As one of the ancient Four Great Classical Novels in China, Water Margin contains many well-known stories and many amazing heroes. However, after all, The Water Margin happened in a time of war, when the rulers were incompetent and the adulterers were in power. In this case, some contemptible things happened frequently. The most familiar bad thing about Water Margin is the story of Pan Jinlian and Ximen Qing, who are the chief culprits of Wu Song's being driven to the Liangshan Mountains.

Pan Jinlian was a well-known person who didn't observe women's morality in ancient China, so many novels took him as the villain, such as Water Margin and Jin Ping Mei. In Jin Ping Mei, there are many scenes of Pan Jinlian bathing, which makes people wonder, does this person have a special liking for bathing?

In the 29th chapter of Jin Ping Mei, Wu Shen-xian Bing appraised Pan Jinlian's orchid soup for life and invited it to fight at noon, this scene was described. Pan Jinlian and Ximen Qing * * * bathed in orchid soup. Then people can't help wondering, how do they take a bath? This is also introduced in the original work. First of all, Pan Jinlian would let her maid Qiuju "take a bath in hot water". Then, because Ximen Qing was late, Pan Jinlian said, "You wash, I'll ask Chunmei to bring the water." Before long, Chun Mei "scooped the tub into the room and filled it with soup".

In this passage, we can see that Pan Jinlian was in the bathtub when he took a bath, and put the bathtub in the room. In our eyes, this is a very strange thing. After all, it is inconvenient to take a bath in your own room. At the same time, the water vapor is relatively large. Was there no bathroom at that time?

Actually, it is true. Before the late Qing Dynasty, people really didn't have bathrooms in their homes. Only some very wealthy families could build a place for bathing at home. After all, people couldn't even guarantee food and clothing at that time. Therefore, it is normal to put a bathtub in your room. For Wu Dalang, this person is just an ordinary family, and naturally there is no money to build a bathroom at home.

In addition, these novels will like to describe Pan Jinlian's bathing, which is actually meaningful, mainly including the following two aspects.

firstly, although Pan Jinlian bathes every day to keep his body clean, he has ulterior motives and cannot be cleaned with water.

Secondly, bathing is a way of flirting, and it is also an evidence that Pan Jinlian has hooked up with Ximen Qing, which can be used as the image of two adulterers and adulterers. At the same time, what will happen after bathing in the room is self-evident.

For these reasons, the bath between Pan Jinlian and Ximen Qing has become an important theme in many novels.