The toilet is the story of the emergence and development of a wonderful invention. Who invented the toilet? History of creation Toilet history of creation
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Origin of the Russian word "toilet"
There are two versions of the origin of the Russian word “toilet”:
Story
For the next hundred and fifty years, toilet design stagnated until the valve-type flush toilet was invented in 1738.
Somewhat later, London watchmaker Alexander Cummings developed a water seal. water closet), which solved the problem unpleasant odors, and in 1775 received a patent for this device.
In 1777, Joseph Preiser designed a cistern with a valve and handle.
There are toilets with a separate cistern, with a cistern installed on a shelf (the so-called compact), and monolithic. Separately located tanks require installation of a connecting pipe between the tank and the bowl. Earlier toilet designs involved installing the tank at a height of about 2 m to generate a sufficiently high flow of water. Subsequently, this design was replaced by compact toilets, which were easier to install and maintain. There are also toilets that require a hidden cistern installation.
Bowl
During the production process, the toilet bowl is cast in such a way that the visible open part of the bowl smoothly passes into the siphon located in the depths of the bowl (provides a water, that is, hydraulic seal for gases formed and accumulating in the sewer system), which then smoothly passes into the “outlet” (in fact outlet pipe).
Structurally, according to the direction of release, toilets are divided into two main groups - with a “horizontal” release and with a “vertical” release:
Toilets with “horizontal” outlet- the outlet of such a toilet is usually located at the rear of the bowl and directed backwards. The outlet pipe itself protrudes noticeably from the toilet body, and the outlet axis is located parallel or at a slight downward angle to the plane of the floor (or ceiling).
Such toilets are widespread primarily in Europe, including Russia and the CIS. Historically, this is due to the fact that the laying of sewer pipes here was carried out, as a rule, along the ceiling, usually along the walls (or partitions). And toilets with horizontal outlet are also installed, as a rule, against the wall, at right angles to it.
The outlet pipe of such a toilet is connected to the sewer pipe, usually with a special cuff. These toilets are attached to the floor (ceiling) through special holes in the bowl leg using screws with dowels or anchors. To install a toilet of the second type with a downward outlet in the case where the sewer pipes are located on top of the ceiling, the floor level under the toilet would have to be raised at least 15...20 cm above the ceiling level in order to hide the sewer bed, which is not always allowed by the design of the toilet And adjacent rooms(you get floors of different heights).
Toilets with “vertical” outlet have a built-in outlet pipe directed downward, hidden, like the siphon, in the main body of the toilet bowl. Such toilets are common in the USA and several other American countries. Here, for a long time, the routing of sewer pipes was carried out under the ceiling without reference to walls and partitions (together with the routing of ventilation and other engineering systems). Then these utilities were covered with a suspended or suspended ceiling, as is the case today.
A type 2 toilet with a downward outlet in this case can be installed at any angle to the walls anywhere in the room, even in the middle of the room. To do this, a special standard screw flange with a lock is mounted in the floor (the toilet is equipped with a corresponding standard mating part) and with round hole in the middle, into which the end is inserted sewer pipe.
The toilet is mounted by installing it on the flange and then turning it at a slight angle until it is fixed. At the same time, since the outlet pipe “looks” down, when installing the toilet, it is pressed against the end of the sewer pipe through a special sealing ring. The design of the screw flange connection allows you to dismantle and replace the toilet in a matter of minutes. The very place where the toilet is connected to the floor is not visible after its installation, so such a toilet looks aesthetically pleasing from the rear, that is, from the side of the tank, which makes it possible to install it indoors in any way.
Flush cistern
The tank is designed to supply the portion of water necessary to clean the toilet bowl. Compact toilet cisterns are usually made of ceramic, while freestanding cisterns can be made of plastic, cast iron, stainless steel and other materials.
A filling mechanism and a release mechanism are mounted in the tank. To fill the toilet, a float valve is used, which closes when the required water level is reached. The pipe for connecting to the water supply can be located either on the side surface (a tank with a side water supply) or at the bottom of the tank (with a bottom connection).
The descent mechanism is of two types: siphon and using a pear. A siphon drain was used in high-mounted tanks - when draining, after releasing the drain lever, water continues to flow due to the siphon effect. This design is quite noisy.
For low-lying tanks, the drain mechanism uses a rubber bulb, which floats up when the drain is activated and returns to its place, blocking the drain hole, only after the tank is emptied. To protect against overflow, an additional pipe is required, which can be either combined with the bulb or made as a separate unit. Dual-mode drainage mechanisms are also becoming widespread, which allow you to drain both the entire volume of water in the tank and a certain part of it.
toilet seat
Historically, the first seats and covers were made of wood, varnished. Currently, plastic structures are more common - they are more hygienic. Seats and covers differ in the quality of plastic and fastener design. In most cases, several toilet seats can be selected for the same toilet model: the so-called soft, semi-rigid and hard. The fastening of the toilet seat to the bowl can be metal or plastic, of various designs.
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An excerpt characterizing the toilet
The actions of Napoleon and Alexander, on whose word it seemed that an event would happen or not happen, were as little arbitrary as the action of each soldier who went on a campaign by lot or by recruitment. This could not be otherwise because in order for the will of Napoleon and Alexander (those people on whom the event seemed to depend) to be fulfilled, the coincidence of countless circumstances was necessary, without one of which the event could not have happened. It was necessary that millions of people, in whose hands there was real power, soldiers who shot, carried provisions and guns, it was necessary that they agreed to fulfill this will of individual and weak people and were brought to this by countless complex, varied reasons.Fatalism in history is inevitable to explain irrational phenomena (that is, those whose rationality we do not understand). The more we try to rationally explain these phenomena in history, the more unreasonable and incomprehensible they become for us.
Each person lives for himself, enjoys freedom to achieve his personal goals and feels with his whole being that he can now do or not do such and such an action; but as soon as he does it, this action, performed at a certain moment in time, becomes irreversible and becomes the property of history, in which it has not a free, but a predetermined meaning.
There are two sides of life in every person: personal life, which is the more free the more abstract its interests are, and spontaneous, swarm life, where a person inevitably fulfills the laws prescribed to him.
Man consciously lives for himself, but serves as an unconscious tool for achieving historical, universal goals. A committed act is irrevocable, and its action, coinciding in time with millions of actions of other people, receives historical meaning. The higher a person stands on the social ladder, than with big people he is bound, the more power he has over other people, the more obvious is the predetermination and inevitability of his every action.
“The heart of a king is in the hand of God.”
The king is a slave of history.
History, that is, the unconscious, general, swarm life of humanity, uses every minute of the life of the kings as an instrument for its own purposes.
Napoleon, despite the fact that more than ever, now, in 1812, it seemed to him that the verser or not verser le sang de ses peuples [to shed or not to shed the blood of his people] depended on him (as he wrote to him in his last letter Alexander), never more than now was he subject to those inevitable laws that forced him (acting in relation to himself, as it seemed to him, at his own discretion) to do for the common cause, for history, what had to happen.
Westerners moved to the East to kill each other. And according to the law of coincidence of causes, thousands of small reasons for this movement and for the war coincided with this event: reproaches for non-compliance with the continental system, and the Duke of Oldenburg, and the movement of troops to Prussia, undertaken (as it seemed to Napoleon) only to to achieve armed peace, and the love and habit of the French emperor for war, which coincided with the disposition of his people, the fascination with the grandeur of the preparations, and the expenses of preparation, and the need to acquire such benefits that would repay these expenses, and the stupefying honors in Dresden, and diplomatic negotiations, which, in the opinion of contemporaries, were carried out with a sincere desire to achieve peace and which only hurt the pride of both sides, and millions of millions of other reasons that were counterfeited by the event that was about to take place and coincided with it.
When an apple is ripe and falls, why does it fall? Is it because it gravitates towards the ground, is it because the rod is drying up, is it because it is being dried out by the sun, is it getting heavy, is it because the wind is shaking it, is it because the boy standing below wants to eat it?
Nothing is a reason. All this is just a coincidence of the conditions under which every vital, organic, spontaneous event takes place. And that botanist who finds that the apple falls because the fiber is decomposing and the like will be just as right and wrong as that child standing below who will say that the apple fell because he wanted to eat him and that he prayed about it. Just as right and wrong will be the one who says that Napoleon went to Moscow because he wanted it, and died because Alexander wanted his death: just as right and wrong will be the one who says that the one that fell into a million pounds the dug mountain fell because the last worker struck under it for the last time with a pickaxe. IN historical events so-called great people are labels that give names to an event, which, like labels, have the least connection with the event itself.
Each of their actions, which seems to them arbitrary for themselves, is in the historical sense involuntary, but is in connection with the entire course of history and is determined from eternity.
On May 29, Napoleon left Dresden, where he stayed for three weeks, surrounded by a court composed of princes, dukes, kings and even one emperor. Before leaving, Napoleon treated the princes, kings and emperor who deserved it, scolded the kings and princes with whom he was not entirely pleased, presented the Empress of Austria with his own, that is, pearls and diamonds taken from other kings, and, tenderly hugging Empress Maria Louise, as his historian says, he left her saddened by the separation, which she - this Marie Louise, who was considered his wife, despite the fact that another wife remained in Paris - seemed unable to bear. Despite the fact that diplomats still firmly believed in the possibility of peace and worked diligently for this purpose, despite the fact that Emperor Napoleon himself wrote a letter to Emperor Alexander, calling him Monsieur mon frere [Sovereign my brother] and sincerely assuring that he did not want war and that he would always be loved and respected - he went to the army and gave new orders at each station, with the goal of hastening the movement of the army from west to east. He rode in a road carriage drawn by six, surrounded by pages, adjutants and an escort, along the highway to Posen, Thorn, Danzig and Konigsberg. In each of these cities, thousands of people greeted him with awe and delight.
The army moved from west to east, and the variable gears carried him there. On June 10, he caught up with the army and spent the night in the Vilkovysy forest, in an apartment prepared for him, on the estate of a Polish count.
The next day, Napoleon, having overtaken the army, drove up to the Neman in a carriage and, in order to inspect the area of the crossing, changed into a Polish uniform and went ashore.
Seeing on the other side the Cossacks (les Cosaques) and the spreading steppes (les Steppes), in the middle of which was Moscou la ville sainte, [Moscow, the holy city,] the capital of that similar Scythian state, where Alexander the Great went, - Napoleon, unexpectedly for everyone and contrary to both strategic and diplomatic considerations, he ordered an offensive, and the next day his troops began to cross the Neman.
On the 12th, early in the morning, he left the tent, pitched that day on the steep left bank of the Neman, and looked through the telescope at the streams of his troops emerging from the Vilkovyssky forest, spilling over three bridges built on the Neman. The troops knew about the presence of the emperor, looked for him with their eyes, and when they found a figure in a frock coat and hat separated from his retinue on the mountain in front of the tent, they threw their caps up and shouted: “Vive l" Empereur! [Long live the emperor!] - and alone others, without being exhausted, flowed out, everything flowed out of the huge forest that had hidden them hitherto and, upset, crossed three bridges to the other side.
– On fera du chemin cette fois ci. Oh! quand il s"en mele lui meme ca chauffe... Nom de Dieu... Le voila!.. Vive l"Empereur! Les voila donc les Steppes de l"Asie! Vilain pays tout de meme. Au revoir, Beauche; je te reserve le plus beau palais de Moscow. Au revoir! Bonne chance... L"as tu vu, l"Empereur? Vive l" Empereur!.. preur! Si on me fait gouverneur aux Indes, Gerard, je te fais ministre du Cachemire, c"est arrete. Vive l"Empereur! Vive! vive! vive! Les gredins de Cosaques, comme ils filent. Vive l"Empereur! Le voila! Le vois tu? Je l"ai vu deux fois comme jete vois. Le petit caporal... Je l"ai vu donner la croix a l"un des vieux... Vive l"Empereur!.. [Now let's go! Oh! as soon as he takes charge, things will boil. By God... Here he is... Hurray, Emperor! So here they are, the Asian steppes... However, good-bye, Bose. I will leave you the best palace in Moscow. Goodbye. Have you seen the emperor? If I am made governor of India, I will make you the minister of Kashmir... Hurray! Here he is! I saw him twice like you. Little corporal... I saw how he hung a cross on one of the old men... Hurray, emperor!] - said the voices of old and young people, of the most diverse characters and positions in society. All the faces of these people had one common expression of joy at the beginning of the long-awaited campaign and delight and devotion to the man in a gray frock coat standing on the mountain.
On June 13, Napoleon was given a small purebred Arabian horse, and he sat down and galloped to one of the bridges over the Neman, constantly deafened by enthusiastic cries, which he obviously endured only because it was impossible to forbid them to express their love for him with these cries; but these screams, accompanying him everywhere, weighed on him and distracted him from the military worries that had gripped him since the time he joined the army. He drove across one of the bridges swinging on boats to the other side, turned sharply to the left and galloped towards Kovno, preceded by enthusiastic Guards horse rangers who were transfixed with happiness, clearing the way for the troops galloping ahead of him. Arriving at the wide Viliya River, he stopped next to a Polish Uhlan regiment stationed on the bank.
- Vivat! – the Poles also shouted enthusiastically, disrupting the front and pushing each other in order to see him. Napoleon examined the river, got off his horse and sat down on a log lying on the bank. At a wordless sign, a pipe was handed to him, he placed it on the back of a happy page who ran up and began to look at the other side. Then he went deep into examining a sheet of map laid out between the logs. Without raising his head, he said something, and two of his adjutants galloped towards the Polish lancers.
- What? What did he say? - was heard in the ranks of the Polish lancers when one adjutant galloped up to them.
It was ordered to find a ford and cross to the other side. Polish Lancer Colonel, handsome an old man, flushed and confused in words from excitement, asked the adjutant if he would be allowed to swim across the river with his lancers without looking for a ford. He, with obvious fear of refusal, like a boy who asks permission to mount a horse, asked to be allowed to swim across the river in the eyes of the emperor. The adjutant said that the emperor would probably not be dissatisfied with this excessive zeal.
As soon as the adjutant said this, an old mustachioed officer with a happy face and sparkling eyes, raising his saber, shouted: “Vivat! - and, commanding the lancers to follow him, he gave spurs to his horse and galloped up to the river. He angrily pushed the horse that had hesitated beneath him and fell into the water, heading deeper into the rapids of the current. Hundreds of lancers galloped after him. It was cold and terrible in the middle and at the rapids of the current. The lancers clung to each other, fell off their horses, some horses drowned, people drowned too, the rest tried to swim, some on the saddle, some holding the mane. They tried to swim forward to the other side and, despite the fact that there was a crossing half a mile away, they were proud that they were swimming and drowning in this river under the gaze of a man sitting on a log and not even looking at what they were doing. When the returning adjutant, having chosen a convenient moment, allowed himself to draw the emperor’s attention to the devotion of the Poles to his person, a small man in a gray frock coat stood up and, calling Berthier to him, began to walk with him back and forth along the shore, giving him orders and occasionally looking displeasedly at the drowning lancers who entertained his attention.
It was not new for him to believe that his presence at all ends of the world, from Africa to the steppes of Muscovy, equally amazes and plunges people into the madness of self-forgetfulness. He ordered a horse to be brought to him and rode to his camp.
About forty lancers drowned in the river, despite the boats sent to help. Most washed back to this shore. The colonel and several people swam across the river and with difficulty climbed out to the other bank. But as soon as they got out with their wet dress flopping around them and dripping in streams, they shouted: “Vivat!”, looking enthusiastically at the place where Napoleon stood, but where he was no longer there, and at that moment they considered themselves happy.
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There are toilets with a separate cistern, with a cistern installed on a shelf (the so-called compact), and monolithic. Separately located tanks require installation of a connecting pipe between the tank and the bowl. Earlier toilet designs involved installing the tank at a height of about 2 m to generate a sufficiently high flow of water. Subsequently, this design was replaced by compact toilets, which were easier to install and maintain. There are also toilets that require a hidden cistern installation.
Bowl
During the production process, the toilet bowl is cast in such a way that the visible open part of the bowl smoothly passes into the siphon located in the depths of the bowl (provides a water, that is, hydraulic seal for gases formed and accumulating in the sewer system), which then smoothly passes into the “outlet” (in fact outlet pipe).
Structurally, according to the direction of release, toilets are divided into two main groups - with a “horizontal” release and with a “vertical” release:
Toilets with “horizontal” outlet- the outlet of such a toilet is usually located at the rear of the bowl and directed backwards. The outlet pipe itself protrudes noticeably from the toilet body, and the outlet axis is located parallel or at a slight downward angle to the plane of the floor (or ceiling). Toilets with a downward-facing outlet are often called "slant-outlet toilets."
Such toilets are widespread primarily in Europe, including Russia and the CIS. Historically, this is due to the fact that the laying of sewer pipes here was carried out, as a rule, along the ceiling, usually along the walls (or partitions). And toilets with horizontal outlet are also installed, as a rule, against the wall, at right angles to it.
The outlet pipe of such a toilet is connected to the sewer pipe, usually with a special cuff. These toilets are attached to the floor (ceiling) through special holes in the bowl leg using screws with dowels or anchors. To install a toilet of the second type with a downward outlet in the case where the sewer pipes are located on top of the ceiling, the floor level under the toilet would have to be raised at least 15...20 cm above the ceiling level in order to hide the sewer bed, which is not always allowed by the design of the toilet and adjacent rooms (floors of different heights are obtained). An eccentric collar is used to connect such outlets with bends.
Toilets with “vertical” outlet have a built-in outlet pipe directed downward, hidden, like the siphon, in the main body of the toilet bowl. Such toilets are common in the USA and several other American countries. Here, for a long time, the routing of sewer pipes was carried out under the ceiling without reference to walls and partitions (together with the routing of ventilation and other engineering systems). Then these utilities were covered with a suspended or suspended ceiling, as is the case today.
A type 2 toilet with a downward outlet in this case can be installed at any angle to the walls anywhere in the room, even in the middle of the room. To do this, a special standard screw flange with a lock is mounted in the floor (the toilet is equipped with a corresponding standard mating part) and with a round hole in the middle into which the end of the sewer pipe is inserted.
The toilet is mounted by installing it on the flange and then turning it at a slight angle until it is fixed. At the same time, since the outlet pipe “looks” down, when installing the toilet, it is pressed against the end of the sewer pipe through a special sealing ring. The design of the screw flange connection allows you to dismantle and replace the toilet in a matter of minutes. The very place where the toilet is connected to the floor is not visible after its installation, so such a toilet looks aesthetically pleasing from the rear, that is, from the side of the tank, which makes it possible to install it indoors in any way.
Flush cistern
The tank is designed to supply the portion of water necessary to clean the toilet bowl. Compact toilet cisterns are usually made of ceramic, while freestanding cisterns can be made of plastic, cast iron, stainless steel and other materials.
A filling mechanism and a release mechanism are mounted in the tank. To fill the toilet, a float valve is used, which closes when the required water level is reached. The pipe for connecting to the water supply can be located either on the side surface (a tank with a side water supply) or at the bottom of the tank (with a bottom connection).
The descent mechanism is of two types: siphon and using a pear. A siphon drain was used in high-mounted tanks - when draining, after releasing the drain lever, water continues to flow due to the siphon effect. This design is quite noisy.
For low-lying tanks, the drain mechanism uses a rubber bulb, which floats up when the drain is activated and returns to its place, blocking the drain hole, only after the tank is emptied. To protect against overflow, an additional pipe is required, which can be either combined with the bulb or made as a separate unit. Dual-mode drainage mechanisms are also becoming widespread, which allow you to drain both the entire volume of water in the tank and a certain part of it.
toilet seat
Historically, the first seats and covers were made of wood, varnished. Currently, plastic structures are more common - they are more hygienic. Seats and covers differ in the quality of plastic and fastener design. In most cases, several toilet seats can be selected for the same toilet model: the so-called soft, semi-rigid and hard. The fastening of the toilet seat to the bowl can be metal or plastic, of various designs.
We get so used to everyday things that we rarely think about what they were like before, what they could be like in the future, and how we would live without them. One of those things we take for granted is the earthenware flush toilet. We already have a variety of models available for installation in an apartment, and today we offer to take a journey through the centuries and trace the development of the toilet design from the most ancient models to modern engineering masterpieces.
Ancient world
The first flush toilets are generally believed to have appeared in the Indus civilization in the third millennium BC. They connected with complex system Even in developed cities there were sewers in almost every house. From the second millennium, the Minoan civilization, which developed in Crete, began to use them.
The Roman Empire
In the centuries of prosperity of the Roman Empire, toilets were quite popular. Like the baths, they were public and connected to a sewer system through which water was periodically released. Unfortunately, with the decline of the empire, the culture of hygiene also declined, and until the end of the Middle Ages, few people cared about the issue of arranging latrines.
Ancient Roman toilet. Photo: Fr Lawrence Lew
Invention of the flush toilet
Sir John is credited with inventing the toilet Harington. It is believed that it was he who created for Catherine I a toilet equipped with a cistern with a valve for draining water.
In any case, the industrial revolution could not but influence the development of technology, and the growth of cities - the development of sewage systems, and gradually toilets began to spread and acquire modern look. This became possible thanks to Alexander Cumming's invention of the hydraulic seal - a U-shaped bend in pipes that prevents foul-smelling and dangerous sewer gases from entering the room.
In 1755, the bolt was patented, and the inventor Joseph Bramah opened the first workshop for the manufacture of flush toilets,starting to install them in London, and at the same time improving the design so that freezing water in winter would not interfere with the operation of the mechanisms.
Joseph Brahm's first flush toilet and Alexander Cummingon's hydraulic seal
English toilets
Only in the 19th century did toilets become a common and widespread item. The manufactory for their production was opened by George Jennings in the 1840s. The most renowned manufacturer toilets (and the holder of several patents for their improvements) was Thomas Crapper. But the ceramic toilet, which represents the unity of a cistern and a bowl (from the word unitas - “unity” - the name of this item), was invented by Thomas Twyford.
Spread around the world
Gradually, toilets began to spread throughout continental Europe. One of the first was installed in 1860 in the palace of Queen Victoria.
Toilets with cisterns raised to the ceiling also appeared in the United States. In 1906, William Sloan invented a flushing system that no longer worked by gravity, but by supplying water under pressure. A year later, a vortex flushing system was invented, in which water flowed down the bowl like a funnel, effectively washing away impurities from it. Toilets were improved, acquiring mechanisms and features familiar to us. In 1980, Bruce Thompson invented a cistern with two containers to save water, and Philip Haas came up with a toilet with a flush system of multiple holes under the rim.
One of Philip Haas's inventions
Modern design
Today, the designs of the toilets themselves, flushing systems and pipelines continue to be improved, and it is obvious that the familiar models with a cistern attached to the bowl are gradually giving way to more technically advanced and stylish models. They are developed by both new companies and veterans - for example, German company TESE, founded back in 1955. It was organized from a design bureau, so it still retains the typical engineering culture of asking questions: when working on projects, specialists strive to improve everything so that the mechanism works faster and more efficiently and looks as attractive as possible.
Modern toilets, like the rest of the equipment, tend to become built-in, and TECE is working precisely in this direction: the company develops wall modules made of high-strength steel, protected by a zinc layer and powder coating. Flush tanks are made of durable and strong plastic that can work properly under load for a calculated service life. Of course, a hidden structure is more difficult to install and repair, so you need to pay attention to the warranty period, which TECE has the longest on the market - up to 10 years.
Along with the technical improvement of hidden structures, modern companies are paying attention to the few structural elements that remain visible, in particular, flush keys. TECE are also market leaders in this regard: no other manufacturer offers such a variety of colors, textures and materials from which the panels are made. The TESE range of flushing systems will satisfy the tastes of the most demanding customer: here are classic buttons installed flush with the wall, rotary handles, and electronic panels for hygienic contactless flushing.
Multifunctional systems and integrated solutions are another important modern trend, which also applies to toilet structures. Thus, the TECElux multifunctional toilet terminal includes an air purification system, touch-sensitive flush keys, a dual flush system and height adjustment.
Finally, it is still possible to improve small details and invent micro-solutions that, despite their apparent insignificance, can significantly improve the quality of life. For example, the problem of splashing when flushing can be solved by installing restrictor rings to regulate the speed of water movement. Simple and elegant, isn't it?
As we see, technology does not stand still, and thanks to generations of engineers, toilets continue to improve, changing to suit our ideas of beauty and the requirements of maximum hygiene. Therefore, if you are going to make repairs, pay attention to the developments of the industry’s flagships and choose a modern system that adapts to your personal needs, and not a design from the last century, no matter how familiar and deceptively reliable it may seem.
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During archaeological excavations on the Orkney Islands, located off the coast of Scotland, scientists discovered stone walls houses, recesses connected to gutters. The finds turned out to be latrines, about 5,000 years old, dating back to the Neolithic era. Today they are considered the most ancient. Slightly younger than them are those found during excavations in Mohenjo-Daro (on the banks of the Indus River) and represented a more complex sewer system: sewage from latrines made at external walls houses, flowed into street ditches, along which they left the city. The latrine was a brick box with a wooden seat. Those toilets of the ancient Egyptians, which we have an idea of (mainly from excavations in Tell el-Amarna (XIV century BC) - the city of Pharaoh Akhenaten), are not connected to the sewer system, which, however, was well developed. In rich houses, behind the bathroom there was a latrine, whitewashed with lime. It contained a limestone slab placed on a brick box filled with sand, which had to be periodically cleaned out. In one of the ancient Egyptian burials in Thebes, dating back to the same century as the city of the famous pharaoh, a portable toilet made of wood was discovered, under which a clay pot was placed. In Mesopotamia, already in the 3rd millennium BC. there were toilets connected to drains through which human waste flowed, collecting in brick sewer wells. The toilet seats in the homes of wealthy people were made of brick.
Story modern toilets starts at Ancient Greece and developed by the ancient Romans. In rich houses there were latrines, sometimes located on the second floor, sewage from which was drained using special vessels into the sewers. In poorer homes they were content with pots. IN Ancient Rome For the first time, public toilets appeared on the street and at thermal baths, decorated with marble and ceramic slabs, and sometimes decorated with paintings. Sewage went into drains under the seats, from which they were washed running water and were carried away through a pipe system into special collectors - sewers. The famous Roman drain Cloaca maxima, which began ca. 500 BC, still exists today. With the fall of the Roman Empire, much was lost, including the principles of urban sanitation.
Cloaka Maxima, marked in redThe sewerage systems built by the Romans in conquered territories were destroyed, and new sewerage systems were rarely built during the Middle Ages. The role of the toilet was played by an ordinary potty placed under the bed, the contents of which spilled directly onto the street. True, there were still toilets in the castles with a primitive sewage system: they went outside the premises, as if hanging over the castle wall, and from these booths there was a stone drain, through which sewage flowed.
During the Renaissance, the construction of urban sewerage systems began to pick up pace. Although the night vase remains the most popular, by the 18th century. which was already a real work of art: faience chamber pots were painted and decorated with inlay. Among the nobility, the fashion for portable ceramic bidets spread. By the way, many famous companies producing sanitary ware grew out of small manufactories that produced earthenware, night vases and bidets. Since the end of the 16th century, the mainstream of toilet construction has moved to Britain. In 1590 (according to other sources - in 1589, according to third sources - in 1594, according to fourth sources - in 1596), Sir John Harington created for Queen Elizabeth I a working model of a toilet with a cistern and a water reservoir - almost as we know it Today. Harrington described his invention in detail in 1596 in the book "Metamorphoses of Ajax", not forgetting to list all the materials used and their prices. The first device cost 30 shillings and 6 pence. However, as historians write, the inventor made two cardinal mistakes. One relates to the design itself, the other, as they would say today, to its PR. The first was that the ancestor of the current water closet smelled strongly, which the monarch often complained about. The second mistake concerned the name: the inventor called his brainchild “Metamorphosis of Ajax” (in English slang “jax” means outhouse), which was understood by contemporaries as a metamorphosis of the throne, which is why the queen had to listen to a lot of jokes that annoyed her. According to other, very original information, sixty-year-old Elizabeth did not like the innovation due to the fact that she was seriously afraid that through the sewer system her enemies could deprive her of her virginity and thereby harm her. However, since in the years when Harrington designed his technical miracle, Londoners did not have running water, there was no question of mass use of the device. Some 50 years later, the French responded to the British challenge with their invention. King Louis 14 was presented with an unusual gift - a ship in the form of soft chair, where you could sit for hours waiting for a pleasant “moment” and gossip with visitors. A few words about the inventor himself. Harrington (1560 - 1612) is a remarkable personality in all respects. Godson of Queen Elizabeth I, but not a sycophant. For some time he was even excommunicated from the court for disrespectful epigrams. Translated into English “Roland the Furious” by Ariosto. He took part in Essex's military campaign in Ireland, where he was elevated to knighthood. There is even an opinion that he belonged to the same circle of family and spiritual aristocracy as William Shakespeare, and supposedly there is reason to believe that Harrington also had a hand in writing some of Shakespeare's comedies. If the above is true, one can only be surprised at the involvement of the creator of the first water closet in the circle of William Shakespeare. Remember, reader, that not the last of his minds struggled with this problem of humanity’s problems! Another thing is 1775, when London watchmaker Alexander Cumming created the first flush toilet - by this time London already had running water. Soon, in 1778, another inventor, Joseph Bramach, came up with a cast-iron toilet and a hinged lid. This toilet was already a success - the townspeople quickly bought it up. The toilets were also made of enameled steel. One such example can be seen in the Hofburg, the Viennese residence of the Habsburgs. Soon a faience toilet appeared - it was more convenient to wash.The golden hour of toilets struck in the 19th century. Unfortunately, it was not because of a good life that he struck. In 1830, Asiatic cholera, which spread through sewage-tainted water, wiped out millions of Europeans. Another scourge was typhoid fever. Governments have realized: it’s time to shell out money for sewerage. Accordingly, the question arose about modern-level toilet seats, to the development of which the creative mind of the designers turned. It was then that the “three musketeers” of toilet design appeared: George Jennings, Thomas Twyford and Thomas Crapper. Locksmith Thomas Krepper patented his invention - (toilet with drain barrel) from a small village in the north of England invented the modern toilet. The main thing in the invention is a U-shaped elbow with a water plug that separates the toilet room from the sewer pipe (according to other sources, it was invented in 1849 by Stefan Green, who invented a water trap - a U-shaped bend of the sewer pipe between the toilet and the sewer, blocking the return of bad odors (Some sorters attribute the credit for the invention of the “water trap” against stench to Cumming.) To increase the pressure, Krepper installed a tank of water under the ceiling, and attached a chain with a handle to the lever of the drain valve (again, this was probably Two Royal Engineers, George). Jennings and Thomas Twyford became interested in the village mechanic's invention and, adding an automatic water inlet tap (it didn't even have to be invented - such a tap was on all locomotives), presented the creation to Queen Victoria. Thomas Crapper became the most famous: the British still call toilets ". crapper,” a long sitting in the restroom is denoted by the verb “crap,” and in the inventor’s home village there is a church that is decorated with a stained glass window with a mosaic image of a toilet. And in 1915, the time came for siphon tanks, which can be placed very low - barely higher than the toilet seat. Although there is an opinion that a modern toilet with a flush (though made of iron with an enamel coating), operating on the principle of a siphon, was developed in England even earlier - in 1870.
In 1912, 40,000 toilets were manufactured in Russia. Even the Bolsheviks did not dare to stop this bacchanalia - in 1929, in Soviet Russia they made 150,000 toilets a year, and in Stalin’s first five-year plan, “sanitary faience” was a separate line: the country needed 280,000 toilets a year. The union, you know, is indestructible... This very device with a cast-iron tank under the ceiling and a handle on a chain is still preserved in station toilets and provincial military registration and enlistment offices. In the era of industrial housing construction of the 60s, “compacts” came to new apartments, that is, toilets with a lower earthenware cistern. Today they make up 92% of the country's toilet fleet. The advantages of old-fashioned compacts include low price and a relatively long service life - 20 years. The disadvantages are also known to everyone: poor quality ceramics, which quickly leads to telltale yellowing, extremely low quality drain fittings, noisy supply and drainage of water. Currently, hundreds of companies around the world are engaged in the production and sale of toilets. High technologies have long become the norm in toilet construction. The modern closet is endowed with additional functions and characteristics, ranging from aesthetic to medical. The production of toilet paper has a business turnover of 2.4 billion dollars a year. There is a toilet in almost every human home.03 Sep 2012
Toilet - well, everyone is familiar with this item. Except that in distant mountain villages they use other means of comfort. One of my friends, who came to the United States in the mid-seventies, was simply shocked to see a toilet with an ordinary toilet in the desert on the Mexican border, tens of kilometers from the nearest housing. But where does the unusual name of this wonderful device come from?
Compact toilet
The first toilet with a flush cistern was invented around 1596 by Sir John Harrington for Queen Elizabeth I. The author gave his invention the name “Ajax” and described it in detail in the book “Metamorphoses of Ajax”, describing all the materials used and their prices. The price of a Harrington toilet was quite high at that time (six shillings and eight pence), but water closets did not become widespread not because of the high cost, but because of the lack of water supply and sewerage in the English capital.
John Harrington.
Toilet design stagnated for the next two hundred years until the valve-type flush toilet was invented in 1738.
Somewhat later, Alexander Cummings developed a water seal. water closet), who solved the problem of unpleasant odors and in 1775 received a patent for this device.Siphon - water seal.
In 1777, Joseph Preiser designed a cistern with a handle-operated valve. In 1778, Thomas Krepper, the holder of several patents for plumbing inventions, invented a device for metered flushing of water, and the toilet acquired an almost modern appearance.
Cast iron cistern with a handle on a chain.In 1883, Thomas Twyford improved the Krepper model by making the bowl from a more aesthetically pleasing faience and equipping the structure with a wooden seat. He presented his creation called “UNITAS” in 1884 at the London International Health Exhibition. The product "UNITAS", that is, unity of aspiration and execution, received highest award- gold medal.
Dressing chair (Europe, 19th century)
At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Spanish company UNITAS, which means “unity” in Spanish, began supplying plumbing fixtures it produced to Russia. These devices were liked by the consumer and, as they say, were in great demand. Contractors who installed these plumbing products called them "Unitas fixtures" or simply "Unitas." Gradually, the incomprehensible word "unitas" was transformed into the word "toilet", with an emphasis on the letter "a". Perhaps this transformation occurred due to the presence in the Russian language of the word “taz”, which also refers to sanitary devices. However, the origin of the name of the product, so popular among all segments of the population, is symbolic. Perhaps nothing in the world unites people of all races and continents like this wonderful device: “Unitas” - a toilet.
Rural toilet in a subtropical design.
At the end of the 19th century, manufacturers of earthenware products from Russia purchased a license for the production of toilets in Russian Empire. Already in 1912, 40 thousand toilets were manufactured in Russia. In 1929, 150 thousand toilets were produced in the USSR, and in the first five-year plan, the production of toilets was a separate line: the country needed 280 thousand toilets per year. In those years, the toilet was a device with a cast-iron tank under the ceiling and a handle on a chain; they can still be found in communal apartments throughout the former USSR.
Before the introduction of toilets, maintaining sanitation in large crowds of people in one place was always a problem. In the Deuteronomy of Moses, warriors were required to carry with them not only weapons (sword, shield, spear) but also a shovel used for digging a hole before relieving natural needs and after, for burying In this way, elements of sanitation were instilled in the soldiers. Epidemics in the troops very often caused much greater losses than enemy weapons.The Israeli army crosses the Jordan.
Maintaining sanitation in the army has always been extremely important. Look at this wonderful document from the beginning of the century.
“Instructions for maintaining latrines” (1907).
In the United States, the adoption of toilets has been slower. The Seattle Museum displays the first toilet designed in the United States in 1890. Until then, toilets were imported from Europe, by the same Spanish company "UNITAS" and they produced their own licensed toilets. But then the United States moved quickly ahead, in this perhaps only the Japanese compete with them.
Technologically advanced toilet with electronic control panel. Tokyo, Japan, 2008
I shared with you the information that I “dug up” and systematized. At the same time, he is not at all impoverished and is ready to share further, at least twice a week. If you find errors or inaccuracies in the article, please let us know. I will be very grateful.
