COMMITT NO NUISANCE

30 April 1844

It is, today, the 182nd anniversary of the ceremonial opening of Norwich Station (with the actual trains starting to run the following day), which must mean it’s time to talk about pissing in the street.

Railways opened up the country, you see, encouraging tourism, but public toilets only really came in with the Great Exhibition of 1851 – and only became common in Norwich in the 1890s. Those of you with a grasp of maths will see that this leaves us with a gap – one which was, apparently, characterised by streams of urine running through the streets of Norfolk’s county town.

Even after public toilets were introduced, they were often locked at night, long before the pubs shut, and men would inevitably head for ‘urine corners’.

The nooks, crannies, and alleyways of Norwich’s 30 medieval churches provided perfect natural cover for the full of bladder, so, feeling that Something Must Be Done, someone came up with “quadrantal brick or concrete features fitted into the angles of … buildings”.

Yes, that’s right: I’ve used the date of one thing as an excuse to talk about something else entirely – in this case anti-urination devices. Well, it’s my account. I am eternally grateful to Jeremy Noel-Tod, incidentally, who discovered this fabulous publication about the things one day in 2020 (and yesterday very kindly sent me a scan of it!)

This pamphlet features pictures of over 40 anti-urination devices, some as far afield as Bath and Oxford, and has a map and instructions for a self-guided tour of the Norwich ones – and a ‘committ no nuisance’ ghost sign (which does, indeed, mean ‘do not piss up this wall’).

This sample page from the booklet shows you a couple of the devices themselves.

Basically, if you’ve ever idly wandered around a cathedral precinct and idly wondered what that-rounded-bit-which-doesn’t-quite-look-like-it-belongs-there is – it’s not part of the original architecture, it’s an AUD.

The idea, of course, is to make a chap stand away from the wall. “Not only was privacy compromised”, booklet author Ray Loveday writes,

but if urination was attempted at that spot, instant sprinkling of feet and legs would occur, to the discomfort of the offender – the splash back factor!

He has a vivid literary style, does Ray. One AUD in Great Yarmouth is

crisply rendered [with] fresh paint beautifully emphasising its form ... very different to the dank, mossy St Faith’s Lane example. All three sites would clearly have been subject to frequent and bountiful peeing before the A.U.D.s were constructed.

And I think he’s having fun with headings such as “Large, Thickset and Chunky”, “Small, Quarter-round, Conical and Tapering”, “Ecclesiastical”, “Metal. A Matter of Pricks and Knobs”, and “Over Large, Diminutive and Curious” – but they’re also informative. He ewars his learning lightly.

I understand Ray has now shuffled off this mortal coil, but I found an obituary which says he also wrote a volume called Hikey Sprites – The Twilight of a Norfolk Tradition, because he was “a scholar of the unusual”. (The phrase ‘life goals’ is overused, but...)

The AUDs booklet even includes a consideration of alternative explanations for these constructions: people suggest

the position they occupy would provide ideal hiding places for footpads preparing to rob the unwary. Interesting, but unlikely.

(You can tell he was a teacher.)

In case you can’t track down the pamphlet, by the way, I can offer you the trail map

Or you can read about AUDs in more depth without tracking down the pamphlet.

Obviously, they’re not unique to Norwich, and you may be aware of the famous ones in Clifford’s Inn Passage, off Fleet Street. Plus, you may not be surprised to hear they don’t just appear in Britain, either.

When Norwich did finally start opening bogs, incidentally, it did it in style. This decagonal example is thought to be the oldest one of its kind, and is Grade II listed.

But I think we should end this thread by celebrating Ray Loveday, a splendid eccentric with an inquiring mind, and the sort of person we could do with more of.

Feel free to discuss public urination, unusual older persons, and niche interests among yourselves, but remember:

…and, obviously: