I believe that many ladies have a bottle of their favorite perfume, spray a little perfume before going out, it seems that the mood is beautiful, and the perfume is pushed to the world, that is, the romantic capital of France, so France is also known as the "perfume capital". But Xiaobian wants to tell you that the reason why perfume was on fire was because the French did not like to bathe at that time, and in order to cover the smell on their bodies, they desperately invented perfume and sprayed perfume, and the representative figure was the king at that time - Louis XIV.
Louis XIV, the longest reigning independent sovereign monarch in European history, reigned for 72 years, 3 months and 18 days, Louis XIV was a rather capable monarch, under his leadership, France became the most powerful country in Western Europe at that time, was revered as the "Sun King", as a result of which he became arrogant and arrogant in his later years, and the people were not happy, resulting in social poverty.
But today we don't talk about politics, let's talk about something "light" - why did Louis XIV not take a bath all his life? How bad does he really stink in the summer?
Reason 1: Low productivity
The article begins by saying that the 17th century (during the reign of Louis XIV) was the peak of the French perfume industry, because Europeans at that time did not like to bathe, according to the data, in 1850 the residents of the whole of Paris only bathed twice a year on average.
Of course, this is not their intention, but at that time the entire Paris facilities were very backward, there was no sewer facilities, people had nowhere to bathe, even "convenient" was solved in the corner of the courtyard, if you want to take a bath, you have to boil water yourself, at that time the iron pot was still a rarity, ordinary people could not afford to wash, then simply do not wash.
As you can imagine, the whole of Paris is stinking, no wonder they have to desperately spray perfume, so Louis XIV did not bathe, and everyone did not feel strange. But as the head of a country, doesn't he have the money to take a bath? This brings us to the second reason.
Reason 2: The plague is rampant
In the middle of the 14th century, a terrible "Black Death" appeared in West Asia and the European continent, which took the lives of more than 30 million people in the three years from 1348 to 1350, and continued to rage in Europe for the next 300 years, becoming the nightmare of countless Europeans.
So the doctors announced, "Don't take a shower!" When you take a bath, your pores will open, and this dirty air will enter everyone's body, leaving you suffering from the Black Death! "Of course people who lack medical knowledge listen to doctors, including Louis XIV, who, as the head of a nation, certainly does not want to die.
On a hot summer day, Louis XIV would emit a terrible stench, and his favorite mistress, Madame de Montespoon, wrote in her memoirs: "The stench of his body, which can be smelled ten steps away, is disgusting!" Just by seeing Madame's description, Xiaobian had some scalp tingling.
Reason 3: Religious beliefs
Louis XIV was a devout Catholic who believed that a dirty body would bring one closer to God and that bathing was an act of depravity. In fact, mental control is the most powerful than force, and as a Catholic, Louis XIV of course had to do it.
Under the impetus of the king, the whole country will not bathe, and if someone can do it for a lifetime without bathing, he will be canonized as a "saint" (saint) after death.
By not bathing, Louis XIV had already suffered from various skin diseases, his hair had fallen out (the wig in the portrait), and he had been tortured all his life, and finally died in pain.