Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin - The Roman Baths at Aquae Sulis

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Jan. 13, 2015 - Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin

18:31

The Roman Baths at Aquae Sulis

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	I recently visited the Roman baths at the English city of Bath, the clues in the name.
	I took quite a lot of photos and videos and I thought it might be nice to share what I have with you.
	So as I said, Bath is an English city located in Somerset.
	The site was occupied with Celtic settlements before the Roman invasion of Britain.
	And after the Roman invasion, around AD 60 onwards, was the site of a town called Aquesulis, which meant the waters of the goddess Sulis, whom the Romans equated with Minerva, known to the Greeks as Athena, the virgin goddess of music, poetry, medicine, wisdom, commerce, weaving, crafts, and magic.
	Aquesulis had only one really notable feature about it, which was the hot springs, the only hot springs in Britain.
	Hot springs were considered sacred, a divine gift with healing properties, and so even before the Romans had arrived, they were used for bathing purposes and healing purposes by the local Celtic tribes.
	The Romans had invaded Britain in AD 43, and by the AD 60s had began building a temple and bath complex at Aquesulis.
	The baths themselves were an extremely intricate construction, of typically Roman complexity and magnificence, and are directly attached to a temple of Sullis Minerva.
	The building that contained the baths was one of the largest buildings in Roman Britain, and certainly larger than anything the Celts had made before the Romans had come.
	Over the baths there was an arching ceiling that was up to 20 meters high.
	The Temple of Sullis Minerva was fairly conventional, a high vaulted chamber containing a statue of the god with adjacent sub-chambers.
	But the fascia on the front of this temple was very unique.
	I'm going to apologise for the quality of the photos and videos here as I was using my camera phone.
	I'm not in any way a professional photographer.
	So the front of the fascia that's been recovered shows, among representations of tritons, servants of the water god Neptune, two winged victories holding up a central head which appears to be that of a gorgon.
	It's probably not accurate to call this a gorgon because gorgons were almost exclusively female whereas this is clearly the face of a male.
	As you can see from the picture he has snakes for hair and probably snakes for his beard as well and a thick moustache and slightly concerned eyes under his heavy furrowed brow.
	It's unlikely that we'll ever really get an answer as to what exactly this fellow represents.
	In the courtyard of the temple you can still see the altar on which incense would have been burned and the Haraspex stone upon which animal sacrifices would have been placed and sacrificed to the gods.
	The Herospex was a specialised priest who was trained in the art of divining the future from animal entrails, usually from sheep or poultry.
	Divining the future was considered quite an important task and the Haraspex would have been quite an important man.
	I've taken some very low quality video of a model of the temple complex in which you can see the baths, the temple and a small temple called a Tholos, that round circular temple on its own platform, which is the only one known to have been built in Britain.
	This is the Tholos again, and I pan across to the temple here, where you can see that the altar stone is actually outside of the temple, meaning that sacrifices and incense burnt to the gods must have been done outside.
	forcing those poor priests to endure British weather.
	Inside the complex the baths were painted in a combination of scarlet and white which do still persist on the walls although I don't know whether that's the original paint or not.
	Honestly I'd be very surprised if it was.
	Here's a poor recording of a 3D animation that was playing that shows you both the inside and the outside of the baths, and shows you how the site changed from 100 CE to 400 CE, just before the Romans actually withdrew from Britain.
	The baths were constructed using standard Roman techniques of the time, one of which was called the Lewis.
	This was a method of lifting stones that would otherwise have been difficult to move via ropes and pulleys alone.
	They involved drilling a hole into the stone, which was wider inside than it was at the entrance, and then inserting into it three separate metal blocks, which allow the masons to lift blocks directly from a hole in the top, rather than having to wrap ropes around them and move them that way.
	This was known as a three-legged Lewis, and although it was a time-consuming technique, it was easily the safest type of Lewis you could use, because it doesn't simply rely on friction to hold the block in place.
	The overarching ceiling to the baths were made out of bricks and mortar.
	The bricks were simply fired clay, although they were made to be hollow in the centre to reduce the weight of the structure.
	There's been an entire segment of the roof spine that's been found and currently stands on display.
	And I have a short video of it for you.
	You probably already know this, but the Roman baths are filled with pipes made of lead.
	In fact, the baths themselves are still watertight because they still have the original lead lining that was made at the time when the baths were made and is still watertight and intact.
	The lead was mined locally in Britain, formed into ingots and then transferred to site, where it was then made into pipes or sheets or whatever it needed to be used for.
	The baths work by controlling the water that comes out of the hot spring, which flows into a Roman-built reservoir, which is then directed around the site, which includes the great bath that everyone's familiar with, the caldrarium, which is the hot bath, the tepidarium, which is the warm bath, the frigidarium which is the cold bath.
	The baths contain an overflow drain to drain off any excess water and the level of water in the baths themselves was directly controlled using bronze sluice gates and all water leaving the complex drained out to the River Avon.
	The Roman baths also had extensive hypercausts.
	The one pictured here is from France, but it shows you more accurately how they worked.
	They were rooms where the floor was elevated on stone pillars and then covered in tile and then concrete and then more tiles, so hot air would flow underneath the floor and heat the floor.
	This would probably have been considered extremely luxurious, and there is, and the native Britons certainly didn't have technology like this.
	The hypercausts were without a doubt covered in tiles, and they may even have been covered in tiled mosaics, such as this beautifully preserved one of hippocampuses and dolphins frolicking.
	To the east and west of the Great Bath were the secondary baths, the calradium, the hot bath, the tepidarium, the warm bath, and the frigidarium, the cold bath.
	These had various different types of apparent healing effects and would have been enjoyed in sequence to get the full effect.
	I apologise for the quality of these photos, it was very dark in there.
	I don't know whether this is to preserve the paint on the walls, I don't know whether the paints are the original paint or not.
	So I'll just let these photos play through in sequence because you can't really see too much about them.
	You can on some see the hypercaust flooring and various nooks and crannies that the bathers would have been able to sit on.
	And finally we come to the Great Bath, which is a remarkably large structure.
	have some very poor quality video shot by myself that you can see before we carry on.
	Probably the first thing that you notice is the water is very green.
	I'm sure you're aware that this is not normal and it's caused by algae because the baths no longer have their overarching roof.
	Sunlight directly hits the warm water which encourages algae to grow.
	When this was operated by the Romans with the roof the water would have been crystal clear and a lot more inviting I am sure.
	The next thing to note about the Great Bath is that the only bits about the bath that are the Roman originals are the bath itself, including the still intact lead lining, and the grey stone plinths around the edge, as well as the steps and stone flooring.
	The sandstone pillars and walkways, as well as the statues of various Roman emperors that can be seen around the top of this walkway, are far more modern recreations done in the 18th and 19th centuries.
	You can see all around the baths that there are stone steps just leading into the bath for people to simply walk in and out of.
	It's really not dissimilar to a modern bath and frankly it's very inviting.
	It's really not difficult to see how people would have just waded into the hot water.
	And the water is actually surprisingly hot.
	It comes out at 46 degrees Celsius, which is more than hot enough for the water to produce steam, especially when it comes into contact with the cold January air.
	You may also be able to see bubbles in the water.
	This isn't due to the water boiling, this is due to gases being trapped underneath it and coming up and releasing.
	This is footage of a section known as the King's Bath, which was a later addition and inaccessible to the public.
	And this is how the hot water flows into the great bath.
	Wow, that is hot.
	You...
	You'd be alright to wash your dishes in that.
	Oh, uh, do not touch the water.
	Sorry?
	Given that Aquasulis was a small town and probably quite a popular destination for people to travel to, it's no wonder that there's all manner of remains and Roman goods found at the site.
	There are plenty of monumental inscriptions and headstones left for people who are coming to dedicate something to the gods.
	I don't speak Latin, but I've been informed reliably that that's what these mean.
	Any one of these could have been a headstone for this chap, who is apparently a man from Syria, from I think approximately the third century, who was found buried in a stone coffin here.
	The fact that he was buried and not cremated indicates that he may well have been a Christian.
	All manner of coins dating from before the Roman occupation right through to the withdrawal of the Romans have been found at Aquasulis.
	Over 12,000 coins in total, as they were left as dedications for the gods.
	And not wanting to offend Sulis Minerva myself, I also made a dedication.
	Hundreds of everyday objects have been found at Aquasulis, such as millstones, pots, cutlery, vases, amphorae, plates, dishes, all the sorts of things you'd expect to find from just people living their everyday lives.
	I don't know why, but I was rather taken with the selection of iron keys, as well as these craftsmen's tools.
	For some reason, I personally find the most mundane items to be the most interesting.
	I really can't explain why, but there's something about finding combs and hairpins and very attractive items of jewelry that really bring it to life for me.
	It really makes you realize that these were just regular people.
	For example, these were spatulas used for making their own cosmetics and tweezers for hair removal.
	I know it sounds silly, but I find that so fascinating.
	The people who lived at Aquasulis were concerned about how they look.
	They were concerned about how they presented themselves.
	They wanted to be clean and neat, and they wanted to show off their social status.
	One of the more impressive finds is this bronze headdress.
	Presumably it's a headdress.
	It's probably belonged to a priest or maybe an aristocratic lady.
	It's rather hard to tell given the state of it, but it was obviously part of a very beautiful piece when it was made.
	It's important to remember that the gods weren't some distant, remote, inaccessible thing to the Romans.
	They could quite freely petition and communicate with their gods and create contracts with them that usually took the form of curses.
	The person writing the curse would promise to do something on the receipt of the action of the god.
	There's one example of a man who had his gloves stolen and wished for the thieves to go blind, and often to recompense the god for their efforts with his time and money by setting up a statue or vote of offering.
	The messages were inscribed on thin sheets of lead and then thrown into the sacred spring, presumably by the priests.
	These were not uncommon at all and we've discovered 130 of them.
	So I guess there are a lot of people who were committing crimes that people wanted the gods to punish them for.
	I think that hands down the most impressive object found at Aquisulis though was nothing less than the gilt bronze head of the statue of Sullis Minerva herself.
	There's very little I can say about this magnificent piece, so please enjoy.
	And finally, since ancient times the waters of the spring were renowned for their healing and restorative properties.
	Not only were you meant to swim in them, but you were also meant to drink them, and some are generously provided for you.
	Not being a chemist, I have no idea whether these minerals are good or bad for you, but it did have a sign there saying that children under seven should not regularly drink this water, so I really don't know.
	But thanks for watching, I hope you found this informative.
	We are now about to drink some of the actual spa water.

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