Transcription
How did people clean themselves before soap even existed?
In prehistoric times, washing meant death by hypothermia. Covered in a layer of animal fat and grime, people shielded themselves from the frost.
In ancient Egypt, the wealthy scrubbed their bodies with a paste made from clay, sand, and animal fat. Then, they rubbed themselves down with scented oils. You weren't clean. You were just marinated.
Romans didn't use soap at all. They covered their bodies in olive oil, then scraped the oil and all the dirt off with a metal blade called a stridel. They called it bathing.
In medieval Europe, bathing was considered medically dangerous. Water, they believed, opened the pores and let plague inside. The aristocracy replaced hygiene with masking odors. Using perfumes and powders, believing that hiding the stench was the same as cleanliness. The perfume didn't help. It just turned every royal court into a competition of who could smell the least like a corpse.
Today you have exfoliating lofah and 48-hour deodorant, thousands of years of hygiene, and you're still a stinky.