People's bathing habits have varied greatly over the centuries and among varying civilizations. Ancient Egyptians bathed for religious purposes, as did the Hindus of India. The city of Mohenjo-daro in the Indus Valley had a number of baths, complete with drainage system, in 2500 b.c. The Cretan Palace of Knossos and some ancient Greek palaces had separate bathrooms with individual tubs, piped-in water, and drainage systems. The Greeks considered bathing as a way to tone up the body, so they used cold water. The Romans turned bathing into a social occasion. Wealthy Romans had their own bathrooms. Soon enormous, elaborate public baths were constructed. These featured cold, warm, and hot bathing rooms, plus theaters libraries, exercise yards, and more. The Baths of Diocletian, built in a.d. 302, could hold 3,200 people at once; the Baths of Caracalla, built in 217, held 1,600 people. The Roman baths were originally intended, as Greek baths had been, for exercise and health, but over time they became centers for luxurious leisure and dissipation. After the fall of the Roman Empire, bathing all but disappeared in Western civilization. Clergymen frowned on bathing because they disapproved of nakedness; bathing was even considered to be unhealthy. So the early medieval population lived in filth and, therefore,sickness. Some public baths appeared in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries,but they became known as centers of immorality and were outlawed in many localities.The general disinterest in bathing among all levels of the population is highlighted by the fact that LouisXIV's (1638-1715) sumptuous royal palace of Versailles, built in 1661, had absolutely no bathing facilities (or toilets). Bathing finally came back into favor during the 1700s. Benjamin Franklin brought the first bathtub to the United States from France in 1790. It was a " slipper bath"--a tub shaped like a shoe, with a water-heating device in the heel and a drain in the toe.
As long as running water remained a rarity, though, bathtubs were generally just wooden tubs filled by hand and put away when not in use. The Virginia stool shower became popular in the 1830s. The bather worked a lever on one side to pump water up through a hose while simultaneously working another lever or pedal to move an attached scrub brush up and down his or her back. Steam baths were popular during the 1840s, after home boilers for heating water became more widespread. Steam baths, also called vapor or Russian baths, were considered to have medical benefits. Closet tubs had a vogue in the 1880s; a comfortable tub folded out of a closet tucked into a corner of the kitchen. Closet as well as free-standing tubs were usually wooden boxes lined with tin, copper,or galvanized iron. The Glamor Tub of 1888 was one of the first to have its own needle spray and shower. Most showers, however, consisted of a hand-held spray nozzle connected to the tub's faucet with a hose. Built-in shower baths only became commonplace after World War I, boosted by the introduction around 1920 of the mass-produced, double-shelled, porcelain-enamel lead tub that could be installed flush to the wall, unlike the old claw-foot tubs. A variation on bathing is the sauna, developed into a national tradition by the Finnish people over 1,000 years ago. Inside wooden huts, the Finns would pile stones over a fire; water poured over the stones created steam in which to bathe. After sweating in the hut, bathers would jump into an adjacent icy lake, or roll outdoors in the snow. In the United States today, saunas are generally found in health clubs and resorts. Group bathing reappeared in the United States in the 1970s when the hot tub made its appearance in California. Luxury fixtures and equipment are the hallmark of many modern bathrooms. In place of standard porcelain bathroom tubs and showers, materials now range from one piece plastic surrounds to marble or other opulent materials, the latter often featuring faucets available not only in chrome, but also in brass or gold plate. Luxury whirlpools that accommodate one or two people, bidets, and personal spas or hot tubs that seat varying numbers of persons are part of this trend.
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