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Baths of Caracalla

Baths of Caracalla

A good example of a Roman bath

Roman emperors often built huge public bath buildings for the people of Rome to enjoy. The largest one, and one that also happens to be very well preserved so we can still see it today, was the one built by the Emperor Caracalla, about 200 AD.

When you first came in, you went into a big courtyard with changing rooms around it. This was for exercising – stretching, jogging, or aerobics.

Who was Caracalla?
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Did people use Roman baths as a gym?

An exercise courtyard at one end of the Baths of Caracalla in Rome

An exercise courtyard at one end of the Baths of Caracalla in Rome

There were two of these exercise courtyards, one on each end of the bath building. They had black and white mosaic pavements with patterns. Above them, there was a wooden balcony that went all the way around, so you could watch the people who were exercising. You can still see the holes in the brickwork where the balcony was attached.

Roman games and exercise
What is a mosaic pavement?

What was a tepidarium?

When you went through the door, you got to the warm baths (the tepidarium). They weren’t big enough for swimming, but were more like a soaking pool. (The metal fences weren’t there in Roman times, but at that time there was a vaulted roof).

What’s a caldarium?

Baths of Caracalla - Tepidarium

Baths of Caracalla – Tepidarium

Baths of Caracalla - the caldarium or hot tub

Baths of Caracalla – the caldarium or hot tub

On your right, there were the hot baths (the caldarium). These were really hot, like a hot tub today.

Who kept the caldarium hot?

People who were enslaved had to stay in the basement all the time, putting charcoal into big ovens to heat up the water. That was a really unpleasant job, hot and sweaty, and also probably pretty dangerous. You could get burned, and even if you didn’t get burned you were inhaling charcoal smoke all day long.

Slavery in ancient Rome
What is charcoal?

The big cold swimming pool at the Baths of Caracalla in Rome.

The big cold swimming pool at the Baths of Caracalla in Rome.

How were the Baths of Caracalla decorated?

Of course the walls weren’t all plain brick when the building was new! They were all covered with marble and stucco, and the swimming pool had mosaics of sea creatures on the bottom and was full of water.

What is marble?
What is stucco?

Baths of Caracalla - mosaic of sea creatures from the bottom of the swimming pool

Baths of Caracalla – mosaic of sea creatures from the bottom of the swimming pool

How did the Baths of Caracalla get all that water?

These big bath buildings needed a lot of water. The Roman emperor Caracalla built a special aqueduct to bring water into Rome just for these baths.

More about aqueducts

What’s a natatorium?

The cold swimming pool was huge – much bigger than a regular public swimming pool today. But the pool was only about four feet deep, all over it. We call it a frigidarium – a cold pool – or a natatorium – a swimming pool.

History of swimming
The weather in ancient Rome

Probably people didn’t do much swimming in it. Roman people weren’t very good swimmers anyway. They mostly stood around in the pool and splashed or played games, or just talked to each other and cooled off. It gets very hot in Rome in the summer! The cold water must have been very welcome.

Learn by doing: go swimming at a public swimming pool
More about Roman bath buildings

Bibliography and further reading about Roman baths:

 

The Romans: Bacillus and the Beastly Bath, by Ann Jungman (2002). For kids (basically British kids).

The Baths of Caracalla: A Study in the Design, Construction, and Economics of Large-Scale Building Projects in Imperial Rome, by Janet Delaine (1997). Another supplement to the well-regarded Journal of Roman Archaeology. By specialists, for specialists.

Bathing in Public in the Roman World, by Garrett Fagan (1999).

Baths and Bathing in Classical Antiquity, by Fikret Yegl (reprinted 1996).

Roman Baths and Bathing, edited by Janet Delaine and David Johnston (2000). Another supplement to the well-regarded Journal of Roman Archaeology. By specialists, for specialists.

The Architecture of the Roman Empire: An Introductory Study, by William MacDonald (1982). Actually not so introductory, but it’s got great illustrations that really make the building techniques clear. Explains how bath buildings were built.

Roman Baths
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