[LINK] OT - delicate question

[Karl Auer]

Thank you to all those who have responded. Any more answers still
welcome :-)

It seems that corn cobs are basically a US thing, possibly still in use
in some Latin American countries. Used cobs are collected and burned as
fuel when dry. I suspect (but have no reference for this) that certain
forms of animal dung could have been used the same way.

The overwhelmingly most common solution in Australia and elsewhere, at
least since the invention of clean, cheap, ubiquitous paper, seems to
have been paper - generally newspapers (and mail order catalogues in the
US especially). Telephone books get a mention too.

Aside from that, it appears that the material used was geographically
determined - in some areas with broad soft leaved plants available,
these were used ("tobacco plant", "elephant ears", "lamb's ears"), also
some soft barks (birch) and sometimes dry leaf litter, sawdust, even
fine sand - rub it on, dust it off.

Natural materials like grasses and flat rocks are still pressed into
service by modern hikers and the like.

In the West at least, old cloth was sometimes used; the squares were put
in a covered pot of some sort after use, then washed, boiled and
re-used. Cotton waste was used when available, too. Sometimes the cloth,
cotton waste or whatever was wrapped around or wedged in a stick for
wiping (someone said the Romans used sponges on sticks).

Going back to when men were men and housing was not yet invented, it
appears that flat rocks, some shells and certain mosses were used. These
have been found in collections that were clearly ancient
dunny-equivalents.

Sometimes a smooth stick was used, often specially carved/shaped for the
purpose. Amazingly it was *re-used*. Seems to me this is a recursive
problem: What did they wipe the stick with? Maybe they didn't...

Some cultures used (and still use) their hands, washing afterwards with
water. This may be the origin of the left-hand taboo in some cultures.

Regards, K.

-- 
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Karl Auer (kauer at biplane.com.au)                   +61-2-64957160 (h)
http://www.biplane.com.au/kauer/                   +61-428-957160 (mob)

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