:-. Smeared with Honey
Pepi II ruled during the Sixth Dynasty in Egypt’s the Old Kingdom. Scholars believe he holds the record for the longest reign in Egypt. He ascended to the throne at age six and stayed there for 94 years. But that’s not why he is on the list. Pharaoh Pepi II hated flies. Really, really hated flies.
He hated them so much that he designated a slave in his sizeable entourage to be stripped naked and covered in honey every day. The idea was for the Slave attracts the flies who’d become stuck to the honey and therefore be unable to bother Pepi while he ate. This worked so well that Pepi ordered a honey covered slave to Stand in every room of his palace like really weird fly paper so that he’d never be bothered by flies again.
:-. Defeated by Cats
You probably don’t need me to tell you that cats were a big deal in ancient Egypt. Ancient Egyptians revered cats because of their Association with the cat-headed goddess Bastet or Bast. This goddess presided over fire, cats, the home, and pregnant women. Cats were considered sacred to Bastet and could never, under any circumstances, be harmed or allowed to come to harm.
It was Only a matter of time before that law was taken to the extreme. During the reign of Psamtik III, the Persians, led by King Cambyses II, decided to invade Egypt. Cambyses II knew of the Egyptians’ love of cats and ordered his men to Collect as many as they could prior to the battle. He then had his men walk up to the front gate of the Egyptian stronghold Pelusium while holding the cats. He also released hundreds more into the enemy ranks as they advanced. The Egyptians had no choice but to Let Cambyses’ men walk straight into the city unchecked.
Cambyses’ men then methodically anyone who dared challenge them, using shields with cats drawn on them, because Laws forbade even striking an image of a cat. Cambyses won the day and celebrated by ordering the defeated Egyptian army to march past him as he Threw cats at them while screaming insults at their god. You have to give the guy credit for being clever.
:-. Fertility Tests
Egyptians created an entire medical system for giving birth. Their methods to test fertility and pregnancy were truly advanced for their time, even if we might think they are incredibly weird. To test fertility, some doctors Rubbed oil all over a woman’s body and told her to lie down until the morning. When she woke up, if she looked “fresh and good,” they ruled that she was fertile. If she didn’t, they said she wasn’t fertile. That’s actually the saner form of testing. Another method involved a doctor inserting a clove of garlic or an onion inside a woman’s vagina. In the morning, he smelled her breath.
Ancient Egyptians Believed that every orifice in a woman’s body was linked and that their mouths had tubes that went all the way down. If the doctor smelled the garlic, then the tubes were clear and the woman was fertile. But if the doctor couldn’t smell the garlic, The tubes were blocked and the woman couldn’t give birth. The Berlin Papyrus, dated at around 1800 BC, contains clear directions for the oldest known pregnancy test. The text instructs women to pee on cereal seeds. If barley grew, then the woman was pregnant with a boy. If wheat grew, then she was going to have a girl. If neither grew, the woman would not give birth. Not sure how that last one worked. Did it mean she was going to be pregnant forever?
:-. Protective Makeup
In ancient Egypt, both men and women wore eye makeup because they believed that makeup contained some mystical healing powers. The makeup came in only two colors: black and green. The black was made from lead and green from copper, both minerals you really don’t want to be applied to your skin in large amounts. However, it wasn’t to make them all look amazing. They wore it to protect their eyes from the sun, repel flies, and ward off infection.
The dramatic makeup also imitated the facial markings of the sun god Horus. Cosmetics also reflected a person’s rank in ancient Egypt. In fact, a Sign of a wealthy woman was a portable cosmetics box. A further hint that this had little to do with pure aesthetics is what happened during the reign of Ramses III. Laborers went on strike because they were not provided with balms and massage oils, which they considered essential for their well-being.
:-. Harsh Punishment
The harsh punishments for crime are not unknown in the ancient world and certainly not in ancient Egypt, according to one text the punishment for a major crime is described as 100 blows and five wounds, some studies carried out on skeleton found in Amarna an ancient Egyptian city gave researchers reason to believe that this may have been a real punishment. They found skeletons with gashes on the shoulder blade area these gashes didn't come from being attacked
but likely from being punished.
Scholars believe that after the punishment the men were then sent right back to work. However while punishment for stealing could be quite harsh those for crimes of a sexual nature could be way worse women were often treated more strictly and if someone caught a woman cheating on her husband she had her nose cut off to spite her face, men on the other hand, had to take a severe beating of 100 blows well this may seem like a double standard the penalty for a man raping a woman was also very strict if a man raped a Freeborn woman he would be castrated.
The punishment for vandalism of temples was the absolute worst though a condemned man was sentenced to being burned alive, it wasn't done often though because Egyptians believed the destruction of the body kept the soul from having an afterlife.
:-. Laxatives Galore
When we think of ancient Egyptians we usually think of the thin boldly drawn figures on temple and tomb walls the reality, however, was far from the truth, obesity and heart disease was a real problem among Egyptian royalty, a medical text from that time describes the symptoms of a heart attack in great detail. Royals were fed three banquets a day food fit for the gods they claimed to be and it was all fatty and rich in calories. Queen Hatshepsut who dresses like a male pharaoh during her time was discovered to have been an obese woman with rotten teeth, one Egyptian princess, if she lived today what if acquired a double bypass despite that Egyptian Royals were very concerned about overeating they might have been fat but that didn't mean they wanted to be slim muscular frames were still the beauty standard for Egyptian men the answer though wasn't in cutting back on the rich food and exercising now they decided laxatives would do the trick most Egyptians took laxatives three days each month. One popular laxative was made of castor oil and the consumer got ready to spend the day on the toilet before modern plumbing, laxatives weren't just for weight loss though ancient Egyptian doctors thought there wasn't a problem that they couldn't cure with laxatives even diarrhea was treated with laxatives apparently the idea was to get the disease out of their bodies by force and as quickly as possible.
:-. Necrophilia
When a man died in Egypt his embalming began right away.
Women especially beautiful and valuable women received a different treatment.
According to Egyptian law, these women could not be sent to embalmers until they had decayed for three or four days, this wasn't because of some weird let's ugly her up first idea. It was actually to protect the court. Ancient Egyptians didn't trust the embalmer to keep their hands to themselves and they had a legitimate fear that the bodies would be desecrated. According to the Greek historian Herodotus an embalmer left in charge of mummifying a Royal body was caught in the act of necrophilia by a co-worker. The co-worker reported him to the authorities. There’s no account of what happened to the offending
embalmer but it led to the Egyptians passing the law that women were not allowed to be embalmed unless their body had decayed a little say that no one would want to have sex with a corpse that was all bloody and gross.
:-. Planned Parenting
The Egyptians had their own ways of practising planned Parenting, for the time these amazing innovations show that ancient Egyptians had an incredible interest in the understanding of Medicine, however that doesn't mean these methods weren't discussing and stomach-turning. Women had a few options for birth control including different mixtures for contraceptive some of the nicer ones involved honey, unripe acacia Rood and ate cotton or another plant fiber was soaked in the mixture relative like a tampon and then inserted into this method might have actually worked because acacia gum ferments into lactic acid which can act as a spermicide the beaver women though makes tree leaves and crocodile dung they didn't eat the dung but used it as a concoction to block the sperm, contraceptives weren't just for women men had them as well and they weren't much better they often use papyrus paper as a condom but another method for men was to rub onion juice onto their foreskins to keep themselves from having kids, what the onion was supposed to do is unclear, maybe scare off the women.
:-. A war on lice
Head lice are parasites that love a good head of human hair. They can cause a tickling sensation as the lice move around as well as itching and sores, for us modern-day people in first world countries lice are a fleeting problem treated with a special kind of shampoo and as may be treating the entire home with sprays not the case in other countries and certainly not the case in ancient Egypt. You might already know that most people shave their heads during various periods of ancient Egypt, pictures and records by people wrote in Egypt and other countries often depict people with shaved heads as a popular fashion even back then fashion choices were important though hairstyles did have significance in indicating age and social standing historians are pretty sure going fully or partially bald didn't have anything to do with looking awesome instead it was more of a way to protect yourself from bugs. lice were everywhere in ancient Egypt the tombs of Egyptian rulers are infested with lice supposedly flooding out from the remains of the bodies like us the ancient Egyptians had lice remedies but they either didn't work or weren't worth the trouble.
Most people became so fed up with the nationwide infestation that both men and women shave their hair.
All of their hair from every part of their bodies some usually women chose to wear wigs which could be discarded when it got infected while other just went around completely shaved from head to toe kind of like today.
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