I was thinking about this in the shower...it seems to me that a lot of technology is required to shower daily. You need water, hot water, running water, an available shower with the appropriate shower equipment installed or available, lots of things. In my country, showering is the main way that people clean their bodies. Every bathtub has a shower in it, pretty much, and there are showers that don't even need a bathtub...basically everyone has access to a shower. It can't have always been like this. How did this come to be so ubiquitous, and when?
William Feetham patented a chain-release shower in 1767. In the late 1800s communal showers took hold by French military, under the direction of physician François Merry Delabost who had first tried them out on prisoners for reasons of economics and hygiene.
In modern times showers did not start to become common until the early 1920s, by which time homes had water heating and reliable plumbing, and had shower heads in existing tubs. But it was slow going at first. A 1954 article in Challenge magazine noted, "the plumbing industry confidently predicts that the day is not far off when a bathroom and bathtub (with shower) will become a necessary adjunct to every bedroom in the home." (Challenge Vol. 2, No. 6 (March 1954), pp. 36-38).
Piggy backing on this, when did bathing regularly become a thing, as an idea of hygiene.
Sure you see public baths in history, but was it due to hygiene or a social thing. Hot tubs are pretty cool and have nothing to do with hygiene.
Like, was there a time when people didn't bathe regularly and just stank or did most people throughout history bathe?