Search over 40,000 articles from the original, classic Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition.
|
See also:FRIGIDARIUM See also:TEPIDARIUM CALIDARIUM FIG
.
4.-See also:Section of See also:baths of See also:Pompeii
.
from such facts as these, that in the baths of See also:Diocletian one See also:room has been transmuted into a See also: At the bottom of the plan is shown a See also:long See also:colonnade, which faces the See also:street, behind which was a See also:series of See also:chambers, supposed to have i e iiill!!!!T!U!1T ! 111HI!Ul . r l .a.... a.00 oo o . ..aoo a o.o. See also:coal/ FIG . 5.-Ground plan of the baths of Caracalla . been See also:separate bathing-rooms . Entering by the opening in its centre, the visitor passes what was probably an inner colonnade See also:round the See also:main See also:building . Passing in by either of the See also:gates (2, 2), he reaches the large chamber (3), which has been variously called the natatio or large See also:swimming-See also:bath, or the See also:tepidarium . The See also:great central room (4) in all See also:probability was the calidarium, with two labra (6, 6) on opposite sides, and with four alvei, one in each corner, represented by small circular dots . (9) has been regarded by some as the See also:laconicum, although it appears very large for that purpose . The rooms (15 15) have been variously described as baptisterla and as laconica . N ost authors are agreed in thinking that the large rooms (13) and (16) were the sphaeristeria or places for playing ball . Returning to the outside, (I) and (18) and the corresponding places on the other See also:side are supposed to have been the exedrae for philosophers, and places corresponding to the See also:Greek xysti .
(20) and (19) have been considered to be servants' rooms
.
(22) was the stadium, with raised seats for the spectators
.
The space between this and the large central See also: The most important bath utensil was the strigillus, a curved See also:instrument made of See also:metal, with which the skin was scraped and all sordes removed . The bath servants assisted in See also:anointing, in using the strigillus and in various other See also:menial offices . The poorer classes had to use their strigils themselves . The various processes of the aliptae seem to have been carried on very systematically . The hot baths appear to have been open from r P.M. till dark . It was only one of the later emperors that had them lighted up at See also:night . When the hot baths were ready (for, doubtless, the plunge baths were available at an earlier See also:hour), a See also:bell or aes was See also:rung for the See also:information of the See also:people.., Among the Greeks and Romans the eighth hour, or i o'See also:clock, before their FiG . 6.'-See also:Ring on See also:dinner, was the commonest hour for bathing. which are suspended The bath was supposed to promote appetite, some of the articles and some voluptuaries had one or more in use in the thpbaths after dinner, to enable them to begin terium . eating again; but such excesses, as See also:Juvenal tells us, occasionally proved fatal . Some of the most effeminate of the emperors are said to have bathed seven or eight times in the course of the day . In See also:early times there was delicacy of feeling about the sexes bathing together—even a See also:father could not bathe with his sons; but latterly, under most of the emperors, men and See also:women often usred the same baths . There frequently were separate baths for the women, as we see at Pompeii or at Badenw,eiler; but although respectable matrons would not go to public baths, promiscuous bathing was See also:common during the See also:Empire . The public baths and thermae were under the more immediate superintendence of the aediles . The See also:charge made at a public bath was only a quadrans or quarter of an as, about See also:half a See also:farthing . Yet cheap though this was, the emperors used to ingratiate themselves with the populace, by making the baths at times gratuitous . Wherever the Romans settled,, they built public baths; and wherever they fe•and hot springs or natural stufae, they made use of them, thus saving the expense of See also:heating, as at the myrteta of Baiae Qr the See also:Aquae Sulis of Bath . In the cities there appear to have been private baths for hire, as well as the public baths; and every See also:rich See also:citizen had a set of baths attached to his See also:villa, the fullest See also:account of which is given in the Letters of See also:Pliny, or in See also:Ausonius's Account of a Villa on the Moselle, or in See also:Statius's De Balneo Etrusco . Although the Romans never wholly -gave up See also:cold bathing, and that practice was revived under See also:Augustus by See also:Antonius Musa, and again under See also:Nero by Charmis (at which later See also:time bathing in the open See also:sea became common), yet they chiefly practised warm bathing (calida See also:lavabo) . This is the most luxurious See also:kind of bathing, and when. indulged in to excess is enervating . The women were particularly fond of these baths, and were accused, at all events in some provincial cities, of See also:drunkenness in them . The unbounded license of the public baths, and their connexion ' The figure represents four strigils, in which the hollow for See also:collecting the oil or See also:perspiration from the See also:body may be observed . There is also a small See also:ampulla or See also:vessel containing oil, meant to keep the strigils smooth, and a small See also:flat See also:patera or drinking vessel, out of which It was customary to drink after the bathing was finished . with modes of amusement that were condemned, led to their being to a considerable extent proscribed by the early Christians . The early Fathers wrote that bathing might be practised for the See also:sake of cleanliness or of See also:health, but not of See also:pleasure; and See also:Gregory the Great saw no objection to baths being used on See also:Sunday . About the 5th See also:century many of the large thermae in See also:Rome See also:fell into decay . The cutting off of the aqueducts by the See also:Huns, and the See also:gradual decrease of the See also:population, contributed to this . Still it is doubtful whether bathing was ever disused to the extent that is usually represented . It was certainly kept up in the See also:East in full vigour at See also:Alexandria and at See also:Brusa . Hot bathing, and especially hot See also:air and vapour baths, were adopted by the Mahommedans; and the See also:Arabs brought them with them into See also:Spain . The See also:Turks, at a later time, carried them high up the See also:Danube, and the Mahommedans spread or, it may be more correct to say, revived their use in See also:Persia and in Hindustan . The Crusaders also contributed to the spread of baths in See also:Europe, and hot vapour baths were specially recommended for the leprosy so prevalent in those days . After the commencement of the 13th century there were few large cities in Europe without hot vapour baths . We have full accounts of their regulations—how the See also:Jews were only allowed to visit them pnce a See also:week, and how there were separate baths for lepers . In See also:England they were called hothouses . See also:Erasmus, at the date of the See also:Reformation, spoke of them as common in See also:France, See also:Germany and See also:Belgium; he gives a lively account of the mixture of all classes of people to be found in them, and would imply that they were a common See also:adjunct to inns . They seem after a time to have become less common, though See also:Montaigne mentions them as being still in Rome in his day .
In England the next revival of baths was at the See also:close of the 17th century, under the Eastern name of Hummums or the See also:Italian name of Bagnios
.
These were avowedly on the principle of the See also:Turkish baths described below
.
But there were several considerable epochs in the See also:history of baths, one in the commencement of the 18th century, when See also:Floyer and others recalled See also:attention to cold bathing, of which the virtues had long been overlooked
.
In the See also:middle of the century also, See also:Russell and others revived sea-bathing in England, and were followed by others on the See also:continent, until the value of sea-bathing became fully appreciated
.
Later in the same century the experiments of See also: The servant of the bath takes off his shoes and supplies him with a pair of wooden clogs . The first apartment has generally three or four leewans (raised parts of the See also:floor used as couches) cased with marble, and a See also:fountain of cold water, which rises from an octagonal See also:basement in the centre . One of the leewans, which is meant for the higher classes, is furnished with cushions or mats . In warm See also:weather bathers usually undress in this room; in See also:winter they undress in an inner room, called the beytowwal or first chamber, between which and the last apartment there is a passage often with two or three latrines off it . This is the first of the heated chambers . It generally has tworaised seats . The bather receives a napkin in which to put his clothes and another to put round his See also:waist—this reaches. to the knees; a third, if he requires it, is brought him to See also:wind round his See also:head, leaving the See also:top of it See also:bare; a See also:fourth to put ,over, his See also:chest; and a fifth to See also:cover his back . When the bather has undressed, the attendant opens to him the See also:door of the inner and See also:principal apartment . This in See also:general has four leewans, which gives it the See also:form of a See also:cross, and in the centre a fountain of hot water rises from a small shallow See also:basin . The centre room, with the adjoining ones, forms almost a square . The beytowwal already mentioned is one of them . Two small chambers which adjoin each other, one containing a tank of hot water, the other containing a trough, over which are two taps, one of hot and one of cold water, occupy the two other angles; while the fourth See also:angle of the square is occupied by the chamber which contains the See also:fire, over which is the See also:boiler . The bather having entered this apartment soon perspires profusely from the humid See also:heat which is produced by the hot water of tanks and fountains, and by the. See also:steam of the boiler . The bather sits on one of the marble seats, or lies on the leewan or near one of the tanks, ,and the operator then commences his See also:work . The operator first cracks aloud every See also:joint in the body . He makes the vertebrae of the back and even of the See also:neck crack . The limbs are, See also:twisted with apparent violence, but so skilfully, that no harm is ever done . The operator next kneads the patient's flesh . After this he rubs the soles of the feet with a kind of rasp of baked See also:clay . There are two kinds of rasps, one porous and rough, one, of See also:fine smooth clay . Those used by ladies are usually encased in thin embossed silver . The next operation is rubbing the bather's flesh with a small coarse woollen bag, after which the bather dips himself in one of the tanks . He is next taken to one of the chambers in the corner, and the operator lathers the bather with See also:fibres of the See also:palm See also:tree, See also:soap and water . The soap is then washed off with water, when the bather having finished washing, and enveloped himself in dry towels, returns to the beytowwal and reclines . Here he generally remains an hour to an hour and a half, sipping See also:coffee and smoking, while an attendant rubs the soles of the feet and kneads the body and limbs . The bather then dresses and goes out." The following description of a Russian bath is from See also:Kohl's See also:Russia (1842): " The passage from the door is divided into two behind the check-taker's See also:post, one for the male,. one for the See also:female guests . We first enter an open space, in which a set of men are sitting in a See also:state of nudity on benches, those who have already bathed dressing, while those who are going to undergo the See also:process take off their clothes . Round this space or apartment are the doors leading to the vapour-rooms . The bather is ushered into them, and finds himself in a room full of vapour, which is surrounded by a wooden See also:platform rising in steps to near the roof of the room . The bather is made to See also:lie down on one of the See also:lower benches, and gradually to ascend to the higher and hotter ones . The first sensation on entering the room amounts almost to a feeling of suffocation . After you have been subjected for some time to a temperature which may rise to 145° the transpiration reaches its full activity, and the sensation is very pleasant . The bath attendants come and flog you with birchen twigs, cover you with the lather of soap, afterwards rub it off, and then hold you over a See also:jet of See also:ice-cold water . The See also:shock is great, but is followed by a pleasant feeling of great comfort and of alleviation of any rheumatic pains you may have had . In See also:regular establishments you go after this and lie down on a See also:bed for a time before issuing forth . But the Russians often See also:dress in the open air, and instead of using the jet of cold water, go and See also:roll themselves at once in the See also:snow." Turkish baths have, with various modifications, become popular in Europe . The Russian baths were introduced into See also:German towns about 1825 . They had a certain limited amount of popularity, but did not take See also:firm See also:root . Another class practically owes its origin to Dr See also:Barter and See also:David See also:Urquhart . It professed to be founded on the Turkish bath, but in reality, it was much more of a hot air bath, i.e. more devoid of vapour than either Roman or Turkish baths ever were. for it is doubtful whether in any See also:case the air of the laconicum was See also:free from vapour . These baths, with their various modifications, have become extremely popular in Great See also:Britain, in Germany and in See also:northern Europe, but have, curiously enough, never been used extensively in France, notwithstanding the familiarity of the See also:French with Turkish baths in See also:Algiers . In England hot air baths are now employed very extensively . They are often associated with Turkish and electric baths . Bathing among the ancients was practised in various forms . It was sometimes a See also:simple bath in cold or in tepid water; but at least, in the case of the higher orders, it usually included a hot air or vapour bath, and was followed by affusion of cold or warm water, and generally by a plunge into the See also:piscina . In like manner the See also:order varies in which the different processes are gone through in Turkish baths in modern Europe . Thus in the baths in See also:Vienna, the process begins by See also:immersion in a large basin of warm water . Sudation is repeatedly interrupted by cold douches at the will of the bathers, and after the bath they are satisfied with a See also:short stay in the cooling-room, where they have only a simple See also:sheet rolled round them . In See also:Copenhagen and in Stock-holm the See also:Oriental baths have been considerably modified by their association with hydropathic practices . This leads us to See also:notice the introduction of the curiously misnamed system known as See also:hydropathy (q.v.) . Although cold baths were in See also:vogue for a time in Rome, warm baths were always more popular . Floyer, as we have seen, did something to revive their use in England; but it was nearly a century and a half afterwards that a Silesian See also:peasant, Priessnitz, introduced, with wonderful success, a variety of operations with cold water, the most important of which was the packing the patient in a wet sheet, a process which after a time is followed by profuse sudation . Large establishments for carrying out this mode of bathing and its modifications were erected in many places on the continent and in Great Britain, and enjoyed at one time a large See also:share of popularity . The name " hydropathic " is still retained for these establishments, though hydropathy so-called is no longer practised within them to any extent . But the greatest and most important development of See also:ordinary baths in modern times was in England, though it has extended gradually to some parts of the continent . The See also:English had long used affusion and swimming-baths freely in See also:India . Cold and hot baths and shower baths have been introduced into private houses to an extent never known before; and, since 1842, public swimming-baths, besides separate baths, have been supplied to the public at very moderate rates, in some cases associated with See also:wash-houses for the poorer classes . Their number has increased rapidly in See also:London and in the principal See also:continental cities . Floating-baths in See also:rivers, always known in some German towns, have become common wherever there are flowing streams . The better See also:supply of most See also:European cities with water has aided in this See also:movement . Ample enclosed swimming-baths have been erected at many seaside places . When required, the water, if not heated in a boiler, is raised to a sufficient temperature by the aid of hot water pipes or of steam . Separate baths used to be of See also:wood, painted; they are nc w most frequently of metal, painted or lined with procelain See also:enamel . The swimming-baths are lined with See also:cement, tiles or marble and See also:porcelain slabs; and a good deal of ornamentation and See also:painting of the walls and See also:ceiling of the apartments, in See also:imitation of the ancients, has been attempted . We have thus traced in outline the history of baths through successive ages . The See also:medium of the baths spoken of thus far has been water, vapour or dry hot air . But baths of more complex nature, and of the greatest variety, have been in use from the earliest ages . The best known See also:media are the 'various See also:mineral See also:waters and sea-water . Of baths of mineral substances, those of See also:sand are the See also:oldest and best known; the practice of arenation or of burying the body in the sand of the seashore, or in heated sand near some hot See also:spring, is very ancient, as also that of applying heated sand to various parts of the body: Baths of See also:peat See also:earth are of comparatively recent origin . The peat earth is carefully prepared and pulverized, and then workedup with water into a pasty consistence, of which the temperature can be regulated before the patient immerses himself in it . There are various terms that may be termed chemical, in which See also:chlorine or hydrochloric See also:acid is added to the water of the bath, or where fumes of See also:sulphur are made to rise and envelop the body . Of See also:vegetable baths the number is very large . Lees of See also:wine, in a state of See also:fermentation, have been employed . An immense variety of aromatic herbs have been used to impregnate water with . At one time fuci or sea-See also:weed were added to baths, under the idea of conveying into the system the See also:iodine which they contain; but by far the most popular of all vegetable baths are those made with an See also:extract got by distilling certain varieties of See also:pine leaves . The strangeness of the baths of See also:animal substances, that have been at various times in use, is such that their employment seems scarcely credible . That baths of See also:milk or of whey might be not unpopular is not surprising, but baths of See also:blood, in some cases even of human blood, have been used; and baths of See also:horse dung were for many ages in high favour, and were even succeeded for a short time by baths of See also:guano . See also:Electrical baths are now largely used, a current being passed through the water; and electrical See also:massage, by the d'See also:Arsonval or other system, is colloquially termed a "bath." Baths also of compressed air, in which the patient is subjected to the pressure of two or three atmospheres, were formerly employed in some places . A See also:sun bath (insolatio or heliosis) , exposing the body tc the sun, the head being covered, was a favourite practice among the Greeks and Romans . Some See also:special devices require a few words of explanation . Douches were used by the ancients, and have always been an important mode of applying water to a circumscribed portion of the body . They are, in fact, spouts of water, varying in size and temperature, applied by a See also:hose-See also:pipe with more or less force for a longer or shorter time against particular parts . A douche exercises a certain amount of See also:friction, and a continued impulse on the spot to which it is applied, which stimulate the skin and the parts beneath it, quickening the capillary circulation . The effects of the douche are so powerful that it cannot be applied for more than a few minutes continuously . The See also:alternation of hot and cold douches, which for some unknown See also:reason has got the name of Ecossaise, is a very potent type of bath from the strong action and reaction which it produces . The shower bath may be regarded as a See also:union of an immense number of fine douches projected on the head and shoulders . It produces a strong effect on the See also:nervous system . An ingenious contrivance for giving circular spray baths, by which water is propelled laterally in fine streams against every portion of the See also:surface of the body, is now common . To all these modes of acting on the cutaneous surface and circulation must be added dry rubbing, as practised by the patient with the flesh See also: |