Chamber pot

A chamber pot or chamber pot ( in Switzerland also called only pot, night harbor or port. Senior students in the jargon as a ship, go therefore navigate the twist sl ) is a container for excrement, urine and vomit. Past were often old, no longer used for culinary purposes suitable for pots or flower pots. There were and are also industrially manufactured pots made ​​of glass, ceramic, plastic, earthenware or sheet metal.

The chamber pot goes back to the time when the toilets were still outside the house at night and were so difficult to achieve. The chamber pot was kept mostly under the bed or in a bedside table or nightstand next to the bed, used during the night and emptied in the morning. The equipment of the houses with water toilets made ​​the chamber pot superfluous. Especially after use went from the chamber pot from a large odor nuisance and he was, as he was often emptied but not cleaned or disinfected, a not to be underestimated infection.

In the Middle Ages it was - for lack of sewers - customary to empty the chamber pot out the window, sometimes over the heads of unwelcome guests or overlooked passersby. The literature is full of reports about the irritated traveler.

Use the chamber pot found in hospitals, retirement and nursing homes, there bedpans and commode are still used today ( a chair with recessed chamber pot ).

The invention of the chamber pot is attributed to the inhabitants of the ancient Sybaris according to Athenaeus.

Culture

In southern Germany and Austria, the dialect name is Potschamberl (or similar) common to one borrowed from French corruption of the French word for chamber pot, the ' pot de chambre '.

Another in the German language formerly common name was also on Stinktopf.

In Vienna there is also the name Sherm ( cullet).

For special occasions there was in the 18th and 19th centuries the Bourdalou. In various areas are still similar vessels for the foreseeable future " emergencies" usual, so for pilots in airplanes without proper equipment, and for truck drivers.

Tonight pots are estimated Fools and collectibles.