What slumbered in Roman chamber pots

Spektrum der Wissenschaft

6.5.2026

Translation: machine translated

All kinds of parasites plagued the people of antiquity. Experts have investigated the exact pathogens on chamber pots and uncovered Roman toilet habits in the process.

Scientists are now scraping historical relics from places where no one once wanted to reach in voluntarily. These are clay chamber pots that were in use in the Roman cities of Novae and Marcianopolis in the 2nd to 4th centuries AD. A research group led by Elena Klenina from the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań has discovered traces of parasites in the remains of the hardened faeces, which provide information about the health of the people on the Lower Danube. As the experts report in «npj Heritage Science», they discovered three parasite species, including Cryptosporidium parvum, which was thought to have originated in Central America. The results also shed light on ancient toilet practices.

The clay pots that Klenina and her team analysed came to light at sites in present-day Bulgaria: on the one hand in the premises of an ancient villa in Novae and on the other in a workshop in Marcianopolis. The researchers took samples of the mineralised faeces. They examined these under a microscope and analysed them using genetic analyses and an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). This method uses antibodies that are directed against a specific antigen. If these are those that occur on the surface of the pathogens, they can be detected.

The experts were unable to find any trace of parasites in the toilet from Marcianopolis; however, they did find them in two pots from Novae: There was evidence of representatives of the genus Taenia (tapeworms) as well as the species Entamoeba histolytica and Cryptosporidiumparvum.

E. histolytica causes amoebic dysentery, which can be accompanied by abdominal pain and bloody diarrhoea. C. parvum also causes diarrhoea, which normally subsides on its own. However, the cryptosporidiosis it causes can be dangerous for children and the elderly.

According to Klenina and her team, the discovery of C. parvum proves that the pathogen was widespread along the Lower Danube around 1800 years ago - and thus in a previously unknown location. Prior to this, there was already evidence from Central America dating back around 1400 years. The region was therefore assumed to be the origin of the disease. However, there is now also prehistoric evidence from the Balearic Islands, which is around 5000 years old. The origin from America has therefore become even more questionable with the discovery from Novae.

When the chamber pots were emptied

Parasites probably infected people back then in a similar way to today: in the case of E. histolytica and C. parvum, this often happened via the faecal-oral route. Their extremely resistant oocysts - a permanent stage of the pathogens that infected people excrete with their faeces - can thus spread from person to person via contaminated water, inadequate hand hygiene after using the toilet or crops fertilised with human faeces. Infection via the faeces of infected animals is also possible. Taenia, on the other hand, is often caught via contaminated meat that has been insufficiently cooked.

There are also findings about the toilet habits of the Romans: One of the chamber pots, for example, was apparently consistently filled to two-thirds of its height with faeces. The total capacity of this pottery was three and a half litres. «This suggests that several individuals used the pot, and its contents included not only urine but also their faeces», the study states. The containers, which were presumably primarily intended for night-time toilet use, were therefore emptied at a filling level of one to two litres - and thus rather frequently, according to the experts.

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