Consumul produselor de igienă din Ţările Române în secolele XVI-XIX
The Consumption of the hygiene products in the Romanian Principalities during the 16th to the 19th centuries

Summary/Abstract: The cultural consumption represents an actual concept within the Western historiographical debate, enlarged by its resemblances, which can be applied to different eras and territories, thus offering a rich and also a fresh analytical spectre, one that continues to develop, as well as incorporates various perspectives in a permanent development regarding the historical retrospection through recent researches and debates. This present article focuses upon such a recent debate, analysing a different matter, i.e the hygiene-product consumption as well as their destination, ritual and casual use in the Romanian countries in a time span of 300 years. The challenge was proven to be the complexity of the topic as well as the scientific aim for the completion of moments, mentalities, customs, policies, and legislative framework, all gathered in order to explain the social changes and behaviours, from the restrained debate focused on products, to a complete view of state particularities regarded through the resemblances of habits. To conclude and let the reader draw his/her own conclusions, this basic and seemingly simple study about elitist products, as well as their origins and merchandise – that points to the field of economic history –, to the domestic need for hygiene, with its health reasons and determinations, from products regarded as prestigious goods to their internal manufacture and use, will reveal how the Western, as well as Eastern consumption items, were imported and adapted to the practical traditions, how their use was or was not maintained and, mostly, how they drew the living standards to the rise of modernity on this side of Europe.

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