Source: @Ni Fangliu

Recently, this news has attracted the attention of many women: in the new public toilet standard in Beijing, it is proposed to change the ratio of male and female toilets from the existing 1:1 to about 1:2, which is planned to be implemented in 2013. In the history of Chinese toilets, the construction of public toilets was also attached great importance in ancient times. When are public toilets separated from men's and women's toilets?

In the early days, public toilets were mostly built along roads

——Pre-Qin toilet "more than 12 feet high"

Needless to say, toilets, like cafeterias, are places that people go to every day.

Xu Shen of the Eastern Han Dynasty said, "Toilet, clear also." "Meaning, the toilet is the place where the dirt is removed. There are public toilets and private toilets, and there is a view in the academic community that public toilets should be the first to appear, not private toilets. Public toilets, also known as official toilets, are the earliest public toilets in China, which are toilets built next to roads, that is, the so-called "road toilets".

There is such a record in "Zhou Li: Heavenly Officials", "The palace people, the cultivation of the six bedrooms of the king, are the wells, and the stench is removed." The approximate meaning of this sentence is that the palace people are responsible for cleaning the room of the king of Zhou, building toilets, removing unclean things, and eliminating odors.

The so-called "匽" is the ancient toilet, which is also called "Yan". According to the annotation of Zheng Xuan, a scholar of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Kuang is a road toilet. Qing Dynasty scholar Wang Niansun believes that the "well box" is a hidden toilet. These two explanations are actually not contradictory, even if the toilet built on the side of the road is also hidden, the simplest thing is to have a wall as a barrier, otherwise it will be immoral, what kind of system?

Public toilets in the pre-Qin era had specific site selection and construction standards. In "Mozi Banner", it is said, "Outside the road is the screen, and thirty steps are round, high." It is more than 12 feet high. The so-called "screen" is a fence for toilets; "溷" is another name for the toilet of the ancients.

The public toilet in Mozi's life era should be a standardized toilet with uniform specifications: the perimeter of the fence is "30 steps", which crosses 40 meters; It is one foot high, more than 2.3 meters. This is a toilet for military use, and in the case of a civilian toilet, the wall is increased to 1 zhang 2, which is 2.7 meters over. The toilet has such a high wall, it is very difficult to peep, which shows that the ancient Chinese were very attentive and fully considered the protection of privacy.

It can also be known from the saying "Minhui" that in ancient times, in addition to being built on the side of the road, it was also popular to build near the pigsty. "溷", that is, the toilet next to the pigsty, this toilet site selection concept is common in ancient and modern times. "Hanshu Liu Dan Biography" records that before Liu Dan, the king of Yanra, failed to seize the throne, a large group of pigs ran out of the toilet at home, which was regarded as a "bad omen", and behind the bad omen was the social custom of building a toilet and a pigsty together.

In the Han Dynasty, there were water-flushing toilets

- "Quite similar to today's foreign latrines"

The description in Mozi only shows the external planning of the toilet in an ancient period, and there is no information about the interior design and the shape of the manure pit. Judging from the historical data, the toilet in the Zhou Dynasty has been set up with a leaky well, and the filth can naturally fall into the pool, and the modern scholar Shang Binghe believes in the "Examination of Social Customs and Things in the Past Dynasties and the Toilet" that the toilet in the Zhou Dynasty is "quite similar to today's foreign thatched toilets".

This statement is well documented, not a lie. In Sima Qian's "Historical Records: The Biography of Wan Shijun" (Volume 1003) of the Western Han Dynasty, there is such a record: Shi Jian, the son of Wan Shijun, a minister in the early Han Dynasty, became an official, every time he went home to visit his old father on vacation, he would first go to the servant's room to inquire about his father's situation, and "take the skirt and toilet of the relatives, and wash himself".

The "toilet raft" here is a kind of obscene vessel that hollows out the middle of the wood to hold feces, and its specific structure and function are similar to those of modern toilets. Shi Jian personally washed his old father's underwear and washed the toilet, without letting the servants do it, which shows that he is a kind of filial son.

Modern archaeology has unearthed a number of ancient toilets. In the tomb of Liu Wu, the filial king of He\Nanshang\Qiumang\Dang\Shanliang, a bathroom was found, and there was a complete set of stone toilets in the room, which could be flushed with water. This toilet is more than 2,000 years old and is believed to be the earliest water-flushing toilet ever discovered in China.

In 2009, the author went to Mangdang Mountain by the way to inspect the tomb of King Liang Xiao. I saw that on the wall directly behind the toilet, a water pipe for flushing the toilet was also chiseled, and there was a stone handrail next to the squatting position, which was quite user-friendly. Later, in the tomb of King Zhongshan in Mancheng Mausoleum Mountain, Lion Mountain in Xuzhou, and the tomb of King Chu in Camel Basket Mountain, the author saw the "toilet", but the luxury Cheng dù ranged. It is worth noting that there is often a supporting "bathroom" next to the toilet, which shows the advanced and scientific concept of hygiene.

The toilet in the tomb of King Liang Xiao should belong to the category of private toilets, which is equivalent to the high-end toilets of today's wealthy families. In ancient times, ordinary toilets should not be like this, from the historical data, it is generally to dig a very large and deep pit, build a wall to enclose the toilet, commonly known as "thatched toilet", "thatched house". There is such an account in "Zuo Chuan: Ten Years of Chenggong", the Marquis of Jin "will eat, Zhang, go to the toilet, and fall into the dung", the Marquis of Jin is the Duke of Jinjing, he felt that his stomach was swollen before eating, and he went to the toilet, but he accidentally fell into the dung pit and drowned, which shows the depth of the dung pit.

The Xijin mansion toilet was mistaken for the master's bedroom

——Ming high-class toilet "does not smell filthy also"

Later, the toilets became more and more exquisite, and many luxury toilets appeared. For example, in the Jin Dynasty, the toilets of some aristocratic families were simply villas, and modern five-star toilets were not so exquisite. According to the "Book of Jin and the Biography of Liu Wei", the toilet of Shi Chong's family, a super-rich man in the Western Jin Dynasty, is a super luxury toilet, with exquisite decoration, "there is a red pattern tent, the mattress is very beautiful, and the two maids hold incense sachets". When it is convenient for the toilet user, they also need to change into new clothes. Liu Wei was an important minister in the court at that time, and he had never been to such a toilet, so he mistakenly thought that he had entered Shi Chong's bedroom. Liu Wei was not used to it, and finally found an ordinary toilet.

Wang Dun, the general of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, went to the toilet of his wife Princess Wuyang (the daughter of Sima Yan of the Jin Dynasty) for the first time, and made a big joke because he was too luxurious and exquisite, and was included in the "Mistakes" volume of "New Words of the World" by Liu Yiqing of the Southern Dynasty. At that time, there were dried dates in the toilet, which was used to stuff his nose, and Wang Dun thought it was for toilet consumption, so he ate all the dates. When he got out of the toilet, the maid brought him soapy water to wash his hands, and he drank it all as tea.

The toilets of Shi Chong and Princess Wuyang belong to private toilets, and luxury public toilets were also available in ancient times. In the anonymous novel "Digging a New Pit and Saving Ghosts to Become Rich Lords" in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, the toilet built by the owner Mu Taigong can be said to be a kind of rural toilet.

Mu Taigong is a farmer in Wu\Cheng\ County, Zhejiang, Jianghu, Zhou, and has built three toilets at home, which are freshly painted and decorated inside and out, which is cleaner and more comfortable than the villagers' bedrooms. He also asked someone to write poems and paint them, and posted them on the toilet wall, "climbing a new pit is like seeing a scene." Anyone who comes to the toilet will also receive a free toilet paper.

The public toilet built by Mrs. Mu is very high-end, and the service is good, and over time, the "Xinkeng Mujia" toilet brand has been played, and many ladies also want to go to such a toilet and ask if there is a women's toilet. In order to meet the demand, Mrs. Mu built another women's toilet. Mrs. Mu built such a good toilet, but it was only for collecting feces, and he saw the "toilet economy" and made a fortune by selling dung.

Although "Xinkeng Mu Family" is a novel description, it is not divorced from reality. In the Ming Dynasty, the toilet in Mrs. Mu's house was actually nothing, and there were more high-end toilets. Ming Gu Yuanqing's "Yunlin Legacy" introduced this kind of toilet: "Its toilet is based on high-rise buildings, with wooden lattices and goose feathers in the middle. Wherever it goes, the goose feathers will cover it, and a boy will be next to it, and it will be easy to go, and there will be no filth. ”

In the Han Dynasty, toilets were already divided into men and women

——About 50 people in the Ming military camp "opened a toilet pit"

In ancient times, toilets were shared by men and women, and only "first come, first served" was spoken, and this situation also exists in modern times. But after all, there is a difference between men and women, especially public toilets, if men and women share them, it is obviously very inconvenient, not to mention privacy protection. With the progress of human civilization, it is natural that toilets are divided into men and women.

The specific time when the toilet was separated from men and women is not clearly recorded in historical materials. It can be inferred from modern archaeological excavations that by the Han Dynasty at the latest, toilets were divided into men and women.

In Shaanxi \ Western Han \ Central \ City \ Han \ Taiwan \ District, from a tomb has unearthed a Ming vessel "green glazed pottery toilet" in the late Western Han Dynasty Wang Mang period, this pottery toilet has a roof, from the side of the gable open two doors. The toilet is separated by a wall, and there is also a short wall outside the door, separating the left and right sides, distinguishing the men's and women's toilets.

In addition to the conjoined design of men's and women's toilets, a partitioned design has also been found in archaeology, that is, the men's and women's toilets are separated. In the collection of the China Agricultural Museum, there is a Han Dynasty pottery toilet is this design, the toilet and the pigsty are built together, and a toilet is built on each side of the pigsty, which is the men's toilet and the women's toilet. The advantages of this design are, firstly, to reduce accidental entry, and secondly, to avoid the embarrassment of men and women meeting at the same time, which is more reasonable than the parallel design of the two doors of the green glazed ceramic toilet.

However, in terms of the ratio of male and female toilets, there were no more female toilets than male toilets in ancient times, which is a self-evident reflection of the low social activity of women in ancient times. Now the Beijing \ Beijing \ City \ plan \ male and female toilets are designed according to 1:2, which reflects the opposite style of the times, and the social role of women has "turned over".

For the number of toilets, the ancients considered it according to the proportion of the population, and this planning concept is revealed in the book "The Practical Record of Military Training" by Ming Qi Jiguang. In the seventh volume, the number of military toilets is specified as follows: "Each horse army has one flag (each flag has jurisdiction over three to five teams, each team has 11 people), and each vehicle has two vehicles (24 people per car), and each has a toilet pit in its own place." That is, in the Qi family barracks, about 50 people will build a toilet.

The emergence of "toilet administrators" in the Han Dynasty

——In the Qing Dynasty, there was a paid public toilet "those who enter must pay a penny"

Since there are public toilets, there is a need for managers, that is, as the saying goes, "look at the toilet", especially in cities, toilet sanitation is related to the entire urban environment.

The "palace people" who appear in "Zhou Li" are actually toilet administrators. Legend has it that the earliest person with a name and surname "watching the toilet" was Liu An, the king of Huainan. Liu An is the grandson of Liu Bang, the ancestor of the Han Dynasty, and the "Liu An" article in the Taiping Guangji (Volume 8) quotes the "Legend of the Immortals" as saying that Liu An committed "great disrespect" when he met the heavenly immortals on the way to heaven after his death, and was accused of going to the emperor. was supposed to be driven out of the fairyland, but after the eight princes interceded, "I will be pardoned and kept the toilet for three years." "After showing the toilet to Heavenly Court for three years, Liu An became an immortal.

Obviously, this is a myth and legend, and it is impossible for Liu An to see the toilet after his death, but it reflects the fact that the toilet was managed by a special person in ancient times.

In the Qing Dynasty, there was a new change in the management of public toilets, and paid toilets appeared. This is the same as the increase in the proportion of female toilets in public toilets in Beijing now, which was also a new thing in those days.

"Yanjing Miscellaneous Records" records that at that time, "in the public toilets in Beijing and Beijing, those who enter the toilet must pay money". How much do you pay? "Those who enter will be paid a penny". Pay the money to enter, and you can get two pieces of toilet paper. "One money", that is, one penny, in northern Jiangsu that year, 25 wen could buy a pound of fresh fish, which shows that the toilet charges in Beijing were still expensive at that time.

Because of the profitability, there is a phenomenon of private people opening public toilets in society. In order to attract "business" and increase business income, toilet owners often advertise, post attractive cloth pictures outside the toilet, erect a large billboard, and write words such as "clean wool room". Books such as novels are also placed in the toilet for toilet users to read and strive for "repeat customers".

Toilet charges are a way to manage public toilets through economic means. However, the toilet charges also have a negative effect, and many people simply do not go to the toilet, and "everyone is drowning in the road", so that in the past, the health of the Beijing and Beijing cities was very bad, and even the Eight-Nation Coalition forces that came in could not stand it.