The Sacred Island of Delos and its Plumbing

The island of Delos is at the center of the Cyclades island group in the Aegean Sea. It's one of the most important mythological and archaeological sites in Greece.

Delos was inhabited since the 3rd millennium BC. It was a holy sanctuary back then. Two conical mounds are visible from its Sacred Harbor, they identify the landscape as holy to a goddess of a pre-Greek religion. Much later, in Mycenaean times (1600-1200 BC), it was believed to be the birthplace of the deities Apollo and Artemis.

After the Greek Dark Ages and the emergence of the Ancient Greek culture, Delos became dedicated to the Ancient Greek religion. These are the famous lion statues on the Terrace of the Lions near the Sanctuary of Apollo. They were dedicated to Apollo shortly before 600 BC by the people of Naxos.

Delos was a major cult center from 900 BC to 100 AD. It went through a number of cycles in which businesses would be established around the pilgrimage activity. At times it had the largest slave market in the region, and a number of large homes were built during these periods. But then the island would be "cleansed" of economic activity and re-dedicated purely to religion.

The Delian League started meeting here after its foundation in 478 BC, after the Persian wars.

The Lake House has only recently been excavated. This is the αποχορετεριον, the apochoreterion or latrine. As the sign there says,

Next to the secondary entrance, far from the main rooms, is the apochoreterion (latrine) and the mageireion (kitchen, or cookhouse). A closed door isolates these two areas from the atrium to keep the masters of the house from being disturbed by any unpleasant smells. The baths were in a separate room with clay bathtubs.

The road from the Sacred Lake district toward the twin mounded peaks is made from broad paving stones.

A sewer channel runs beneath this street.

The House of the Trident is one of the impressive homes built during the periods when permanent settlement was allowed. Here you can see the mosaic tile of its central atrium.

Below you see two views of its large latrine.

A water supply from further up the hill washed the waste down through this channel, under the atrium floor, and out underneath the front of the house to join the sewer line running under the paving blocks of the street.

Like all the Cycladic islands, back then as well as now, Delos had a very limited water supply. It's a small and rather barren island that receives little rainfall.

Very clever systems of cisterns, aquaducts, and underground channels were devised.

This series of arches forms a large public cistern for collecting and storing what water is available. It would have been roofed over and appeared from above to be just another plaza.

Rose George's The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters is a fascinating description of sanitation conditions around the world. "2.6 billion people don't have sanitation. [....] Four in ten people have no access to any latrine, toilet, bucket, or box. [....] Poor sanitation, bad hygiene, and unsafe water — usually unsafe because it has fecal particles in it — cause one in ten of the world's illnesses. [....] Diarrhea — nearly 90 percent of which is caused by fecally contaminated food or water — kills a child every fifteen seconds. The number of children who have died from diarrhea in the last decade [1998-2008] exceeds the total number of people killed by armed conflict since the Second World War.

In September 2009, Morna Gregory and Sian James published a book titled Toilets of the World. It's pretty much the same theme that you find here — photographs and commentary on other people's plumbing.

The Porcelain God: A Social History of the Toilet, by Julie Horan, contends that civilization began with the toilet.

Toilet: Public Restrooms and the Politics of Sharing, edited by Laura Noren and Harvey Molotch, has essays by anthropologists, sociologists, and architects on the importance of the toilet, especially for urban dwellers.

Latrinae Et Foricae: Toilets in the Roman World describes the toilets of the Roman Empire from Iberia to Syria, and from North Africa to Hadrian's Wall in Britannia.

Toilets, Bathtubs, Sinks, and Sewers: A History of the Bathroom, explains the history of personal cleanliness and hygiene to children in grades 5-8.

If you're not bored yet, you might be interested in (or at least tolerate):

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