Why we crave connection when the cold hits
The ancient city of Mohenjo-Daro in modern-day Pakistan is where we find evidence of the first buildings with latrines connected to a sewage system.
The ancient Greeks first used wastewater as a fertilizer on crops. Pictured is a harvest scene relief from the vestibule of the tomb of Petosiris at Tuna el-Gebel, Egypt.
The Romans built one of the world's earliest sewage systems—Cloaca Maxima, the Greatest Sewer. By the 1st century CE, 11 aqueducts were connected to the system. Remnants of the sewer are pictured here near the Forum.
Cloaca Maxima carried effluent to the Tiber River. The sewer was still being used after the fall of the Roman Empire, and in fact parts of the system function today. Pictured is the now defunct outfall seen from Ponte Palatino.
For the most part, human waste was thrown into the street or carried away as fertilizer for farming. Pictured is a paved road in Pompeii with stepping stones to allow for clean and safe pedestrian crossing.
The concept of urban hygiene was developed during the Roman Empire. Sanitation in ancient Rome was especially well advanced, although the primary purpose of sewers was to carry away surface water. Pictured is a drainage channel unearthed at the Roman colony called Barcino, where present-day Barcelona is situated.
Public toilets, meanwhile, were designed as communal latrines. By 315 CE, Rome had 144 public water-flushed toilets, though privacy clearly wasn't a priority.
Eventually, a decree passed in 100 BCE obliged all Roman households to connect to the sewage system.
There are religious teachings that deal with human waste. Mosaic law from around 1300 BCE urges individuals "to remove [their] own refuse and bury it in the earth. The Book of Nehemiah in the Hebrew Bible tells of rebuilding Jerusalem (pictured), where there was a refuse gate that served as a depository for city waste. And the Talmud called for the streets of Jerusalem to be cleaned daily.
The Palace of Knossos, the ceremonial and political center of the Bronze Age Minoan civilization and culture on Crete, had a sophisticated water-management system that featured sanitation drainage and the first known water-flushing system latrine.
The ancient Greeks developed some of the first human waste dumps, around 500 BCE. In Athens in 320 BCE, the first known edict banning the disposal of refuse in the streets was passed.
Some members of society found regular work during this period. A gongfermor was someone who dug out and removed human excrement from privies and cesspits. Also known as a gong farmer or nightman (they were only allowed to work after dark), these individuals were scorned by society for the smelly and unsavory nature of their task.
The fall of the Roman Empire in the West effectively turned an urban society into a rural one. By 500 CE, Roman advances in sanitation were all but forgotten. Europe entered the Dark Ages, and a period of filth.
Medieval Europe saw a return to the quick disposal of human waste by tossing it out of the house. Cesspits were built for what was supposed to be the temporary collection and storage of feces, but were soon saturated.
By the late 19th century, English plumber Thomas Crapper improved upon the S-bend plumbing trap by inventing the U-bend, in 1880. His company went on to pioneer some of the most revolutionary designs of sanitary engineering in the 19th century, including the automatic syphon flushing cistern.
Little advance was made in hygiene technology. Indeed, the lack of a functioning sanitation system recalled the outhouse, chamber pot, and open latrine. Pictured is a basic slab-stone toilet in the ramparts of the fortified city of Aigues-Mortes in the Languedoc-Roussillon region of southern France.
Yet despite these technical advances, the 18th century still saw the so-called nightmen employed to collect "night soil"—the archaic term for fecal sludge. Pictured is the calling card of a London nightman and rubbish carter.
With excreta smearing the streets of cities, towns, and villages across Europe and beyond, it was inevitable that disease would spread. The Black Death caused the deaths of nearly 200 million people, but the relationship between excrement and disease was not immediately recognized.
While disease and chaos wracked most of Europe, the Moorish strongholds across the Iberian Peninsula escaped relatively unscathed due to established sanitation rules ingrained in Arab culture. Rainwater provided communities with their most vital life-preserving commodity. Water had a separate use domestically—so-called grey water—and was also used carefully and effectively in the waste management process—identified as black water. This terminology is still used today.
Cistern are built to catch and store rain water. Vestiges of crude cisterns have been unearthed at some Neolithic sites. The Romans used them throughout the empire. During the Middle Ages, hill castles drew on a water supply fed from an underground cistern.
The plagues that decimated Europe in the 14th century ultimately led to the establishment in England by King Henry VI of the commissions of sewers in 1427. The purpose of the statute was to encourage the adoption of best water practices, and "provided severe penalties for the pollution of streams." It also made special provisions for the disposal of tanners' and brewers' wastes. The commissions were strengthened by the 1531 Statute of Sewers and later legislation, including the Commissions of Sewers Act 1708.
A noted author, John Harington is credited with inventing England's first flushing toilet, in the early 1590s. This forerunner to the modern flush toilet had a flush valve to let water out of the tank, and a wash-down design to empty the bowl.
John Harington's flush toilet design lacked an S-bend plumbing trap, a feature to trap liquid or gas to prevent unwanted flow. The S-bend was eventually conceived by Alexander Cumming in 1775. His patent for a valve closet with an S-trap laid the foundations for the modern flush toilet.
French chemist Louis Pasteur later confirmed Snow's findings. Pasteur discovered the microorganisms present in wastewater caused infectious diseases such as cholera or typhoid fever.
The efforts of both scientists led to new legislation being drawn up to severely limit the construction of new cesspits and transform existing examples into septic tanks— underground concrete chambers through which domestic wastewater (sewage) flows for basic sewage treatment.
It took a catastrophe to radically change the view of sanitation. The Great Fire of Hamburg destroyed one quarter of the city in May 1842 and killed dozens of residents. Reconstruction included a new sewage system that incorporated a single circuit drainage of wastewater, the pipes of which were flushed with sea water once a week as part of a strict cleaning and maintenance roster. The engineering model was copied by cities across Europe and the United States.
In 1914, engineers Edward Arden and William T. Lockett discovered the activated sludge process, a type of biological wastewater treatment process for treating sewage or industrial wastewaters using aeration and a biological floc, or aggregate, composed of bacteria and protozoa. It's a process still used today in all sewage treatment plants.
During historic conflicts, the latrine was an integral feature of garrisons and camps. Here, a few federal prisoners of war squat along a narrow slit trench used as a latrine at Andersonville, Georgia. Originally known as Camp Sumter, the Confederate prison camp became notorious for maltreatment of prisoners; over 13,000 prisoners died in the camp during the American Civil War. Chief causes of death were scurvy, diarrhea, and dysentery.
The first ever space toilet was created for Skylab in 1973. Today, dumping while exploring the Cosmos is a lot easier with equipment like this, a space toilet waste collection system (IWCS) originally designed for NASA's Space Shuttle program.
Sources: (Historic England) (National Park Service) (Historia Sanitaria)
See also: Controversial and bizarre toilet facts from around the world
As sanitation technology evolved across Europe, so too did the correlation between sewage and disease. In 1854, British physician John Snow identified cholera as being caused by drinking water that had been contaminated with wastewater.
To delve into the history of sewage is to explore the evolution of sanitation technology and the invention of the modern-day flush toilet. The story begins with a latrine carved out of the ground in about 2500 BCE, and has progressed to a waste collection system designed for NASA astronauts. Intrigued?
Take a seat and click through this gallery to find out more about how we've processed the act of defecation.
A history of sewage management
This is the way we've processed the act of defecation
LIFESTYLE Curiosities
To delve into the history of sewage is to explore the evolution of sanitation technology and the invention of the modern-day flush toilet. The story begins with a latrine carved out of the ground in about 2500 BCE, and has progressed to a waste collection system designed for NASA astronauts. Intrigued?
Take a seat and click through this gallery to find out more about how we've processed the act of defecation.