Weird Histories 5 | The Biggest Toilet in the World

Introduction

Nowadays, what with the big public toilets in airports and massive hotels and guest venues, you might think we have the biggest public toilets in history and you’d be right, but only partly right. It really depends on what your definition of “public toilets” is. Your definition is probably governed by the way we think nowadays. You think of a public toilet as a row of private, individual cubicles each containing its own toilet for you to use behind closed doors.

Oh how times have changed!

Weird Histories – Number 5: The Biggest Public Toilet in History… probably

The Roman definition of a public toilet was similar to yours but without the separate cubicles. The Romans, being more social than us, sat down to go to the toilet in groups. These groups weren’t always small either.

• So how Big was the Biggest Public Toilet?

According to the extensive research undertaken to write this learned article, the biggest public toilet still surviving is to be found in Libya. This public facility seated 50 along four walls of a rectangular room in Hadrian’s Baths. There was plenty of room for standing and waiting – so you could have taken your family and friends in with you and there would have been no need to pause your conversation. How weird is that?!

• Further Activities:

Read more about Roman Toilets and acceptable Roman Toilet behaviour CLICK HERE

It is a good idea to wind children up by telling them that you are going to install a Roman toilet so you can all sit down as a family – with any friends or passing strangers – to toilet together. Do tell them you are only joking if they are too young to share this kind of humour.