Archaeologists excited over old toilets!

IAFRICA ^ | Posted Thu, 20 Jan 2005 | AFP

[vannrox]

Archaeologists excited over old toilets

Posted Thu, 20 Jan 2005

Excited archaeologists are sifting through the contents of 150-year-old New Zealand toilets to get a better understanding of the everyday lives of early settlers.

Although there is plenty of oral and written history, there are gaps which can only be answered by lifting the lid on the sanitary habits of pioneering families, they say.

About 30 of New Zealand's leading archaeologists arrived in Wellington on Thursday to start a five-week project to collect and document information from historic sites along an inner-city bypass route.

The old toilets, locally referred to as long-drops or dunnies, "are a really good source of material", senior archaeologist, Rick McGovern-Wilson, said at the site where the Tonks family lived in the mid-1800s.

"You would be surprised what people used to throw down their dunnies."

The Tonks family, who ran a brickworks and set up steam mills and a shipping company in the area, had lived alongside their workers and archaeologists expect to find evidence of the different social standing of the residents.

"Bones will tell us that. You would expect the Tonks' probably ate roast mutton (leg bone) while rib bones would show their workers were eating mutton flaps," McGovern-Wilson said.

[vannrox]

Oh the days when you didn't have to worry about "Lo-Flo" toilets.

[Fiddlstix]

Ping

[ScottFromSpokane]

Excited archaeologists are sifting through the contents of 150-year-old New Zealand toilets....

Whatever turns you on, I guess.

[Cinnamon]

caca diggers... lmfao

[freedumb2003]

Archaeologists excited over old toilets

When you reeeeealllyyy gotta go an you're in a desert anything even resembling a toilet will cause excitement ;)

[NorCalRepub]

I get kind of giddy over mine too after several beers...

[martin_fierro]

Really Old Stuff PIng.

[Willie Green]

ping

[Coyoteman]

If I excavated one of those I would be just flushed with pride!

[mlbford2]

There's noth'n like carbon dating some old turds to get the juices flowing.

[pipecorp]

Will they use "crapon dating" to determine the age of the contents the extract?

[duckman]

"The old toilets, locally referred to as long-drops.."
I have two Kohler 'Low Boys' aka 'Easy Riders'. Real comfortable, not unusual to go thru a reading of 'Gone With The Wind' or 'Exodus' in one sitting.

[Snowy]

No sh*t?

[camas]

there is a two holler behind us that is at least 130 years old.

it has not been used for 75 years. my neighbor wants to dig it out, but I'm not to keen on it.

[afnamvet]

"You would be surprised what people used to throw down their dunnies."

Draft notices, bills, watergate tapes, ballot boxes...........

[microgood]

LOL..This could branch into a whole new area of science, maybe called Turdology or Excrementology.

[Calvin Locke]

Well, as long as it fit, you'd be surprised what they disposed in latrines. Broken everyday items before the days
of plastic such as pottery, china, metal, etc.

During the fiasco known as "The Big Dig" in Boston, they shut down the project for a day so archaeologists could
retrieve the cr@p from an outhouse dating back to colonial days.

IIRC, that was $1.3M or $3.1M stoppage. But hey, a billion here, $15B there, for a leaking tunnel.

At least they got the stuff from ye olde outhouse.

There's no figure given for the NZ what I am inferring is interrupting work on the bypass.

Gotta build bypasses, you know.

[WildTurkey]

If I excavated one of those I would be just flushed with pride!

[Cyber Ninja]

Archaeologists excited over old dunnies
The place to think & stink & leave your cheese
Leave behind
The daily grind
Unload the sheet & read the funnies

CB^)

[Miss Behave]

Sh*t disturbers. Let the poor, departed toilets rest in peace!