It’s common knowledge that people in the Middle Ages didn’t have access to the type of healthcare that we do today, but you won’t believe the extreme lengths they went to to cure illnesses. Most of the answers are too gross to be true…
Sharing Bathwater With The Town
Because most households did not have access to large amounts of water in the Middle Ages, bathhouses were used for public bathing to conserve water and guarantee everyone in town had access to it. The downside – the water was filthy because of all the bodies that soaked in it. If anything, public bathing was counterproductive.
Denture Teeth Belonged To WHO?
The English aristocracy were suffering from a combination of lots of sugar in their diets and terrible dental hygiene. So when their teeth fell out, the logical solution was to get fitted for a pair of dentures. The creepy downside to dentures? They used dead soldiers’ teeth.
Poisonous Shoe Polish
Nitrobenzene is an amazing ingredient that makes shoes extra extra shiny. However, the fumes can make you dizzy and even faint if you were polishing shoes in an unventilated area. Nitrobenzene can also get absorbed into the skin of your hands and lead to internal organ damage and cancer.
The King’s Personal Assistant
There really was such a position called “Groom of the King’s Close Stool.” The primary task: assisting the King with toilet and hygiene functions. Though it seems highly demeaning, this position was actually super important and rivaled after. The person often acquired considerable wealth and wielded major political power. But at what cost…
Eating Chalk, For Aesthetic
Pale skin was favored in the Middle Ages, and one way to achieve this ivory complexion was to consume chalk. Eating chalk was believed to completely transform the complexion from the inside out. The risks??? High.
Belladonna For The Pupils
Belladonna has always been used as a poisonous plant – royalty would even use it to kill their enemies. It’s also a hallucinogen, and an unpleasant one at that. During the Renaissance, Belladonna extracts would be made into eyedrops that women used to dilate their pupils for a more seductive look. However, many of them went blind. So there’s the lesson in that.
Flaunt That Gingivitis
When sugar came around, it was expensive and hard to come by, so rich people of course wanted to prove that they could afford plenty of it. However, dental hygiene was less than up to par, and so the upper class was infamous for having horrible teeth.
Radioactive Hair Dye
Caradium, a hair restorer intended to treat hair with a “secret ingredient,” turned out to actually be radioactive. On top of that, big hair was still in. Because of the intricacy of the hairstyles and how difficult it was to take it all down, women often times went weeks between washings.
Lead-Based Makeup
The coveted pale skin that noble women wore in the Middle Ages was actually caused by Venetian Ceruse, a lead-based foundation. It caused dangerous lesions on the skin, which caused the wearer to apply even more, eventually leading to potentially fatal poisoning.
A Cure For Hair Loss
Men have tried almost anything to avoid going bald – but Medieval men took it a step further. They believed chicken poop mixed with caustic lye was an effective remedy for hair loss. It was – NOT.
Sulfur Burned Off Freckles
Apparently, freckles were considered ugly and a perfectly clean and smooth complexion was desired, so people would rub sulfur all over their skin in hopes of burning them off.
In 1800, The Combs Were Exploding
In the middle of the 19th century, chemists invented celluloid, a replacement for expensive ivory, and found a market for it in women’s hair accessories. Unfortunately, it’s a highly flammable substance, and would actually explode from seemingly harmless things like movie theater lights.
Homemade Mouthwash
Ancient Greeks and Romans used to use urine as mouthwash because they believed it was good for the teeth and for preventing disease. Since urine contains ammonia, it’s not completely crazy. But I’m not about to volunteer to test that.
Ancient Egyptian Contraception
In Ancient Egypt, women believed that an effective form of birth control was crocodile waste. They would roll up the excrement into small balls and insert them into their bodies… and I don’t want to know how the rest of the story goes.
People Didn’t Wash Their Clothes In Winter
If the weather was too cold, and you couldn’t build a fire, then you were NEVER taking your clothes off. Like for three months straight.
Human Corpses Were On The Dinner Menu
European nobility would pay for ancient Egyptian mummies, as well as fresher Irish graves, to be robbed and turned into all sorts of potions and creams to treat everything from epilepsy and nosebleeds to headaches. (Full disclosure: these were not effective treatments by any means.)
Silphium Birth Control
The plant silphium was used for everything from birth control to abortions, but the effectiveness of the treatment is unproven due to the fact that the practice went extinct centuries ago.
The Floor Is Straw
Whenever the straw got really gross, it was swept and replaced, but only the top layer. Who knows what kind of vermin were crawling around under there…
Wounds Were Cauterized
That means wounds were burned shut. Even though that’s sometimes still practiced today, it was the only way to stop bleeding in the Middle Ages. And definitely not with a safe, clean too. A physician used a red hot metal poker, often resulting in infections. Dying was common.
Flammable Hair
If you were an upper class Victorian woman, you would almost always be seen with extravagantly tall hairstyles. If you could afford the big hair, then you could also afford the big, fancy events like ballroom dances. In the age before electricity, ballroom dances were lit by literally hundreds of candles. Tall hair + candles = FIRE HAZARD.
Toothpaste? What’s That?
The medieval equivalent to toothpaste was a mixture of burnt herbs, like rosemary and mint. So at least there was sort of an equivalent, but the bad news was that it tasted terrible.
How To Ease Labor Pains
I’m not sure of the rationale behind this, but women were given eagle droppings during labor to ease the cramping.
When Is Laundry Day Again?
Probably never. If you weren’t wealthy and didn’t own a lot of clothing, then you weren’t washing the few pieces you did have very often. If you really desperate, you’d have to sleep in your clothes too.
Castle Moats Were Disgusting
Sewage was free-flowing in the Middle Ages, literally. Castle moats were the most convenient places for dumping, because that water already wasn’t used for swimming, bathing, or drinking.
Lysol Was A Feminine Hygiene Product
Lysol was believed to be a highly effective cleaning solution for the vaginal area, and an after-sex contraceptive. Doctors would wash the entire birth canal area after delivering a baby, but eliminating the vagina’s natural bacteria led to extreme infections.
X-Rays Were The OG Laser Hair Removal
A more recent cosmetic discovery: X-rays were able to remove unwanted body hair. Women would sit through hours of radiation in order to zap off their hair. Unwanted side effects: thickening/leathering of the skin, wrinkles, and cancer risky.
Finger Food For Everyone
Rich and poor alike did almost all of their eating with their hands. Hand washing was also uncommon and considered basically unnecessary. If you needed it, then you always carried around a knife and a spoon.
Tooth Lacquering Was Actually A Thing
Glossy black teeth were a symbol of beauty and marriage among Asian women. It also carried some health benefits – it protected the teeth like a modern dental sealant, which helped to retain healthy teeth into old age.
Sticky Servants
Ancient Egyptian servants were often slathered in honey in order to keep flies away from the Pharaoh. Living by a river could mean there were an abundance of pesky insects, and if the Pharaoh was distracted by bugs then who would run the kingdom!
Graham Cracker’s Original Purpose
Sylvester Graham, pastor and inventor of graham crackers, hoped that by sticking to an intense vegetarian diet and indulging only on graham crackers, people would be less tempted to pleasure themselves. Seems weird…right?
Ancient Romans Had No Sense Of Dental Hygiene
Romans used to brush their teeth with mouse brains. Baking soda + mouse brains = clean??? I’m nauseas over here.
A Beaver’s WHAT?
Women used to drink a potion made from beavers’ male parts as birth control. In what is now Canada, women would brew tea made from dried beaver’s testicles as a form of contraception. I uhh don’t think it worked.
TP Could Be Anything
Tissue paper only gained popularity in the 19th century. Until then, people used just about anything. Newspaper, books, leaves, grass, their hands, sponge on a stick. You name it.
Your Barber Doubled As Your Dentist
In the Middle Ages, barbers were called “barber surgeons,” and usually they would give you a haircut and a shave as well as pull your teeth. In that day and age, pulling the tooth was really the only cure for a dental problem anyways.
Mercury Cured Cold Sores
Until scientists realized mercury was harmful, it was seen as a sort of magical substance that could cure nearly anything. That was quickly stopped when people learned how dangerous it is.
Moss Helps Mensturation
Before the invention of pads and tampons, women would actually use moss to absorb their flow. However, moss obviously led to infections and problems because it’s basically dirt.
Sometimes Toilets Were Just Holes In The Ground
Outhouses are common if you’re in the middle of nowhere, but the OG outhouse was literally just a hole in the ground. A hole without anything to sit on. No flush. No thanks!
The Real Reason Women Always Held Flowers
People didn’t bathe very often, so women would carry very fragrant flowers with them to disguise their body odor.
When Clothes WERE Washed…
…they were cleaned with a detergent made of urine and lye. Urine is: gross. Lye is: dangerous.
Bed Bug Prevention
People wiped their beds with kerosene to try and prevent the spread of bed bugs. If you manage to avoid burning your house down, you’re still stuck with the semi-effective kerosene smell.
Surgery Was Not Sterile
Science didn’t know germs existed until the 19th century, so sterilizing surgical instruments was unheard of. For a while, doctors pushed back against connecting sterility and infection.
Lead Pipes Were Common
Lead was used for almost any possible water storage function that you can think of. It was useful because of its low melting point, but it has long-term health risks.
Save The Bees, But Not For This
People would actually consume pieces of cadavers that had been mummified in honey as a cure for illnesses. “Candied human contents” could cure anything from a broken bone to a cold.
Deodorant Was Invented in 1888
Before 1888, people still were not bathing regularly. With the invention of deodorant, people finally had a quick fix in between showers. At last!
Tobacco Smoke Was A Health Tonic
Europeans picked up smoking tobacco from Native Americans and ascribed all sorts of health benefits to it. The warmth of the nicotine and the stimulation of the smoke were thought to be beneficial. In reality: a huge mistake.
Roman Women Used Wool Tampons
Wool is notoriously scratchy and uncomfortable. Roman women, for whatever reason, used to make tampons out of the stuff. Thank goodness we don’t use this anymore.
Tapeworms Were Used In Diets
Disclaimer: The Tapeworm Diet is DANGEROUS. People used to ingest tapeworm eggs on PURPOSE and let the worm curb their appetite. Nasty? YES.
Snail Syrup
Snail syrup was used as a cough cure in the 18th century because it would coat the patient’s throat, much like our cough syrup today. The difference: one is absolutely disgusting.
Sewage? Toss It.
Before plumbing, raw sewage was simply tossed into the river. That’s why water-borne illnesses don’t exist in those countries anymore, because of the preventative steps modern plumbing offers. But before that – forget it.
Contraception Was Illegal To Advertise
America’s Comstock Laws of 1873 made it illegal to advertise or send by mail anything of sexual nature or intended for contraception.
Regency Toothpaste
A mixture of gunpowder and alum was used as a tooth-cleaning solution in 19th century England, just another somewhat futile attempt at dental hygiene.
Bloodletting Was The Cure For Nearly Everything
People would jump at the chance to drain their blood. Hippocrates believed that menstruating was a woman’s body’s way of clearing her system of “bad humors.” This led to the idea that bleeding all sick people could help cure them and bring their humors back. It was not a good idea. At all.
Mummy Powder Was In Everything
12th century Arabs used mummy powder as a sort of cure-all drug.
Cataract Surgery Was Very Painful
Surgeons used an incredibly painful process called “needling,” with no anesthetics. The doctor would insert a needle into the edge of the person’s cornea, and then modern medicine decided we should never do that again.
Surgeons Often Bore Holes Into Patients Heads
This method was called “trepanning.” It was considered to be a cure for various ailments like epilepsy and migraines, and was practiced well into the 20th century.
Medeival Medicine Originated In Ancient Grace
The ancient Greek physician Galen became referred to as the “Medical Pope of the Middle Ages,” while Hippocrates was also important.
Plant and Animal-Based Remedies Were Popular
Parsley was apparently recorded as a remedy for a snake bite!
Thomas Becket’s Shrine Was Good Luck
Situated in Canterbury Cathedral, Saint Thomas Becket’s tomb became the most popular shrine in England during medieval times. It was believed that visiting it could cure illnesses.
English And French Monarchs Had “Healing Hands”
It was called “the royal touch,” and it continued into the Renaissance Period.