Imperial Roman Toilets (Britannia)
These are Imperial Roman toilets at Vercovicium Fort, a part of Hadrian's Wall in Northumberland, England.
This was the outer fringe of the Roman Empire.
Hadrian's Wall was built across the narrowest part of Britain just south of the Pictish lands starting in 122 CE, during the rule of the Emperor Hadrian.
Click here for lots of pictures from hiking along Hadrian's Wall,
These Imperial Roman toilets are at Vindolanda Fort, near Hadrian's Wall, Northumberland, England. These are at the military garrison at the fort.
More Roman toilets can be seen at Vindolanda Fort. These are at the public baths.
The ruins of Vindolanda were occupied for several centuries after the gradual departure (or assimilation) of the Romans. Exhibits there show that life was better there during Roman times than it was for the crofters in the mid 1700s!
Rose George's The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters is a fascinating description of sanitation conditions around the world. "2.6 billion people don't have sanitation. [....] Four in ten people have no access to any latrine, toilet, bucket, or box."
In September 2009, Morna Gregory and Sian James published a book titled Toilets of the World. It's pretty much the same theme that you find here — photographs and commentary on other people's plumbing.
The Porcelain God: A Social History of the Toilet, by Julie Horan, contends that civilization began with the toilet.
Toilet: Public Restrooms and the Politics of Sharing, edited by Laura Noren and Harvey Molotch, has essays by anthropologists, sociologists, and architects on the importance of the toilet, especially for urban dwellers.
Latrinae Et Foricae: Toilets in the Roman World describes the toilets of the Roman Empire from Iberia to Syria, and from North Africa to Hadrian's Wall in Britannia.
Toilets, Bathtubs, Sinks, and Sewers: A History of the Bathroom, explains the history of personal cleanliness and hygiene to children in grades 5-8.
| A Sani-Flush blue border indicates a toilet that I've used. |
How long have my Toilets of the World pages been around? I'm not exactly sure, although they started in the mid 1990s as a single page on a Purdue University server. The Internet Archive Wayback Machine lets you see what that looked like as far back as January 17, 1999.
My cromwell-intl.com domain appeared in September, 2001, although the Wayback Machine didn't notice its one enormous Toilet of the World page until January 17, 2002. Some time soon after that I split it into categories, and the collection has grown ever since.
In December, 2010 I registered the toilet-guru.com domain and moved the pages to a dedicated server.
If you're not bored yet, you might be interested in (or at least tolerate):
