At http://blog.zoesaadia.com/bathing-twice-a-day/

Bathing twice a day

26 June 2012

In Mesoamerica of 16th century the dilemma was simple.

Was it better to bath once a day or once a month?

The state policy of reorganized by the Spanish authorities Tenochtitlan stated that once a month was more than enough. Any more frequent visits to temazcalli – Mesoamerican traditional steam bath – was illegal and open to a government punishment of "one hundred lashes and to be bound for two hours on the marketplace". Not a pleasant experience. But then to go about stinking, sweat-covered and lice-ridden was not a much better option. Mesoamerica was not a happy place in the post-Columbian times.

 
However, only a century earlier, in pre-contact Mexico, the things were quite different. All over Mexican Valley and its surroundings, Highlands and Lowlands alike, no settlement, however small, would exist without more than a few traditional bath-houses. How could they? After all, those bath-houses combined pleasure with health. A happy combination.

The word temazcalli means just that – temaz-bath, calli-house. The old goddess Temazcalteci, the grandmother of the baths, was watching over the medicine practice in general, worshipped by healers, surgeons and midwives. With steam baths being the integral part of a healing process, the goddess's image would adore many respectable bath-houses.

Mesoamericans of all ages and sexes would enter the small, mushroom-like construction, squeezing in through a low doorway into the dark world of heat and humidity, shaking off the worries of the day, exchanging the agitation of the gushing outside life for a chance to sprawl and relax, to have a good conversation or simply to connect with one's inner self.

The bath-houses were usually built to resemble a shape of a woman's womb, so, after sweating profoundly in the unbearable heat, after scrubbing one's body with bunch of twigs or grass, the bather would emerge back into the world cleansed, at peace and as though... ( more at http://blog.zoesaadia.com/bathing-twice-a-day/ )