All the Ways We’ve Wiped: The History of Toilet Paper and What Came Before Among tools people used in the past were moss, sponge on a stick, ceramic pieces and bamboo 'spatulas.'

https://www.history.com ^ | APR 15, 2020 | CRYSTAL PONTI

[dforest]

I installed my own bidet on my toilet during the lockdown. I still use paper, but not as much. Feels good having a clean butt.

[dainbramaged]

We used to visit my great uncle’s dairy farm way back in the late 50’s and their only bathroom was an outhouse, which did have toilet paper but also a copy of the Sears catalog for backup.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Red Badger.

[dforest]

Sears and Roebuck catalogs.

[Stravinsky]

Toilet paper? More like privilege paper, Everywhere you go it’s white, white, white. < /neo-Marxist>

[Red Badger]

Now you know what made Sears & Roebuck such a success in the late 1800s.....................

[Red Badger]

There used to be colored TP........................

[Openurmind]

Ever been hunting without paper? I am thinking the very first tool was a rock... Or two... lol

[Army Air Corps]

[HartleyMBaldwin]

I refer you to Chapter XIII of Gargantua, by Rabelais. Too long to post here.

[Deaf Smith]

Rabbit going through the woods stopped to take a dump.

He looked over and whoa! He is next to a bear doing the same.

The beer looks over to the rabbit and ask "Do you have a problem with poop sticking to your fur?"

The rabbit says No, so the bear grabs the rabbit and uses him to wipe his butt.

[bigbob]

“Yo, Tiberius, pass the communal sponge-on-a-stick willya!”

[M Kehoe]

Depending on the location, I’ve often used the Arkansas bidet.

5.56mm

[Farmerbob]

We put them (bidets) in when our house was built. Now one family pack of TP last a year. We didn’t blink an eye at the TP shortages.

[Billthedrill]

I installed my own bidet on my toilet during the lockdown.

I did the same. Big difference, and my septic system thanks me.

[knarf]

Smart people, the truly "woke"

WASHED THEMSELVES WITH WATER,

patted themselves dry and never had anal sting

I've been using a hose then a bidet since I visited my fiancee', now my American wife

In the Philippines in 2009

[Bonemaker]

[ifinnegan]

“$$$$$......................”

Oh yeah.

This was of course 35 to 40 years ago when I was in my early 20’s.

I drove by her parents old house a few years ago to go down memory lane and the house was totally gone and a new twice as big one had replaced it.

[OftheOhio]

Interesting from my perspective. I found one of these wiping stones several years back on an Appalachian plateau. It smelled terrible and I concluded that was exactly what it was. There was a Hopewell mound on the plateau, so the stone could have been from a couple thousand years ago.

[KarlInOhio]

He doesn't know how to use the three seashells.

The three seashells was an inside joke between the screenwriters because one of their wives had some decorative shells in the bathroom and they couldn't figure out the reason why.