BAT 25 



main building contained large halls for swimming and 

 bathing, some for conversation, others for various athletic 

 and manly exercises, and some for the declamation of poets 

 and the lectures of philosophers : in a word, for every species 

 of polite and manly amusement. These noble rooms were 

 lined and paved with marble, adorned with the most valu- 

 able columns, paintings, and statues, and furnished with 

 collections of books for the studious who resorted to them. 

 (See Pompeii, published by the Society for the Diffusion of 

 Useful Knowledge, vol. i.) These baths, which were called 

 Thermte, are now all in ruins. The test preserved are 

 those of Titus, Diocletian, and Antoninus Caracalla. (See 



B A T 



Life fif Anlun. Caracal!, by J&\. Spartianns.) We here 

 subjoin a plan of the baths of Caraealla, which were finished, 

 according to Eusebius, in the fourth year of that em- 

 peror's reign. The most complete and elegant baths had 

 generally the following apartments: An apodyterium, or 

 room for undressing ; an unctuarium, for the ointments ; 

 a sphseristerium, or large room for exercises; a caliihi 

 lavatio, or warm bath ; a laconicum, or hot room for sweat- 

 ing; a tcpidarium, or warm room with a tepid bath; and 

 a frigidarium, which contained the cold bath : to these may 

 be added rooms for feasting and conversation. (Cameron Oil 

 Roman Baths.) 



sooaooooooooooooooooooooo ooo OQoo&ooQOQQOC'OooooooQ'! 



[Plan of the Baths of Caracalia from the measurements of Palladio.] 



Seal* of E*sliik ft.-t. 

 100 SCO 800 



A. a 'circular room, over which was a roof of copper; B. the Apodyterium ; C, the Xystus; D, the Piscina; E, Vestibules on the tide of the Piscina, 

 which served for the spectators and to contain the clothes of those who bathed; F, Vestibules at entering the Thermic; on each skip were libraries; 

 (*, G, Rooms where the wrestlers prepared for the exercises of the Palaestra, with a staircase to ascend to the upper story ; H, H, the Peristyles, which 

 we find in all the Roman Therma 1 , having in the middle a Piscina for bathing; I, I, the Ephebium or place of exercise ; K, K, the Klicotheaium, or 

 Elvothekitun ( EXa*-3w0y-3>jxj0v) ; L, L, Vestibules, over which there is another room with a Mosaic pavement; M, M, Laconicum; N, N, Warm 

 Bulb ; O. O, Teptdarium ; P. P, FrigMarium ; Q, Q. Rooms for the spectator! anil for the use of Hie wrestlers ; R, R, ExhcdiK for the philosophers ; S, 

 Stadium; T. T. Places for heating the water; I', V. Cells for bathing ; W, W. Rooms for conversation; X. X, Cisterns of three stories to receive 

 rain-ater: Y, Y, lite Conisterium ; X. /, Recesses for ornament, and which served for the spectators to sit in; 1, Theatre for the spectators to see the 

 exercises in the open air; 2. Apartments of two stories for the use of those who had the care of the baths; 3, 3, Kxhedrffi, where the pymnastir exerci: 

 were taught; 4,4. Rooms for those who exercised in the Stadium; 5.5. Atria to the academies ; 6, B, Temples ; 7, 7, Acarlemii s; 8, 8. Arcades for them 

 ters to walk in, detached from the uoise of the Paltestra; 9,9, Covered Haths; 10, 10, Stairs, &c., which led to the tup; 11, 11, Stairs by which you ascended 



the Patoitra. 



Flaminius Vacca informs us that in 1471 there was to be 

 seen in these baths an artificial island formed of marble, full 

 of the remains of figures which had been carved on it. Near 

 the island was a ship, with many figures in it, much broken. 

 There was also a bathing vessel of granite. Two labra of 

 granite, found in the same place, are now employed as 

 fountains in the great square before the Farnese Palace at 

 Rome. In these baths were also found the Farnese Her- 

 cules and the great group of statues known by the name of 

 the Farnese Bull. Besides the great granite column now 

 in the palace of S. Lorenzo at Florence, Piranesi tells us 

 that he saw, in the peristyle, two fountains enriched with 

 the remains of bas relief*. ' 



mas- 

 ,ded to 



The provincial towns had also their baths, both public 

 and private. The public baths of Pompeii, which were dis- 

 covered in 1 824, in a very perfect state, throw much light 

 on what the Roman writers, and especially Vitruvius, have 

 written on the subject. The following description of them 

 is taken from the second Tolume of the Pompeii, (published 

 by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge), with 

 a few verbal alterations, and some omissions. These baths 

 occupy a space of about 100 feet square, and are divided 

 into three separate and distinct parts. One of them was 

 appropriated to the fire-places and to the servants of the 

 establishment ; the other two were occupied each by a set 

 of baths contiguous to each other, similar, and adapted to 



NO. 208. 



[THE PENNY CYCLOPEDIA.] 



VOL. IV, E 



