23. People Used Urine to Do Their Laundry
When people washed their laundry in medieval times, they cared a lot more about removing dirt, grease, and stains. There was no fuss about making clothes smell like roses, or using fabric softener. Many poor people would go days or weeks without washing their clothes, or simply rinsing them off in lakes and rivers. But for the upper class, they could afford to hire services of a laundry woman to give their clothing a deeper clean. Instead of detergent, they used “lye”, which was a mixture of white ash and urine. As gross as it sounds, urine contains ammonia, which helped to remove stains from clothing. According to records, the urine also acted like bleach, taking away stains and turning yellowed fabric white again. Personally, I don’t want to experiment with this any time soon.