we tend to think of lavish homes, beautiful gowns,

and passionate romances.

But as we all know, the truth is often

stranger than fiction, smellier too.

Victorians may have had a lot of nice things,

but when it came to hygiene they were,

for lack of a better term, [BLEEP] gross.

Beneath the fancy garments of lace and silk

were people who had no indoor plumbing

and didn't regularly bathe.

Diseases were common, and the hygienic practices

meant to cure them were often as bad, if not worse,

than the illnesses themselves.

Today, we're going to take a look at what hygiene

was like in the Victorian era.

But before we get started, be sure to subscribe to the Weird

History channel, and let us know in the comments below what

other hygiene-related topics you would like to hear about.

OK, plug your nose.

We're going to Victorian England.

Victorians had to do laundry just like everyone else,

but they often used more than mere soap

to get their clothing clean and fresh.

For example, oil and grease stains

would be combated by rubbing chalk into the fabric.

Grass and bloodstains, on the other hand,

would be removed with kerosene while other miscellaneous odors

would be dealt with using milk.

So far, these all sound like life

hacks you might find in a modern YouTube video.

But when it came to bleaching their clothes,

the Victorians used a method modern folks probably

wouldn't be too keen on--

they soaked their clothes in their own urine.

Mmm, mmm.

Asparagus.

It sounds disgusting, but as it turns out,

urine contains ammonia, which is a very effective cleaning

agent, except windows, not very effective on windows.

Trust me when I tell you that.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Toothbrushes and toothpaste existed at the time

and were available to the Victorians, but typically only

the middle and upper classes.

Most working-class folks had to get a little bit more creative.

Toothpaste, for example, could be made at home

using common ingredients that include things

like chalk, soot, or even powdered cuttlefish.

Toothbrushes of the era typically

had wooden handles, harsh bristles,

and weren't terribly comfortable to use.

Despite this, they were relatively expensive.

And those who couldn't afford them had to find alternate ways

to clean their teeth.

One common method was the use of celery,

which was believed to be abrasive enough to clean

one's teeth while being chewed.

It was better than nothing, but as you probably guessed,

it wasn't a medically ideal way to keep

one's chompers looking good.

Nonetheless, you'd want to do your best

to protect your teeth, because the dental care

available at the time was, to be kind, utterly terrifying.

Many areas didn't even have dentists,

which meant if you needed oral care,

you would probably have to go to your local barber

or blacksmith.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

The earliest indoor toilets, also known as water closets,

were both convenient and popular.

But because they predated the invention of indoor plumbing,

they had some undesirable drawbacks.

With no pipes to carry away the waste,

it often just dropped into a large cesspool

that was located in the building's basement.

While this arrangement was more accessible than an outhouse

and less exposed than a chamber pot,

the cesspool would eventually fill up.

Once that happened, it didn't take too long

for the whole house to start smelling, well,

like a cesspool.

To combat the stink, a cottage industry of night soil men

sprung up.

These laborers would empty the cesspool

and then sell the waste to farmers, who

needed it to use as fertilizer.

They were known as night soil men because the laws of the era

restricted the emptying of cesspools to night time,

as the task was considered too disturbing to be undertaken

in broad daylight.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

You would think something as simple as how

to take a bath would be pretty intuitive to most people.

You sit in water and wash yourself.

But in Victorian times that wasn't common knowledge.

In fact, as regular or at least semi-regular bathing

came into fashion, Victorians were

besieged by publishers selling books

that taught the uninitiated what to expect from a bath.

Much of this guidance, though, was non-scientific.

For example, one such book advised the curious

and unwashed among Victorian society

to avoid bathing within four hours of eating a large meal.

This rule still exists today, though it's usually

applied to swimming after meals, rather than bathing.

Another tip one might find in these books

was to avoid washing their face when they traveled,

unless they had the means to first purify

the water with ammonia or alcohol.

So-called Russian baths, which consisted

of washing the face with extremely hot and then

extremely cold water, were advised

for those who were worried about preventing wrinkles.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Today, pretty much everyone is obsessed with their hair.

Victorian times were much the same,

except that modern shampoos were still a ways off.

So how did one clean their hair back then?

Well, women of the era would typically use eggs.

One would crack an egg over their head,

and then work the yolks into their hair

like with a modern shampoo.

The egg would then be washed out with a pitcher of water.

Another popular option was vinegar diluted with water.

Mmm, that's got to smell morning fresh.

Eggs in vinegar weren't the only cooking-related items

that made for a popular pre-shampoo hair cleaner.

Rum, black tea, and rosemary were all

considered normal and effective for hair washing.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Cleaning one's hair is important,

but maintaining a youthful and vital look

is, to many, equally important.

The Victorians were no different.

To that end, Hall's Vegetable Sicilian Hair Renewer,

first introduced in the 1860s, became

a staple of the era's hair care regimens.

The product's main benefit was to darken hair

in such a way that allowed people to hide their gray.

Unfortunately for the people who used it,

Hall's Hair Renewer used lead as a bonding agent.

Its function was to aid other chemicals

in darkening the hair, but it had the slight side effect

of causing lead poisoning.

Eventually, the company that manufactured

Hall's managed to get the lead out, or at least most of it,

in the formula, and the product managed to stay on the market

well into the 1930s.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Most people don't like a bad smell, but in Victorian times

bad smells were considered more than just unpleasant.

They were believed to be downright dangerous.

The idea that various conditions, including cholera

and chlamydia, were spread through pollutants

in the unclean air was called the miasma theory, or night

air, and it dated back to antiquity.

Victorians put a lot of stock in the miasma theory

and blamed the poor health endemic

in London's impoverished districts

on wicked smells that floated through the streets.

Even Florence Nightingale, one of the most famous nurses

in history, believed it and thought

that clean air would restore health to sick patients.

While there was a connection between the bad smells

and poor health, it wasn't the causative one Victorians

believed.

Turns out the poor sanitation that

was normal in industrial areas of the time

was independently causing both the bad smells

and many of the diseases.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Victorian hygiene obviously had a lot of shortcomings,

but it was also one of the first times in history

that mainstream society took the time

to address the concerns of feminine hygiene.

Indeed, both the disposable pad and the earliest versions

of the tampon were invented in the late 19th century.

These new technologies took some time

to become normal and widespread, and in the interim women

of the era got creative.

It was discovered that the wood pulp

base used to make the bandages typically used

to treat the wounds of soldiers at war

were also used for menstruation care.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Ask anyone who lives in New York, London, or Hong Kong,

and they'll tell you that in the heat of the summer

big cities, even modern ones, can develop a noxious smell.

But the stench that emanated from London in 1858

was something else entirely.

It was so unbearably heinous that the whole city practically

shut down.

During the Victorian era, the River Thames

used to be the hub of the entire London sewage system.

In practice, this meant that most citizens

disposed of their waste by simply dumping it

into the river.

Londoners were not happy, and they raised quite a stink

over the foul odors that came from the water.

Doctors, in accordance with the aforementioned miasma theory,

blamed the stench for causing rampant disease

throughout the entire city.

It was so horrible that the summer of 1858

would forever be known as the Great Stink.

That's a T-shirt waiting to happen.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

From bad smells to evil spirits, many strange things

were blamed for causing diseases in the past.

Among the strangest, though, had to be the Victorian era theory

that tuberculosis and its spread was attributable to women's

clothing.

Doctors of the era theorized that long skirts dragging

along the street were picking up the disease and women who

wore them were unwittingly bringing sickness

into their home and spreading it to their families.

The theory didn't stop at dresses though.

Doctors of the time also believed that the tight corsets

women wore were also responsible for tuberculosis

on account of the fact that they constricted the lungs.

As such, doctors trying to stop the spread of the disease

were prone to prescribing looser corsets and shorter skirts--

very fashionable.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Despite being socially unacceptable

during the Victorian era, escort work

was a very common way for the women

who lived in London's most impoverished neighborhoods

to make a living.

Sexually transmitted diseases were extremely common

at the time.

And without regular access to contraceptives,

sex workers often transmitted those STDs to their clients.

The clients, in turn, would then transmit them

to their wives and anyone else they might be involved with.

Things got so bad that the spread of sexually

transmitted diseases was eventually declared

a public health hazard.

Laws were passed that allowed escorts

to be detained by police and forcibly treated for STDs.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Though it wouldn't be widely marketed

until 1914, the mouthwash we know

as Listerine was invented by Dr. Jordan

Lawrence and chemist-turned-entrepreneur

Jordan Wheat Lambert in 1879.

Victorians were slowly beginning to accept notions

of modern hygiene, so Lambert first

tried marketing his concoction as a medical antiseptic.

For whatever reason, the product was overlooked and failed

to turn a profit for its creators.