Baths and Bathing at the Early Georgian Court
Resource type
Journal article
Creator (person)
Marschner, Joanna
Date published
1995
Abstract
The second half of the seventeenth century saw a lively debate between those who advocated bathing as beneficial to health, and those who decried it as damaging, except in the most carefully prescribed circumstances. Several serious outbreaks of plague and an uncertainty about the means by which this disease was transmitted, together with the growing association of public bathing houses with immoral purposes, had served to discourage bathing on any large scale. In 1655 the Frenchman T. Renaudot wrote 'the bath except for medical reasons, when absolutely necessary is not only superfluous, but very prejudicial to man'. However, by the end of the century the custom of bathing for recreational purposes was again in the ascendant, promoted in 1697 by Sir John Floyer who advocated 'temperate baths' for 'beauty and pleasure' as well as for 'cleanliness'. By 1769 William Buchan in Domestic Medicine was even more explicit.' A woman can have no excuse for allowing a child to be dirty. Poverty may oblige her to give it coarse cloaths, but if she does not keep them clean it would be her own fault. . . frequent washing not only removes the filth and sordes . . . but braces the body and enlivens the spirits.'
Journal title
Furniture History
Volume
31
Official URL
Keywords
Collection