Urin Tax in ancient Rome
PECUNIA NON OLET = money does not stink.
The ancient Romans have passed many traditions on to modern day society, but they certainly had a different perspective on urine. It was seen as much more useful than today. They used it as a cleaning agent for washing their clothes, brushing their teeth as well as for tanning leather. Ancient laundries even used to collect urine in giant clay pots which were placed out in public for people to relieve themselves. Eventually, so much urine was used and collected that a tax was imposed by the Roman emperor. Pecunia non olet meaning, “money does not stink" was a famous phrase coined as a result of this tax levied by the emperors Nero and Vespasian in the 1st century AD.
The Uses of Urine in Ancient Rome.
While today we flush or urine away without giving it a second thought, in ancient times it was considered a valuable commodity. Urine contains a wide array of important minerals and chemicals such as phosphorus and potassium. The Romans believed that urine would make their teeth whiter and keep them from decaying so they used it as a mouthwash and mixed it with pummis to make toothpaste. In fact, urine was so effective that it was used in toothpastes and mouthwashes up until the 1700s.
As far as the Romans were concerned, the best and therefore the most expensive urine on the market came from the country of Portugal. It was supposedly the strongest urine in the world and thus, the choice for whitening teeth. Though most people today would decline the option of a urine-based toothpaste, it actually worked! This is because urine contains ammonia which is used in many household cleaners today. If you leave urine out in an open vat it turns stale and produces ammonia through interaction with the air. In Roman times, this was then used for laundry. The so-called fullones (workers who clean the clothes) stomped barefoot clothes immersed in tubs full of water and aged urine, taking advantage of the foam produced by ammonia present in the latter. Although this work was not the best however, proved quite profitable. Due to the ammonia content, urine was also important for the textiles industry, which was a booming trade during the Roman Empire. Often urine was used to bleach wool or linen and tan leather.
The "Vectigal Urinae" tax for Urine Collectors
In the first century AD, the Roman emperor Nero levied what was known as the “vectigal urinae”, which translates from Latin into “urine tax”. This tax was placed on the collection of urine at public urinals, since the lower classes of society had to relieve themselves in small pots which were then emptied into cesspools. Urine was also collected from the public toilets of the upper classes. The buyer of the urine paid the tax, then it was then collected from the cesspools and recycled as a valuable raw material for a number of chemical processes.
