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Rat catcher -

By the 19th century, rats had earned a reputation as talented disease spreaders, and a (un)lucky few Victorians were tasked with catching the rodents.

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Rat catcher -

Professional rat catchers would cover themselves in oils to attract the rats, and then they would kill them with their bare hands. Sometimes they would use dogs, but not always.

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Groom of the stool -

For centuries, it was unthinkable for a monarch to frequent the bathroom alone. It was the job of one lucky aristocrat to accompany and aid the king or queen with all things bathroom-related.

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Groom of the stool -

The intimate nature of the role meant that the groom of the stool often became a sort of confidante for the monarch, sometimes raising his status within the royal court.

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Vomit collector -

In addition to building roads and developing sanitation, the Romans are often remembered for their hedonistic parties, at which they would eat and drink to high heaven.

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Vomit collector -

Once full, they would actually induce vomiting to make room for more food, at which point they called on the services of their trusty vomit collectors to empty and clean their buckets!

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Bone grubber -

In the scavenging economy of Victorian England, bone was considered a useful if not valuable material and was used to make personal items such as necklaces.

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Bone grubber -

There was an occupation known as "bone grubbing," which involved scrounging around wherever possible, looking for matter to sell on to bone dealers.

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Snake milker -

This job still exists today and involves extracting the venom from snakes to use as antivenom, a treatment for snake bites. An unpleasant, but very important job.

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Snake milker -

Anyone wishing to get into this profession can look forward to working with cobras, mambas, vipers, asps, corals, copperheads, kraits, sea snakes, and rattlesnakes.

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Violin string maker -

Back in the day, the job of building a violin was much worse than it is today: violin strings used to be made by weaving together strands of sheep innards.

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Violin string maker -

Thanks to the 17th-century revolution in violin string making, this practice is now less common. Although, some performers do still opt for sheep gut strings for their specific sound!

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Match girl -

While the job itself merely involved dipping wood in phosphorus solution, exposure to the fumes emitted by the solution caused a terrible condition later known as "phossy jaw."

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Match girl -

Anyone suffering with the condition, which was rife in the 19th and 20th centuries, saw their gums begin to abscess, sometimes to the point that the jaw had to be removed.

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Chimney sweep -

Often reserved for small children who could squeeze their bodies into the narrow spaces, the role of chimney sweep involved clearing out ash and dust from chimneys.

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Chimney sweep -

The job was unpleasant to say the least, and it came with many occupational hazards, including the constant exposure to and inhalation of toxic substances.

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Tanner -

During the Victorian era, the preservation of animal hides involved soaking them in lime, scraping off the fat, and then reimmersing them in dog feces.

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Tanner -

Luckily, modern tanning methods are slightly less smelly and unpleasant, but tanning centers such as Fez in Morocco are still known for their strong stench.

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Resurrectionist -

When the study of medicine was really taking off in the 19th century, scientists relied on resurrectionists, or "body snatchers," to dig up dead bodies for medical research.

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Resurrectionist -

The practice was, of course, illegal, but the job was very well paid, meaning that some body snatchers even resorted to killing in order to meet demand.

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Leech collector -

In the 19th century, doctors used a technique called "bloodletting" to cure illness and disease. It involved withdrawing blood from the patient, often using leeches.

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Leech collector -

The leeches were often hard to come by, and it became the responsibility of leech collectors to gather the leeches, often using their own legs to attract them.

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Tosher -

A tosher was a kind of scavenger in Victorian-era London who roamed the sewers looking for tradable goods. The term was also used to refer to thieves who stripped the copper off boats.

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Tosher -

The job of a scavenger tosher was dangerous and extremely unpleasant, but also very lucrative: a full-time tosher earned enough to support around 200 people.

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Mudlark -

These guys had the same role as toshers but in a different, although not necessarily healthier, location: the banks of the filthy River Thames.

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Mudlark -

Mudlarks were not so well off as toshers, but were nonetheless financially independent. Most mudlarks were young, normally between the age of eight and 15.

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Gong farmer -

In Tudor England, before the dawn of modern sewage disposal systems, most houses had a cesspit in which human waste was deposited. The foul smell was a constant issue.

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Gong farmer -

A lucky few "gong farmers" collected the excrement from the cesspits and transported it away from the town. They were only allowed to work at night.

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Plague burier -

The Black Death was the most fatal pandemic recorded in human history. It caused the death of 75-200 million people across Eurasia and North Africa.

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Plague burier -

Some of those victims were buried in mass graves known as "plague pits." And, of course, they had to be buried by someone: enter the plague burier.

Sources: (Jobsite)

See also: These are the noisiest jobs in the world

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