam-bathing in Old Norse. The usual term is "baking" in the bath-house, which strongly implies sauna-like conditions. Iceland has bath-houses using volcanic hot springs that have been in continuous use since the Settlement. Now where is this documented? *sigh* Take a look at the article I referenced above and let me know if this gives you the proper ammo. I recall that I had a tough time finding specific references to the bath-house when I wrote it to start with... ::GUNNORA:: <<<<<<<< And from the article found at the URL listed above: >>>>>>>> Although the popular image of the people of the Viking Age is one of wild-haired, dirty savages, this is a false perception. In reality, the Vikings took care with their personal grooming, bathing, and hairstyling. Perhaps the most telling comment comes from the pen of English cleric John of Wallingford, prior of St. Fridswides, who complained bitterly that the Viking Age men of the Danelaw combed their hair, took a bath on Saturday, and changed their woolen garments frequently, and that they performed these un-Christian and heathen acts in an attempt to seduce high-born English women (1): It is reported in the chronicle attributed to John of Wallingford that the Danes, thanks to their habit of combing their hair every day, of bathing every Saturday and regularly changing their clothes, were able to undermine the virtue of married women and even seduce the daughters of nobles to be their mistresses (2). (1)Gwyn Jones. A History of the Vikings. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 1968. p. 177. (2) Ian Riddler. Two Late Saxon Combs from the Longmarket Excavations . Canterbury's Archaeology 1989/1990, The 14th Annual Report of Canterbury Archaeological Trust Ltd. Accessed 5/15/99. And since I have no other salient obligatory food comment, other than the fact that at a Viking Feast, one would certainly be assured of hand-washing on the part of the kitchen staff, as would a feast from the Noble Arabs. Steamily, Tyrca ===== Lady Tyrca Ivarsdottir AoA, OPN, ASTA, oleander Canton of Lindenwood (all sorts of places in and around Ft. Worth & Dallas, TX) Kingdom of Ansteorra Date: Wed, 25 Oct 2000 04:24:09 -0000 From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Nanna_R=F6gnvaldard=F3ttir?=" Subject: Re: SC - Clean Vikings -- OT >Iceland has bath-houses >using volcanic hot springs that have been in continuous use >since the Settlement. Now where is this documented? *sigh* Huh? Is the lady saying that we have bath-houses that have been in continuous use since the Settlement? If so, I'd dearly love directions to find one of them. If she means that the hot springs have been used for bathing since the Settlement, well, some of them were used then, and are used now, but I'm not too sure about the continuous use. For washing and sometimes cooking, yes. For bathing - well ... She also says, in the article referred to: >In Iceland where natural hot springs are common, the naturally heated >water was incorporated into the bath-house. This could easily be understood as if most farms had a bath-house heated with water from hot springs. I'm not saying there weren't any but offhand, I can't recall any such bath-house mentioned in the Sagas. Sure, a house was probably built around Snorralaug in Reykholt and a few other hot springs but that was not the norm. There was a bath-house (or bathroom, probably a sauna of sorts) at most farms but it was usually heated by firewood. Later, when wood became scarce, the bathroom was the only heated room in the farmhouse and people began sleeping there. Later still, almost all fuel (mostly peat and dung, at that point) had to be used for cooking and people stopped bathing, more or less - but the "bathroom" kept its name (bastofa). For centuries, the main sleeping/living/dining/working room of the Icelandic farm went by the name of bathroom. My mother was born in a "bastofa" in 1928. Yes, the old Icelanders probably bathed a lot, as did the Vikings (saturday is still called "laugardagur" (bath day) in Icelandic). And they probably used natural hot springs when available. But relatively few Icelandic farms have a hot spring of suitable temperature close by the farmhouse, so these naturally heated bath-houses couldn't have been that common, really. Nanna Date: Thu, 11 Sep 2003 07:29:24 +0200 From: UlfR Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Questions about cleanliness and food safety at Viking Era event To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org Sharon Gordon wrote 2003.09.11: > The question has arisen, for Real Viking I and other events where we > wish to be highly authentic, what steps can one take to assure proper > hygiene (especially in the kitchen) with period materials and > techniques? Quote a bit. * I assume you have ample access to basins (e.g. cut up barrels or purpose made equivalents work fine). * The key is warm/hot water and soap, and some sort of scrubbing tool for things that need them, none of which is beyond viking age technology (I *think* soap was available, but don't quote me on that). You can get detergent type effects from some plants, but I have no idea if this is even remotely documentable. * Making scrubbing brushes from thin birch twigs. A bit like the traditional birch whisks, but cut down. Works quite well. For pot scrubber use Equisetum hyemale (Rough Horsetail, http://linnaeus.nrm.se/flora/orm/equiseta/equis/equihye.html), which works _very_ well. > Obviously, a soap can be made from fat and ashes, and if you have greasy > dishes, you don't need extra fat. Can this be documented in the > Viking Age? Don't use pure lye, make soap and use that. While it is true that soap is made from fat and lye, which was traditionally obtained from ashes, the devil is in the details (in extreme brief you need to mix the proper proportions of fat and lye, heat them and allow to stand for several weeks). Too much lye and it will hurt your skin. Remember that lye is nasty (e.g. if someone gets it in their eyes), so be carefull when using it. > Is there a period hand-lotion to use after this > harsh-on-the-skin substance? Sand gets suggested as well. Period (to the viking age) as in documentable, or as in "quite possible"? For the latter try using suitable fats (sheeps tallow, lanolin, etc), beeswax, etc as the base for a cream. /UlfR -- UlfR Ketilson ulfr at hunter-gatherer.org Date: Sun, 26 Oct 2003 21:00:29 -0500 From: Cynthia Virtue Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: Re: Female underwear in the 12th century Of course, the TRH stuff is 300 years later than the lady's inquiry. Some think that nothing was worn, even for menstruation, that the shift/chemise took care of it. This site which discusses it, may be of interest: http://www.mum.org/whatwore.htm -- Cynthia Virtue and/or Cynthia du Pré Argent Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 19:56:33 -0500 From: Cynthia Virtue Newsgroups: rec.org.sca Subject: A source! Re: Female underwear in the 12th century I finally had time to look in several of my more reliable books; texts in translation, from a medieval women's health book to some clothing books and so on. The health book described some amazing and fearful things, from pessaries to tampons for medicine delivery (usually in the case of too little or too much blood, (but not for absorbing menstrual flow.) Most books, even about the lives of women in particular, say little on underwear and nothing on what to do with *normal* monthly "purgations" or "flowers" (their terms). However, I did find the following about underclothes. _Women's Lives in Medieval Europe: A Sourcebook_ edited by Emille Amt. "66. The Ancrene Riwle (13th c.)" (A guide for Ancoresses.) on p. 260 A woman may well enough wear drawers of haircloth very well tied, with the strapples reaching down to her feet, laced tightly. Now, since it specifies haircloth, wearing drawers may just be another way of self-abasement, as they wouldn't be comfortable. Then again, maybe they were normal, if they weren't made of haircloth. No way to tell; but it's all I've found so far. -- Cynthia Virtue and/or Cynthia du Pré Argent Edited by Mark S, Harris p-hygiene-msg Page 16 of 16