What's the Poop on Ancient Toilets and Toilet Habits?

Today we view the ancient world through a highly sanitized lens. In reality, the Roman world was a filthy, malodorous, and unhealthy place. This article focuses on ancient toilet habits and toilet facilities, with special consideration of the situation in Roman Palestine and rabbinic Judaism. The toilet habits at Qumran—where excrement was considered a source of impurity, defecating on the Sabbath was prohibited, and the sectarians practiced toilet privacy—are exceptional for antiquity. In contrast, rabbinic Judaism did not associate excrement and defecation with ritual impurity. The final sections of the article discuss the toilet in the temple of Jerusalem and its priests’ toilet habits, as well as Jesus’ position on the impurity of excrement.