Fascinating subject

I'll want to check this one out.

clipped from www.npr.org The 'Dirt on Clean' in an Oversanitized World All Things Considered, November 17, 2007 · Medieval Europeans weren't as smelly and sweaty as the modern-day world perceives them to be. Public bathhouses were very popular and the wealthy had private baths. It was only in the 14th century — after the Black Death killed at least 25 million people — that the French determined that hot baths left people susceptible to illness. That belief would hold firm in Europe for the next 200 years. In her new book, The Dirt on Clean: An Unsanitized History, Katherine Ashenburg looks at the fascinating history of cleanliness — or the lack thereof — and how humans' obsession with hygiene has led to today's over sanitized world. Americans, Ashenburg writes, were just as grimy as Europeans until the Civil War. But the Union convinced citizens that good hygiene helped control disease.