Egypt of the Pharaohs and of the Khedivé

by F. Barham Zincke

CHAPTER XL.
ORIENTAL CLEANLINESS.

Wash and be clean.—II. Kings.

On the subject of cleanliness, Orientals’ ideas are the very reverse of what, to a time within the memory of the present generation of Englishmen, we entertained. Our idea used to be that it meant a clean shirt; theirs is that it means a clean skin. The Mr. Smith, who, some forty years ago, obtained, during his University career, his differentiating epithet from his practice of changing his linen three times a day, would probably, from unfamiliarity with the bath, have been regarded by Orientals, as might many a beau of that, and of the preceding generation, as an insufferably dirty fellow. The annoyance Thackeray represents an old lawyer in chambers as feeling at the daily splashings of the young barrister over his head, and his inability to imagine how sanity of mind, or body, could be compatible with such a practice, fix the date, now about thirty years ago, when our manners and customs were changing on this point.

The old oriental ideas, which go so much further towards satisfying the requirements of the case, are still carefully maintained. In order that they may become habitual and universal, they have been made imperative by religion. The when, the where, and the how have all been prescribed. The shaving also of the head, the plucking out of hair, the use of depilatories, and circumcision, which is practised even by the Christian Copts, are customs which, though not imposed by religion, are generally observed, because they contribute to the same object as their frequent and scrupulous ablutions.

With these practices we must class their ideas about the uncleanness of dead bodies, and the defilement contracted by contact with them; for, of course, the idea of defilement had its origin in the fear of what might engender, or convey disease.

The persistent oriental aversion to knives and forks may be connected with this subject. The disinclination to use them may arise out of an uncertainty as to whether they may not have contracted defilement, which might sometimes mean the power of conveying infection. The leprosy of the East, and the cutaneous diseases of that part of the world—almost all the diseases mentioned in the Old Testament are more or less of this kind—are at the bottom of these ideas and practices. On the whole, we can have no doubt but that, if they were as uncleanly, and careless about these matters, as a large portion of our own population, the range of many bad diseases—climate and meagreness of diet being their predisposing causes—would be very greatly extended. As things, however, are, it is pleasing to observe how carefully all classes in the East attend, in their way, to personal cleanliness. The poorest, even those who cannot afford a change of clothes, do not appear to neglect it. The stoker of an Egyptian steamer does not look like a stoker throughout the whole of the twenty-four hours; nor would, if there were such people, an Egyptian chimney-sweeper never be seen without the grime of his work.

It must have been for reasons of the kind I have referred to (though doubtless religious grounds were imagined for the practice, for those were times when there was no other way of thinking about or of putting such matters) which led the Egyptian Priesthood to abstain, in their own persons, from the use of woollen garments. Habiliments of this material, from their condition not being readily ascertainable by the eye, and from their not being chilly to the skin when saturated with perspiration, are less likely to be frequently washed than those which are made of vegetable fibres. It is much the same with silk and leather. We know that in the Middle-Ages, woollens, which were then very much in use next to the skin, were not very frequently washed, though the soap which would have thoroughly cleansed them, had then been known for centuries, for it had been an old invention of the Germans, among whom the Romans had found it in use. The same negligence we may be sure had existed to an equal, or greater, extent in all the old world. At that time the washing, especially, of woollens was costly, and could only have been insufficiently accomplished. The Egyptians, we know, used alkaline preparations for rendering soluble the animal matter their clothes had contracted by being worn, that is to say for washing them. They were probably also acquainted with the solvent and detergent properties of the animal appliance which the Emperor Vespasian was bantered for having excised. We may suppose this because its washing power is referable to the alkaline matter contained in it, which was just what they were in the practice of collecting for washing their clothes; and also because the supply derived from the camel was known to be particularly effective for this purpose. In passing, the unsavoury tax just referred to was imposed as a method of making the scourers, so large and important a trade at Rome that they had their own quarter of the city, pay for licences to carry on their business, in such a manner that in each case the cost of the licence should be proportioned to the amount of business carried on. This was effected by taxing the chief material employed in the trade. The impost must have been productive, for it was retained as an item of Roman excise for two centuries. These were means, however, which were never likely to have been turned to much account, anywhere, by the mass of the people. The consequences, of course, would be serious. The animal matter that accumulated, and was decomposed in such clothing, so used, must to some extent have been reabsorbed through the pores of the skin; and so have been the fruitful source of cutaneous, and other disorders. Probably this was the very cause why our forefathers were visited so frequently by the plague, and jail fevers. The priests of old Egypt quite understood how prejudicial to health, particularly in that climate, are all practices of this kind; and they felt that it behoved them, as the teachers of the people, to set an example of cleanliness in such matters. To do this was also pleasing to their thought, because it symbolized, and appeared to have some connexion with, the analogous virtue of moral purity; and so they imposed on themselves the ceremonial observance of abstaining from woollen garments. There could be no question about the perfect cleanness, such as became a Priest, of their robes of glistening white linen. This was a lesson to every eye. Such were the thoughts and practices of men, on these subjects, in the valley of old Nile, at least six, no one can tell how many more, thousand years ago.

Orientals’ regard for cleanliness I said is shown in their way, because, as might have been expected of ceremonial practices, it does not extend beyond the letter of the law; the object and spirit of the law, as is usual in such cases, having been lost sight of. The letter of the law is compatible with untidiness and dirt in their houses, and does not exact anything from children, who are as yet too young for religious observances. Their houses, therefore, and children are singularly untidy and dirty. Why make burdens unnecessarily severe? Why go beyond the letter? If they submit to the law in what it directs, surely they may indemnify themselves by compensatory neglect in what it does not direct. This element of feebleness and failure is inherent in all religious systems which undertake to think for the whole community in every matter. It is as conspicuous in Romanism as in Mahomedanism. The letter killeth: the spirit it is that giveth life. Up to a certain point, but it is one that is soon reached, they elevate and give light. When that point has been reached, they arrest and abort moral growth, and extinguish light.