Looking at all the clothing (made of natural fibers like wool and silk) which says “dry clean only” makes me wonder what people did to clean their clothes when there was no dry cleaning? It’s a relatively new invention… How did they keep their clothes from shrinking and felting up? An internet search yielded only a reference to dry cleaning in the 1800’s where flammable chemicals like gasoline (!) were used, but clothes made out of the fibers I mentioned have been around for much longer.
Thanks
My WAG …
In the days of yore, when all clothes were made of natural fibres and were taken down to the local river, or wherever, for a good ole scrubbin’ …
Clothes weren’t tailored to fit the body the way they are today - they were made pretty shapeless and “contoured” with the aid of belts, buttons etc. So a bit of shrinkage probably went unnoticed.
As I say, just a WAG.
Julie
Umm. I beg to differ on the “not tailored” part. Haven’t you ever looked at the way people are dressed in old paintings? If anything, clothing was moretailored more complicated and much more expensive to make back then than it is now. Even common folk had fitted clothes. Most people didn’t have 30 changes of clothing like we do now, which made washing even more important.
Here’s my stab at the question:
First of all, in days of yore not only did the people bathe much less frequently, they washed their clothes less often, too. Especially in winter.
Second, some of the “dry clean only” rules are, in part, because of the chemicals we use on the non-dry cleaning these days. There is no reason you can’t wash silk (as an example) in soap and water - but add bleach and your silk disappears. For really fine, sheer silks the residues of chemicals left from a prior load in either a commercial or residential washing machine can leave holes or worse. Hence, “dry clean only”. Or handwashing.
You can also wash wool in water. In fact, back in the days when I was learning how to process wool from “sheep to sweater” we had to wash the fleece, and we did NOT dry clean it! (I’ve never understood why some folks are enamored of wool “spun in the grease”. Hey, a sheep was living in that and they are filthy, filthy, filthy creatures. Not to mention you can pick up charming disease like anthrax wearing “spun in the grease” clothing if the sheep wasn’t adequately immunized or whatever). You CAN wash wool in soap and water BUT (and this is very important) you must not agitate it!. VERY gentle squooshings. Otherwise, it turns into felt. What do modern washing machines do? Whomp the bejessuz out of your clothes on the “spin” cycle. So no wool in the washing machine. Either dry clean or hand wash (with very gentle squooshings).
All of this probably had something to do with why folks had a “Sunday best” outfit and took a bath on Saturday night before putting them on - it keep your best outfits in better condition and the stench down. Work clothes were probably quite nasty by our standards. Also, remember that folks wore more layers in the past - the top layer might have been kept washed and such, and the underbits less so, because washing a lot of clothes by hand is hard, physical labor and without mechanical dryers, drying them could be difficult, too.
Slight hijack: I’ve never heard this term “spun in the grease”. Care to dispel my ignorance?
This may very well be the way it was. However, if it was me, I’d be more concerned with washing the underwear. I’d rather wear a pair of jeans for a second day without washing, than a pair of undies! Also, depending on the time period we’re talking about, women tended to wear things like aprons, etc., which were easy to wash, to keep their hard-to-wash dresses cleaner.
Spun in the grease: (context: wool processing) A method of converting fleece wool into yarn by first carding (a combing type process) to remove large debris, then spinning, THEN washing the wool prior to using dye. (Some advocates even forgo the wash-and-dye part for a truly natural look - and presumably “natural” aroma). Although the surface of the resulting yarn is clean, the inner core retains dirt and debris.
I was taught that you first remove large debris, wash the fleece until the rinse water runs clear (this may take mutliple washings), THEN you card the wool. At which point you can either dye then spin (technical term is “dyed in the wool”) or spin first then dye.
Wool thread, such as used in true Scottish tartan, or fine suit materials, is always washed prior to spinning - “spun in the grease” just doesn’t seem to allow for as fine a thread, and it doesn’t allow for as even a dye job. Advocates of grease-spinning claim that is is more “natural” (so are barnyard diseases) and will wax lyrical on how the oils and grease are so good for your skin. Well, OK, lanolin is a great moisturizer, but this stuff is filthy - you can pick up nasty skin infections from it, and I’ve known folks to acquire poison ivy rashes from it (if the sheep rolls in it before shearing, the plant oils that cause the problem mix with the fleece oils and stay in the wool) and incredible allergic dermatitis from it due not to a “wool allergy” but rather to a wool contaminent allergy. Grease advocates also claim washing “strips” the wool of all oils. Not true. Proper washing results in clean wool which still contains some lanolin. If you still want that slimy feel you can add refined lanolin back in. Frankly, part of the reason these folks want the grease is that it makes the wool easier to spin - but a little more refined skill will take care of that, and give you a better yarn or thread to boot.
As for the underwear issue - yeah, I’d be more concerned about delicate underthings myself. But lots of folks in the past never heard of underwear at all. And human hygiene was pretty abysmal by our standards throughout Europe from the fall of the Roman Empire through the 20th Century, and no better in the Americas if you’re talking about the non-Natives. Not conversant enough about Asia to comment, although I think the Japanese, at least, were into bathing on a regular basis.
And you’re right about the aprons - that’s sort of why they were invented, to spare the clothing underneath.
All true. I guess it’s just that, given my narrow world-view and my spoiled American ways, that level of lack-of-hygiene is mind-boggling and incomprehensible to me!
For most of history, northern Europeans didn’t have a way to dry their wash during the winter. Washing was a summer activity. Those who could would stash a pile of dry clothes for the cold periods.
No wonder those Vikings got a little testy.
Yeah, and you could smell their “testys” from a mile away!
Well, since were on the subject of garment nastiness, I might as well mention what was used as a common de-greaser/cleaning agent prior to the Modern Era:
stale urine
Really. You set aside human urine for a number of days, waiting for an overpowering amonia aroma to get going. The amonia is what acted as the cleaning agent, and yes, it was commonly used to clean wool, both in the initial processing and later. Was also used in some cultures to wash hair and people, particularly where water was scarce.
Some folks maintained it had to be the urine of pre-pubescent children, or adult men, or whatever – all of which might have affected the exact quality of the resulting aromas, but really, it was the amonia that did the trick.
A lot of clothing couldn’t be washed at all. Very elaborate clothing, like that of the wealthy in the Elizabethan Age couldn’t be cleaned, except through spot washing to remove stains. The item may have been “aired” to try to remove the worst of the odors, but completely submerging some clothing items in water was impossible. Sometimes, the clothing was perfumed.
Body odor was not a probblem like it is today. Everyone stank. It was just a fact of life. Some dresses had removable sweat pads, and women wore many layers of undertings beneath the dress, which hopefully kept the outer garment from getting soiled.
In my museum, we have several dresses which date from the mid 1800’s. They’re incredibly elaborate, and apparently, were never washed. Body oils have heavily stained the inner linings, and the sweat pads, still attatched, are as hard as a rock.
It was only after the early 1900’s that Americans were finally shamed into frequent bathing and washing their clothing out of fear of disease.
Another point is that the slogan, “Cleanliness is next to godliness” is a modern one and an explicit reaction to the idea, widespread in the middle ages, that washing, frequent washing anyway, was sinful since it showed too much concern with the body and affairs of this life. I am not sure when this attitude changed.
When I lived in Zurich for 6 months in 1967, I was astonished to discover that we got to use the laundry room 3 days each month. Three consecutive days, that is! What, we didn’t have clothes for 30 days? Well, it turns out that the Swiss were accustomed to change their clothes (including underwear) only once a week. Every night, they aired them out, however. We had a year-old baby (as well as a new infant by the time we left) and we were able to find a diaper service. But it was brand new and the owner, it turned out, had spent a year in the US learning how to make it work. Without that, I do not know what we would have done. Paper diapers were not available (and were very new and not very satisfactory in the US). They also had a saying that Americans shop once a week and take a bath every day, while Swiss shop every day and bathe once a week.
The “never washed their clothes” argument, might be fun to think about but it doesn’t explain how people cleaned their shrinkables. I’ve seen paintings of washerwomen - this was a profession. If dirty clothes were so acceptable, then why isn’t anyone ever painted with dirty clothes? Even peasants have clean clothes. Besides, I can’t believe that we suddenly changed our values about clothing cleanliness in the 1930’s when dry cleaning became more widespread with the advent of safer chemicals.
I sometimes feel the “people were dirty” argument is bolstered by movies where anyone depicted in the middle ages is dirty. (See “Braveheart” - why does everyone in Scotland have dirt on their faces and messy hair?) Grave goods found throughout the millennia indicate that human beings were always concerned about their appearance. (elaborate combs, etc)
I do think clothes were washed much more frequently than people were. It was also much more difficult back then to keep clothing clean, in a time when not everything was paved. So someone had to do the laundry at some point, and I’m interested in the technical process for things that shrink.
Also, the Japanese have a long history of cleanliness, and also a long history of tailored clothing. So what did they do to clean their clothes? Before the advent of mass production, clothes were very expensive and not likely to be discarded just because they were dirty.
I think Broomstick addresses that:
**
Yes it was. Washerwomen were employed by the wealthy to wash their undergarments. The nobility prided themselves on white under-linen. Their outer garments were ofetn slashed in order to show it off.
The desirability of white linen came from how difficult it was to keep clean, because the flesh below was incredibly filthy. By displaying a lot of snowy linen, a nobleman bragged of his wealth. Underlinen could be bought by the wealthy in large quantities, whereas the outer garments were extraordinarily expensive. As one scholar put it, “A nobleman may wear his entire fortune on his back.”
The outer garments often were made of unwashable material. Velvet covered in pearls cannot be scrubbed, obviously, nor can embroidered cloth-of-gold. Outer garments were brushed, scented and aired, but never submerged in water.
**
Portraits show their subjects in their best clothes. Once a garment became too worn or visably dirty, those wealthy enough to afford having their portraits painted would simply have purchased a new garment.
Simply put, expensive garments couldn’t be washed. The garments of the poor, which probably could, weren’t washed because the peasants saw no reason to do so.
**
Paintings of peasants are idealized. People only wanted to see the romanticized version of peasantry, which means you rarely see paintings of starving, diseased, filthy peasants. The peasants in paintings are often plump, happy, well-dressed individuals. The reality was much harsher.
Most of the time, a peasant only owned one garment, and often had no underclothes at all. They were simply too expensive. Most peasants never had a new garment in their lives: they bought used clothes, most likely with the dirt of the previous owner still meshed in the fabric.
Most peasants probably didn’t see any sense in washing their clothes. Their flesh certainly was never washed, because bathing was considered to be at least unhealthy, if not sinful. The peasants saw nothing wrong with good, honest dirt.
**
The push toward personal hygiene came from a desire to prevent communicable disease. After 1900, people began to connect dirt with illness, and bathing became a “high class” thing to do.
Advertising had a lot to do with it, I think. Soap and deodorant makers began hinting that body odor was socially shameful, and American’s took notice.
**
If anything, they probably would have been dirtier than they’re portrayed in the films. And it wasn’t just the Scots-- most peasants in Europe were equally filthy. Only the wealthy could afford a semblance of cleanliness.
Their teeth would have been rotten, because of the complete lack of dental hygiene. (Even the rich merely rubbed their teeth with a cloth.) Many would have been scarred from disease or accidents. They may have had open, running sores. Getting your head wet was considered a sure-fire way to catch a fever, so their hair would have been caked with grease. Their body odor would probably make a modern person physically ill.
**
Generally, only the wealthy had grave goods. The poor need those things for the living.
Don’t confuse filthiness with a disconcern for appearance. To people of the past, appearance did matter, but they focused on other attributes than cleanliness. Physical stature, fashionable clothing, hairstyle and a “pretty face” were what mattered, not the dirt coating the skin.
A poor housewife who bought fabric that shrunk would have been incredibly stupid, since the garment would be completely impractical. They would have purchased a more sensible fiber, one which they could care for.
Those who could afford such fabrics still wouldn’t have washed them, because they would have underlinen which kept the fabric from touching the body. Once it became too dirty, they would get rid of it and buy another.
There are many passages in *The Tale of Gengi * which talk about “scenting” robes, which is either by directly applying perfume, or by holding the robe in incense smoke.
Remember that the Japanese wore many layers of robes. The simplest under-robe may have been a washable garment, but it probably was impossible truly to wash the heavy silk outer robes. Since they never came in contact with the flesh, they probably didn’t need to be washed, just like we don’t wash our coats every time we wear them.
**
Yes it was. Washerwomen were employed by the wealthy to wash their undergarments. The nobility prided themselves on white under-linen. Their outer garments were ofetn slashed in order to show it off.
The desirability of white linen came from how difficult it was to keep clean, because the flesh below was incredibly filthy. By displaying a lot of snowy linen, a nobleman bragged of his wealth. Underlinen could be bought by the wealthy in large quantities, whereas the outer garments were extraordinarily expensive. As one scholar put it, “A nobleman may wear his entire fortune on his back.”
The outer garments often were made of unwashable material. Velvet covered in pearls cannot be scrubbed, obviously, nor can embroidered cloth-of-gold. Outer garments were brushed, scented and aired, but never submerged in water.
**
Portraits show their subjects in their best clothes. Once a garment became too worn or visably dirty, those wealthy enough to afford having their portraits painted would simply have purchased a new garment.
Simply put, expensive garments couldn’t be washed. The garments of the poor, which probably could, weren’t washed because the peasants saw no reason to do so.
**
Paintings of peasants are idealized. People only wanted to see the romanticized version of peasantry, which means you rarely see paintings of starving, diseased, filthy peasants. The peasants in paintings are often plump, happy, well-dressed individuals. The reality was much harsher.
Most of the time, a peasant only owned one garment, and often had no underclothes at all. They were simply too expensive. Most peasants never had a new garment in their lives: they bought used clothes, most likely with the dirt of the previous owner still meshed in the fabric.
Most peasants probably didn’t see any sense in washing their clothes. Their flesh certainly was never washed, because bathing was considered to be at least unhealthy, if not sinful. The peasants saw nothing wrong with good, honest dirt.
**
The push toward personal hygiene came from a desire to prevent communicable disease. After 1900, people began to connect dirt with illness, and bathing became a “high class” thing to do.
Advertising had a lot to do with it, I think. Soap and deodorant makers began hinting that body odor was socially shameful, and American’s took notice.
**
If anything, they probably would have been dirtier than they’re portrayed in the films. And it wasn’t just the Scots-- most peasants in Europe were equally filthy. Only the wealthy could afford a semblance of cleanliness.
Their teeth would have been rotten, because of the complete lack of dental hygiene. (Even the rich merely rubbed their teeth with a cloth.) Many would have been scarred from disease or accidents. They may have had open, running sores. Getting your head wet was considered a sure-fire way to catch a fever, so their hair would have been caked with grease. Their body odor would probably make a modern person physically ill.
**
Generally, only the wealthy had grave goods. The poor need those things for the living.
Don’t confuse filthiness with a disconcern for appearance. To people of the past, appearance did matter, but they focused on other attributes than cleanliness. Physical stature, fashionable clothing, hairstyle and a “pretty face” were what mattered, not the dirt coating the skin.
A poor housewife who bought fabric that shrunk would have been incredibly stupid, since the garment would be completely impractical. They would have purchased a more sensible fiber, one which they could care for.
Those who could afford such fabrics still wouldn’t have washed them, because they would have underlinen which kept the fabric from touching the body. Once it became too dirty, they would get rid of it and buy another.
There are many passages in *The Tale of Gengi * which talk about “scenting” robes, which is either by directly applying perfume, or by holding the robe in incense smoke.
Remember that the Japanese wore many layers of robes. The simplest under-robe may have been a washable garment, but it probably was impossible truly to wash the heavy silk outer robes. Since they never came in contact with the flesh, they probably didn’t need to be washed, just like we don’t wash our coats every time we wear them.
The main “shrinkable” was wool, and I already explained that.
You CAN wash wool in soap and water without it shrinking, IF you do not agitate or roll it, and do not change temperature abruptly. Given that hot water was not available from the tap, and it’s better to wash wool at room temperature anyway, and it was done by hand, it is entirely possible that an extremely soiled wool garmet could be washed. Such a material would NOT be “scrubbed”, rubbed on a washboard, or beaten on a rock, however. You do that with linen and cotten, not wool.
I also mentioned the stale urine solution, which will de-grease wool without shrinking it. Since soap was a luxury item through most of the middle ages, and in some times and places heavily taxed, and urine readily available this might have been a more common solution to the “dirty wool” problem.
In most places, wool tended to be an outer garment, with the cloth that actually touched the skin being cotton or linen. In the Middle Ages, linen was definiately more common, as flax grows throughout Europe and cotton is a warm weather crop. (As a side note, the processing of flax to produce linen is also an extremely smelly process).
I would agree that peoples’ undergarments would get washed or replaced more often than their outerwear - but “more often” is a relative term. Typically, neither bodies nor clothes would be washed during the cold of winter.
Wool produced by black or grey or brown sheep would tend not to show dirt as readily as white wool. We are very accustomed to bleached fabrics, but in earlier times browns, greys, and beiges - the natural colors of fibers - were much more typical.
Some types of clothing, those that are essentially a long piece of fabric wrapped around the body such as an Indian sari or the Medieval Scottish great kilt, could be refolded to a “fresh” section when part of it showed wear.
Given that Europeans used to house their cattle in the same room as their families, they obviously had a much higher tolerance for dirt and odor than present-day folks.
Heh heh heh, idn’t dat cute?
But it’s WRONG!
In the 18th century, gentleman’s breeches were remarkably close-cut. The traditional Scottish “trews” of the 17th century were as closely-contoured as modern “bike pants”. As for “shapeless”, tell me, have you even bothered to LOOK at surviving historical clothing? It is the 20th century that excels in “shapeless” clothes, not earlier eras.
Is there some kind of study of the clothing various people owned centuries ago? Does anyone know, for example, how many pair of underwear Abe Lincoln owned when he was a teenager? (I don’t necessarily mean Lincoln, but any frontier teenager. Have there been records preserved of people’s wardrobes or anything specific in terms of documentation?)
Or this is all guesswork?
What did they do before dry cleaning?
Stunk to high heaven.