A toilet article

Life often feels like a cesspool, and indeed it once was just that, very literally. Luckily for millions of us, the classic and to date unsurpassed design of the toilet was invented in the 19th century by a Yorkshire man whose destiny it was to do just that: with a name like Thomas Crapper (1837–1910), his calling must have been obvious from day one. This, as well as many more fascinating facts about modern homes, comes from the excerpt from Bill Bryson's book (At Home: A Short History of Private Life), presented in the Guardian.

Until Crapper's invention, the flush toilet was an unreliable, treacherous contraption, not that much of an improvement to its predecessors. Until the U-bend was incorporated in the design, toilets exuded the smell of hell, not to mention that they were prone to the occasional eruption. Crapper's 'Marlboro Silent Water Waste Preventer', was 'clean, leak-proof, odour-free and wonderfully reliable, and their manufacture made Crapper very rich and so famous that it is often assumed that he gave his name to the slang term "crap" and its many derivatives'  (from the Guardian).

In fact, the word 'crap' has evolved from the Dutch 'krappe' from 'krappen', which means 'pluck off or cut off'. In Old French 'crappe' meant 'siftings', while the Anglo-Latin 'crappa' meant 'chaff' (source: Shorter OED). And ultra-modern toilets, such as the ones below, have evolved from Crapper's original design.

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