stackyFACTSTanneries required an acidic substance to properly soften tough animal hides. Enter the 'pure finders', impoverished locals who walked the streets with buckets, exclusively hunting for white dog excrement. They scooped up the foul material and traded it to leather makers for a few meager coins.
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Some of the world's oldest cities had better sanitation than Victorian London. Around 4,000 years ago, the Indus Valley civilizations built settlements like…
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Majestic architecture completely ruined by basic biology. Many towering castles featured projecting toilets that simply dropped human waste straight down the…
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Navigating a city was a terrifying game of dodging human excrement. With no indoor plumbing, Londoners would simply shout a quick warning before emptying…
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Three centuries ago in many European cities, the safest thing to drink at breakfast was beer. Urban water supplies were often contaminated by sewage and…
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Mudlarking was a truly horrific way to earn a living. Desperate children waded knee-deep into the foul, untreated muck of the low-tide Thames, frantically…
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Electric grids eventually ruined this highly romanticized, exhausting job. Individuals armed with long poles and wicks walked miles of dusky streets every…
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