Women & Period's back in the days

A very old lady once told me once that her nanny, born in mid-19th century into a peasant family, did not own or wear any pantalettes until well into her 30s when she moved to the city. As a girl and young woman, she only wore a linen shift under her skirts and blouse, just like all other women around her, and during her periods, she would just pull the front and back hems of the shift between her legs, fold them a few times, and pin the edges forming something like makeshift knickers that she would bleed into. In the morning she would wash herself, change into a clean shift, and launder the stained shift in ice cold water with lye and corn or sunflower stalk ash (sheets were washed once the period was over as that job was much more tedious and time-consuming.) Of course, on the heavy flow days, she could leak through, but the thick fold between her legs still absorbed most of the blood (and do not forget that compared to us, people of that time were undernourished, so their “heavy” flow was still much lighter than what modern women experience), so in the worst case, she could drip a few droplets of blood as she walked. No one made any fuss about that; it was seen as something gross, but natural (well, the peasants’ lives have always been full of gross yet natural things, so what’s the news), and so people around just pretended not to notice. Women from wealthier families had more shifts at their disposal, so they could change two or three times a day depending on their needs (still, the used shifts were immediately washed so that the stains would come off easily, and the shifts became available the next day.)

That was also the reason why women were not allowed into the church during their periods or right after giving birth: even a drop of blood would desecrate the church building requiring lots of time, efforts, and expense to consecrate it back, so no one wanted to take the risk. If, e.g., a bride saw that she could have a period on her wedding day, there were concoctions based on heavy doses of lemon juice, vinegar, and other acids to stave it off for a few days, and ensure a proper ceremony on the set date (and help avoid the awkwardness in bed with the new husband.)

My very strong guess is that those hygiene practices were exactly the same in the centuries before, passed from mother to daughter down the line for hundreds of years.