I think Sherwood does this very nicely in one of the stories I read off her website. The main character visits another world and runs around with the characters there. Meanwhile, she has to use the bathroom — and it seems like those girls never do. She asks about bathrooms and it turns out there’s a waste spell so bathrooms aren’t needed. It never has to be mentioned again and I don’t wonder about the latrines.

In Athens, near the temple of the winds, is a row of stone holes that are obviously toilets. I did not inspect the disposal system as they were in pretty bad shape.

In Teotitlan, there was a series of troughs leading to a stone with holes in it. Looked like a shower to me. At the bottom of this stone, which was well above my head, there was a trough to lead the water away. Bet they had toilets.

In Crete, there was a toilet with troughs (in stone) to lead the waste away to pipes. The pipes went thru the city (small city) and thence to the hillside. I imagine whatever was in the pipe just went over the edge. Mind you, a lot of reconstruction went on there, but it looked pretty original to me.

These sites were all near places of importance so maybe the “regular” people just had to make do.

This was in the Utne Reader, Feb. 2007 issue. Back to homework. yuck.

Flush with Progress
The homeless population of Vancouver, British Columbia, has doubled in recent years. Now high populations of homeless persons and drug abusers have created an unsanitary problem for the city–streets, alleys, and parking lots around the downtown are habitually used as outdoor toilets. The city is now purchasing several new high-tech, self-cleaning bathroom booths–at up to $300,000 apiece–to be installed in critical areas, with an urban anthropologist to pinpoint major problem spots. The city is looking at a stainless steel model that cleans and dries every surface of its interior after each use.

From the journal: Environmental Health Perspectives
http://www.ehponline.org/docs/2005/113-11/forum.html

Constance, I can’t wait to see your post on Google searching.

A quick Google on “Google search terms” gives you helpful info. I knew you could get definitions using define: and use google as a calculator, but currency conversion?

And here is the googleguide and tutorial on search operators

Straws in the Wind: Medieval Urban Environmental Law–The Case of Northern Italy - Page 63
by Ronald Edward Zupko, Robert Anthony Laures - 1996 - 152 pages
… during stormy periods.14 Medieval Water and Sewer Systems The dissolution of the
… were located in low-lying areas near latrines and cesspools. …
Limited preview - Table of Contents - About this book

This provides the useful search string, “Medieval Urban Environmental Law.� Legal research opens so many doors ….

Then the full-text capacity to search out-of-print books on google opens surprising doors. I’m still just in awe of this capacity from home, that wasn’t available on this level even a year ago!

And now, almost everything in English that is out of print from the 19th century and earlier is full text on google. Which means all those most useful travel books, that contain so much essential information as to how things were with the actual people, that histories don’t include — though historians have now learned to consult them too, though the stricter historians still don’t consider them primary documents. Only texts generated by official figures and institutions are considered ‘primary’ by that sort.

Just amazing. Just wonderful, what you can find online. Instead of driving to the U of VA you can read the book at home, online, on their library’s site.

Love, C.

It was kept in a pot of water, to which I hope had been added some sort of disinfectant/deodorizers, like vinegar.