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Young Blonde Girl With Blue Eyes Shows Off In The Bathtub
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History of bathing
Documented early plumbing systems for bathing go back as far as around 3300 BC with the discovery of copper water pipes beneath a palace in the Indus Valley Civilization of ancient India. Evidence of the earliest surviving personal sized bath tub was found on the Isle of Crete where a 5-foot (1.5 m) long pedestal tub was found built from hardened pottery. This tub is the most likely forefather of the classic 19th century clawfoot tub.
The Roman Empire is most widely known as the early champions of bathing. Around 500 BC Roman citizens were encouraged to bathe daily in one of the many public baths. Private bathing rooms were far more ornate and typically would resemble shallow swimming pools that encompassed the entire room. The Romans used marble for the tubs, lead and bronze for pipes, and created a complex sewage system for sanitation purposes. The Roman empire set the early bar for modern personal hygiene.
Contrary to popular belief, bathing and sanitation were not a lost practice with the collapse of the Roman Empire. Soapmaking first became an established trade during the Early Middle Ages. Also, contrary to myth, chamberpots were not disposed of out the window and into streets in the Middle Ages - this was instead a Roman practice. Bathing in fact did not fall out of fashion until shortly after the Renaissance, replaced with the heavy use of sweat-bathing and perfume, as it was thought that water could carry disease into the body through the skin. Modern sanitation was not widely adopted until the 19th and 20th centuries.
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