The ancient baths of southern Syria in their Near Eastern context. Introduction to the Balnéorient...

SPASANITAS PER AQUAM

Tagungsband des Internationalen Frontinus-Symposiumszur Technik- und Kulturgeschichte der antiken Thermen

Aachen, 18.-22. März 2009

Proceedings of the International Frontinus-Symposiumon the Technical and Cultural History of Ancient Baths

Aachen, March 18-22, 2009

Bearbeitet von

Ralf Kreiner und Wolfram Letzner

PEETERS

Leuven - Paris - Walpole, MA

2012

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INHALTSVERZEICHNIS

Abkürzungen

Grußwort des Präsidenten der Frontinus-Gesellschaft e. V.

RALF KREINERDas Aachener Thermensymposium 2009 Hintergründe und Verlauf

Öffentlicher Abendvortrag

ANDREAS SCHAUBAachen als römische Bäderstadt

Vorrömische Anlagen

MAJA AUFSCHNAITERBronzezeitliche Sanitäranlagen im ägäischen Raum Eine Besonderheit?

MONIKA TRÜMPERGender-Differentiation in Greek Public Baths

KARL STROBELThermenanlagen in Kleinasien: Romanisierung der hellenistischen Urbanität

Heilthermen

JENS KÖHLERTradition und Fortschritt in Römischen Thermalbädern

HANS ULRICH NUBERDie römischen Schwefelwasserthermen von Aquae-Bad Gögging, Stadt Neustadt an der Donau,Lkr. Kelheim

JAVIER ANDREU PINTADOVBI AQVAE IBI SALVSVerbindung zwischen Gesundheit und Religion in den Thermen des Römischen Hispanien

SILVIA GONZÁLEZ SOUTELOThermal Spas in the Roman AgeAn approximation to the architectonic configuration of baths with mineral-medicinal water in Hispania

Archäologische Befunde

MATILDE CARRARADie Badeanlagen der Villa di Livia in Prima Porta

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VIKTORIA BAUR, MIRIAM ETTI, MARIAN KEULER, JAN KRÄMER, ERIC LAUFER, JANINE LEHMANN,SALVATORE ORTISI & JENNIFER SCHAMPERDie Aachener MünsterthermeZu den Ergebnissen der Altgrabungen 1910-1913

ANNE HASELEYDie Südwestthermen von Olympia

GARY WHITEDas Badegebäude im Bonner Vicus

THOMAS LEPAONThe Western baths of Gerasa of the Decapolis: original or standard building in the Near Easternbathing context?

F. FATIH GÜLŞENTlos Large Bath and Bath Church

RAIMUND KASTLER & STEFAN TRAXLERunter Mitarbeit von Eva M. Feldinger & Martin PietschRömische Bäder in Nordwest-NoricumAltgrabungen, neue Forschungen, typologische Aspekte

DENNIS MURPHYA Bathhouse in Rural Lycia

Infrastruktur der Wasserver- und Abwasserentsorgung

TÜNDE KASZAB-OLSCHEWSKIZur Frage der Wasserversorgung von Bädern ländlicher Hofstellen

F. MARTENS, J. RICHARD & M. WAELKENSThe Roman Baths at Sagalassos (SW-Turkey)A Preliminary Study of the Research Potential for a Reconstruction of its Water Management System

E.J. OWENSBaths and Water Supply in the Cities of Pisidia: Antioch

GABRIELE SEITZKonstruktionsmerkmale der Hangdrainagen zweier römischer Großbauten von Badenweiler,Kreis Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald

CRISTINA CORSI & FRANK VERMEULENWater in AmmaiaInfrastructures and Leisures in a Roman Town of Lusitania

Bautechnik römischer Thermen

KLAUS GREWEDie erste Getriebedarstellung der WeltDas Relief einer Steinsägemaschine aus Hierapolis in Phrygien

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H.P.M. KESSENERThe mechanization of marble slab production

MICHAEL DODTNeue Ergebnisse zu den Trierer Barbarathermen

PETER I. SCHNEIDERSkulpturenausstattung und Wasserspiele in den Faustina-Thermen von Milet

SOPHIE ZU LÖWENSTEINDas Stifterwesen in den Großen Südthermen von Timgad

FRERICH SCHÖN, JENS HEINRICHS, THOMAS SCHÄFER & ANDREAS GERDESDAMNUM NOCET, DAMNUM DOCETWerkstoffanalyse von antiken Zisternenverputzen

MICHAEL DODTNeue Ergebnisse zu den Zülpicher Thermen

Organisation/Funktion

GONZALO MATILLA, JOSÉ A. MOLINA, ALEJANDRO EGEA & LAURA ARIASRoman Baths in South-East Hispania: Historical, Architectonical, Religious and Social Aspects

STEFANIE HOSSFrom rejection to incorporationThe Roman bathing culture in Palestine

HUBERTUS MANDERSCHEIDEin spätes Kaiserbad in Rom oder von der Genese eines Faktoids

SARAH JAPPEine römische Badeanlage in der Stadtgrabung von Pergamon

MARTINO LA TORRE & MARTIN STESKALDas Vediusgymnasium in EphesosEin kaiserzeitlicher Bad-Gymnasium-Komplex

INGE UYTTERHOEVENPrivate bathing in the Imperial and Late Antique EastA Contribution to the Study of Ancient Bathing from a Privat Point of View

GILBERT WIPLINGERDer Gebrauch des xylospongiumsEine neue Theorie zu den hygienischen Verhältnissen in römischen Latrinen

Badekultur in nachrömischer Zeit

SALEH LAMEIEgyptian Baths and Cultural tradition in the medieval Cairo

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WERNER HEINZVon der Antike zum Mittelalter: Balneologie im Wandel

TZVI SHACHAMBathhouse from the Crusader Period in Nazareth

THIBAUD FOURNETThe ancient Baths of Southern Syria in their Near Eastern ContextIntroduction to the Balnéorient project

Präsentation/Denkmalschutz

IRIS HOFMANN-KASTNERRömische Thermen und ihre heutige Präsentation

ALFRED SCHÄFERDie großen Kölner ThermenAusgrabung und Denkmalschutz

MEINRAD N. FILGISDie römischen Heilthermen von Badenweiler, Kreis Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald

HELMUT LULEYSicherung und Präsentation römischer Thermenbefunde im Rheinland

NORBERT ZIELINGDie öffentlichen Thermen der Colonia Ulpia Traiana - Xanten

Liste der Autoren

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This article developed out of four posters exhib-ited at the 2009 Frontinus Symposium has two ob -jectives. First, to briefly present a collective researchprogram, Balnéorient, which has brought togetherdifferent scholars since 2007, mainly French, towrite in common, the history of collective bathingin the Middle East and the Egyptian area fromAncient times until today and to focus on specifictopics and problems, such as identifying and ana-lyzing continuity patterns.

The second objective was to select a regionunder the scope of the Balnéorient program i.e.southern Syria, for which an architectural synthe-sis can be attempted, for the Roman/late Antiqueperiods including the first centuries of Islam,based on my work and those of other researchers.

It is necessary to stress that this is a work inprogress, partly built on working hypotheses thatmay change depending upon the progress of fieldworks carried out in the entire Middle East.However, it is already possible to complementand correct existing regional studies by analyzingnew archaeological data and unpublished archi-tectural studies.

The limits of this paper are obvious. Ourapproach is an architectural one and relies mainlyon plans and technologies. The buildings understudy can only be presented briefly, due to edit-ing standards. Additionally, the historical dimen-sion of the practice, such as the links betweenbath, religion and society is only touched uponhere. It is important to note that due to the com-plexity of the phenomenon, the variety of disci-plines concerned with the practice, a genuine syn-thesis on bath history in the Middle East is acollective task.

THE BALNEORIENT PROJECT

Near East and Egypt are often considered areasoffering a unique possibility to observe the evo-lution of collective bathing through two millennia.However, they are seldom taken into account inthe ever expanding bibliography on ancient baths.

This is all the more illogical, since buildings, bothancient and mediaeval, are often in an exceptionalstate of conservation, and written sources provideplenty of information, for each period.

The Balneorient program1 intends to collectthese extremely rich sources of data and to em -phasize their value. To fulfill this purpose schol-ars from all over the Mediterranean are cooper-ating to write, in common, the history of publicand collective baths. Their aim is to analyze theevolution patterns of thermal practices, to focuson transitional periods and to insist on local adap-tations and differences. Within this very broadchronological framework from the Bronze Age topresent day. Participants from all disciplines arein the process of creating a corpus of textual, ar -chaeological and architectural data, as well as alsorecording in the field new archaeological and his-torical facts or heritage.

Corpus

Balnéorient aims first at writing the true historyof bathing, by collecting and comparing differentdata sets. Therefore, besides translating and editingselected written sources (a Sourcebook is underpreparation), it intends to define graphic stan-dards for presenting architectural evidence, i.e.plans redrawn at the same scale, following com-mon graphic norms and conventions which willfacilitate group discussion and reinterpretation.

These graphic standards elaborated collectively,help compare and contrast antique, medieval andmodern architectural patterns, that have been sofar documented in a quite heterogeneous way. Theshort typology presented below for small Easternbaths during Roman, Byzantine and Umayyadperiods is one of the first result.

Fieldwork

The second major objective is to increase and re -new the data available by funding and launchingfield works: archaeological soundings, architec-

The ancient baths of southern Syria in their Near Eastern contextIntroduction to the Balnéorient project

Thibaud Fournet

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Fig. 1a-b. Near-Eastern Baths selective Typology. Roman, Byzantine and Umayyad periods (Th. Fournet).

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Fig. 1aSmall public baths of 1st-2nd century AD, linear raw type

Angular row type,standardization of the

basilica thermae

Angular row orring type,

larger cold rooms

Small late roman and byzantine baths

Small public baths of 3rd century AD

Khirbet ed-Dharin(drawn from DURAND fc)

Mampsis, 4th-5th century(drawn from NEGEV 1988, pl. 36)

Beth Yerah, 4th-5th century(drawn from MAISLER, AVI-YONAH

1959, fig. 1)

Brad, 4th-5th century(drawn from CHARPENTIET 1995, fig. 9)

Ascalon, 5th-6th century(drawn from ISRAEL 1993, fig. 109)

Andarin, 6th century(drawn from MUNDEL-MANGO 2008, pl. 3)

HalabiyEe-Zénobia, 6th century(drawn from LAUFFRAY 1991)

Doura Europos F3(drawn from Dura VI, 1936)

Lejjun(drawn fromPARKER 2006)

Shâ‘ra(drawn from FOURNET 2008a)

Sleim(drawn from

FOURNET fc)


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Private and public baths of the umeyyad period (8th century AD)

Balnéorient’s graphic conventions

Hammam as-Sarah(drawn from ARCE fc)

Qusayr ‘Amra(drawn from VIBERT-GUIGUE, BISHEH 2007)

Anjar (east)(drawn from

FINSTER 2003, fig. 22)

Qasr el-Heyr al-Sharqi(drawn from GRABAR 1970)

Andarin, the Umeyyad Bath(drawn from ‘AQADA 2008)

Public spaces

Outside public spaces(courtyards, palestra

Hypocaust-heated room

Service room

Alveus, hot immersion basins

Piscina, cold immersion basins

Praefurnium

Latrine

Restaured praefurnium

Praefurnium with boiler

Restaured praefurnium with boiler

Praefurnium with steam boiler

Restaured praefurnium with steam boiler

Djebel Says(drawn from CRESWELL 1969, fig. 539)

0 10 20 30 m

Fig. 1b


tural studies, surveys, archives analyses, etc. TheBalnéorient website lists all major fieldwork con-ducted by the group alone, or in collaborationwith other teams, in Yemen, Saudi Arabia, IraqKurdistan, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and Egypt.

Meetings

Scientific events are organized on a regular basis,from international symposia and conferences, totraining sessions for PhD students, and work-shops. The meetings already held in Alexandria(2006) and Amman (2008), and soon to take placein Damascus (2009) fully demonstrate how crossexchanging information between specialists ofAntiquity, Islamic world and modern MiddleEastern societies can yield fruitful results.

THE ANCIENT BATHS OF SOUTHERN SYRIA IN THEIRNEAR EASTERN CONTEXT

The second aim of this article is to present,through the study of several buildings in south-ern Syria, a preliminary architectural synthesis onthe evolution of thermal practices in the Romanprovince of Arabia, from its creation in AD 106 tothe 1st century of Islam.

This fieldwork completes the results of G. Char -pentier’s expeditions to northern Syria,2 as wellas those obtained by H. Broise at Bosra3 and by S.Hoss on the baths of Palestine.4 They help us toanalyze with increasing precision and better under -standing, bathing practices in the Roman Easternprovinces (Syria, Palaestina, Arabia), which are stilllittle known despite the large number of buildingspreserved and their often very good state of pres -ervation.

The way monographs about thermal practicesin Antiquity (such as Nielsen 1990 and Yegül 1992in particular) interpreted bathing in the East werebiased by this lack of documented evidence.However, recent works enable researchers to clar-ify several specific points and to reappraise somegenerally accepted conclusions.

The matter is still open for discussion and thesynthesis presented below is still a rough simpli-fication of sorts. A lot of fieldwork is being carriedout on buildings still hardly documented or un -published (at Apamea, Tyre, Jerash, Beit Mery, TellAsh‘ari, Petra, Andarin, Lattakia, Jebleh, Rasm el-Hajjal, Palmyra, al-Kalibiyya, etc.) and will verysoon provide to scholars - above all those work-ing for the collective Balnéorient project, more rel-evant and precise information on the history ofbaths in the East.

Near Eastern baths: a typological approach

Out of a total of more than 250 public and privatebaths brought to light in the Near East (Syria,Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine/Israel), 170 have theirlayout sufficiently preserved to be included with -in a typological study. Too often they are roughlydated in an approximate manner. They can benevertheless divided into three clearly chronolog-ically distinct sub-sets: Hellenistic and Herodianprivate baths (35 buildings), baths of the Romanand Byzantine period (118 constructions) and bathsof the Umayyad period (17 constructions).

Except for private baths, most of the Near Eastthermal baths of Antiquity were built between the2nd and 6th century AD and can be divided intotwo sub-groups: 1. great monumental thermaeerected in urban settings (with a surface areabetween 5,000 and 9,000 m2, and 2. small bathsoperating for some neigh bourhood or village, andof much more modest dimensions (between 200and 1,500 m2).

Often located in the countryside, in small set-tlements or in military installations, the smallbaths are better known than the larger urbanones, which is quite unsettling. As a result, sci-entific work depends on some very well-pre-served baths of the Byzantine period, which ledfor a long time to a distorted interpretation ofthermal practices in the Orient. For instance, thesesmall ‘late’ baths were considered as the successorsof the monumental thermae of the Roman imper-ial period and were assumed to have graduallyreplaced the former ones. However both groupsactually (the small baths and the huge thermae)are attested too ever since collective bathing wasinitiated in the Middle East; they went throughparallel transformation processes until the majorbreaks of the first centuries of Islam.

A late adoption

During the Hellenistic period, bathing practicesspread all around the Mediterranean, after devel-oping in Greece for a few centuries. The hugenumber of buildings discovered in Sicily, Italy,Greece, Cyprus and above all in Ptolemaic Egypt,5fully demonstrate that the Greek bath was a greatsuccess and points out the relative uniformity ofpractices during this period.

However, the Levant apparently did not adoptbathing practices at this time. Archaeological field -works, numerous in Palestine, would not havemissed buildings characterized by rotundas, tholoi.Yet only a few isolated hip-bathtubs of Hellenistic

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date have been discovered to this day, within pri-vate housing belonging to expatriate settlers orwealthy landowners.6 Pre-existing Jewish ritualbaths or individual bathrooms in these areas can-not explain this surprising absence, which is stillmore striking outside Palestine, in what was thefuture province of Arabia. The role played by theJewish religion in the late adoption of the publicbath, often put forward, must be pushed aside. Asalready suggested by S. Hoss, the entire area wasreluctant to bathe, beyond the religious aspectspeculiar to Judaism. Obviously Hellenization inthe East concerned just a restricted elite.

This lack of popular support for thermal prac-tices can be observed a century or two later, at the

beginning of the Roman period. Baths built inHerodian palaces, following Italian architecturalmodels,7 could have entailed the spread of thermalpractices in Orient. These baths, however, werebuilt only as part of a protocole whose main rolewas to reflect the greatness of Rome. In the 1st and2nd centuries BC, these practices were far frombeing shared by the lower classes. As a conse-quence, the palatial baths had no direct descen-dants, except for some private installations in richresidences of the Nabatean kingdom.8

Several coastal cities were adorned with bathsshortly after the Hellenic period (for instance An -tioch during the reigns of Cesar and Tiberius), butRoman bathing traditions firmly took root in theEast only in the 2nd century AD. This was at a timewhen monumental urban programs were devel-oped and another type of building, the theatrewhich was not previously attested too in theseHellenized regions, started being built.

This late introduction was nevertheless suc-cessful and long-lasting. In less than a century, allcities and a large number of Syrian and Arabianlesser towns were equipped with thermal instal-lations, from the Euphrates shores to the confinesof Arabia.

Small Roman and Byzantine Baths

Small baths, often associated to late transitionalbaths, whose evolution lead to the Arab hammam,are relatively litte known in the Roman period.The most ancient public buildings of this type(apart from Herodian and Nabatean private baths,limited in both time and space) are located inCapernaum (1st century AD), En Gedi (between AD70 and 132) in Palestine,9 Khirbet ed-Darih (end1st century-beginning 2nd century AD) in Jordan andat Sleim in Southern Syria.10 The bath at Sleim,which is wonderfully preserved may be assignedto the end of the 1st century AD or to the begin-ning of the 2nd century AD. based on constructiontechniques and architectural context. The bath islaid out in an axial row scheme (apodyterium-frigi-darium-tepidarium-destrictarium/laconicum-caldari -um), that runs parallel to a courtyard. The politicaland cultural context for this bath which was prob-ably built slightly before the creation of the prov -ince of Arabia, remains unclear, but architecturalmodels and heating techniques are obviouslywestern imports. Without any feature suggestinga local thermal practice, it confirms that the Hel -lenistic bath model was not adopted in the futureprovince of Arabia.

Baths dating later than those of Sleim or Khirbet

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Fig. 2. From Roman Baths to Hammam: Evolutionof Heating Techniques (Th. Fournet, after Fournet2008a and Charpentier 1995).

Roman heating techniques(Shâ’ra, redrawn from Fournet2008)

Eighth century hammams heatingtechniques(H. as-Sarah, redrawn fromCharpentier 1995)

Service room

Hot room (hypocaust)

Steam

Hot water tank (boiler) or pool

0 5 m


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ed-Dahrih differ from this imported model. Plansgradually evolve the same way as they did fromDoura Europos on the Euphrates11 to Shâ‘ra in theLejja (Trachonitis),12 and apparently confirmingthe role of the army in spreading of thermal prac-tices to the new boundaries of the Roman Empire.These later examples, dated to the 3rd century AD,are laid out on a classical ring or row type plan, andlook like a ‘miniature’ adaptation of larger build-ings built during the same period in neighbouringcities. Heating techniques with a hypocaust anda boiler reflect traditional patterns.

On the contrary, the cold room becomes largerand increasingly important in terms of surface,when compared to the heated sector of the baths.This evolution is obvious in two examples, Lejjunin Jordan13 and Kalibiya in Palmyrene,14 the for-mer at least in a military context. This trend isalready pronounced in the 3rd century and becomessystematic in the fourth century. It over shad-owed the disappearance of the palaestra, and obvi-ously the main characteristic of Near EasternByzantine small baths. Most often the cold roomis provided with one or two immersion basins.This room remains a frigidarium, but its functiongoes well beyond this. It is now used as a restingroom, a cloakroom, a meeting place, and thus be -comes the most important room of bathhouse. Atthe same time the heated rooms tend to be smallerand collective piscinae are gradually replaced byindividual tubs. The decrease in size of the hotrooms and immersion basins has often be inter-preted as an economic choice in order to reducethe operating costs of buildings. However such aconclusion is hardly convincing in a rural settingthat is often prosperous. This change in practicesrather reflects a change in mentalities. People nowbathe individually, even if they still do it in thesame place and at the same time as others.15

The transformation process in heating tech-niques also starts rather early and develops quitegradually, from the 5th century AD onwards, withthe installation of steam diffusion devices in theheated rooms.16 This innovation, added to thereduction in size of tubs, marks the birth of thehammam, both in the Orient and in Egypt, whosemain characteristic is heating through steam ratherthan through the hypocaust’s dry heat. The reduc -tion in volume of the hot rooms follows andfavours this evolution towards steam baths.

At the beginning of the 8th century AD, duringthe Umayyad period, the baths built in the entireNear East, are in all aspects similar to some exam-ples of the 6th century, in which steam productionand large cold rooms are associated. Therefore the

hypothesis of a technical or architectural breaklinked to the Moslem conquest must be aban-doned when confronted with these observations.17

The social role of the bath does not change aswell. The magnificent Umayyad private or semi-private baths built in luxurious residences havelong given the impression of a change in the sta-tus of bathers, or a return to a bath intended main -ly for the elite. Others examples, whose numberis increasingly growing, tend to demonstrate thaton the contrary, the masses keep going to thebaths in town, and will do it until the medievaland modern hammams.

Urban Thermae

Urban monumental baths built in city centers arenot attested too earlier than the 2nd century AD inthe province of Arabia. They probably follow oradapt models already existing on the Mediter -ranean coast, in such places as Beirut or Antiochfor instance. More than the adoption of thermalpractices, the construction of these huge baths, aswell as theatres and other monuments which werepreviously unknown in Orient reflect how deeplyconcerned they were about promoting the newimage of political, economic and cultural power.The baths were meant to be a living image of anurban or provincial power seeking fame on animperial scale.

The buildings still preserved are neverthelessdifferent from imperial models that were fash-ionable in Rome, Asia Minor or North Africa. Thefact that builders did not reproduce the largesymmetrical plans of imperial baths and restrainedthemselves instead to more modest and non-sym-metrical outlines might be the result of a cautiousattitude of a recently Romanized province. In thewestern part of the Roman Empire, these moremodest plans were abandoned for bath buildingsbuilt on a large scale. One may also assume thatexpansions were planned from the start, but couldnot be completed within an already dense urbanfabric.

In any case, Eastern societies turned to the bath.The adoption of baths obviously had long-lastingeffects. Bathhouses built in the 2nd century BC areenlarged to a monumental scale in the 3rd century.This was accomplished by increasing twofold thenumber of hot rooms, local builders followed theimperial type of lay out while doubling their ca -pacity (fig. 3). The Southern baths at Bosra studiedby H. Broise,18 or the central baths in the samecity,19 illustrate this splitting process that than canbe found more or less clearly in other cities of the


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area (Oriental baths at Jerash,20 Hammat Gader21

or Scythopolis,22 etc…).The development of these buildings, both in

terms of size and number, illustrates the successof monumental baths. It is also the result of com-petition and emulation between neighbouringcities. Bathhouses built at that time and until theend of the fourth century all adopt from the startan imperial symmetrical plan.

The Shahba-Philippopolis baths in southernSyria are a case in point. The town was the birth-place of Emperor Philip the Arab and this smallregional centre was the focus of an impressivetown building cycle during the four years of hisrule (AD 244-249). Baths founded during this shortperiod were laid out according to an ambitiousplan of the imperial type. Disproportionate in sizewhen considering that Shahba was nothing morethan a village. After Philip’s death, the baths, stillin construction, underwent a radical change in thebuilding scheme. Only a small part of the initiallyplanned building was completed, while the re -mainder of the project did not go beyond founda-

tion level. The circulation patterns initially plannedwere also modified. The impressive façade behindthe double natatio, itself surrounded by a portico,now only gives access to a modest ring type bath.A specific political context explains why this evo-lution is so different of that in Bosra, but the un -finished initial project perfectly fits the global trendobserved in the provinces of Syria and Arabia inthe 3rd century AD; the imperial type of baths wasfrom now were ubiquitous.

The thermae of the byzantine period

Because the eastern monumental baths were hard -ly known, particularly in their later stages, it hasbeen suggested that either these large buildingsdeclined from the 4th century AD onwards,23 orthat the capacity to change was restricted to smallbaths at the expense of monumental thermae. Thisview is now denied by studies carried out onsouthern Syrian baths and some other ones in thearea. Far from declining, buildings in this periodreached their maximum extension. The huge sym -metrical compositions and plans created in the 3rd

and 4th centuries increased even more in magni-tude whith the addition of peripheral facilities(latrines, porticoes, pools, etc…), which made thebaths even more impressive from a monumentalperspective.

The baths were even at times completely recon-structed and enlarged at times following an earth-quake, as was the case in Beth Shean in the 5th

century.24 The large porticoed courtyards found atBosra, at Jerash, Beth Shean, Palmyra, are built onan even more monumental scale that at Tyre, andare relevant examples of this trend. The marble ormosaic-paved palaestrae lost all relation whatso-ever to sports. Their main function appears nowto perpetuate one of the canonical elements of theRoman model, the latter tentatively reproduced inthe cities’ centers, also lately modeled accordingto classical cities.

The vitality of urban thermal practices in theByzantine period (from the 4th to the early 6th cen-tury AD) was paralleled by the emergence in thecountryside of a new model of bath heralding thehammam. Far from being opposed, these twotypes tend rather to demonstrate the increasingpopularity of this institution in the Late AntiqueNear East, despite the sharp criticism of the ‘Fa -thers of the Church’.

Bathing in cities during Islam’s 1st century

The expansion of huge baths was a phenomenon

A - 2nd half of 2nd century AD B - 3rd century AD

C - 4th to 7th century AD

Caldarium

Destrictarium, laconicum

Tepidarium

Frigidarium, courtyard, apodyterium, etc.

0 50 m

Fig. 3. Architectural Development of the SouthernBaths in Bosra from 2nd to 6th centuries AD

(Th. Fournet, after Guide de Bosra 2007, 222).


lasting in cities until the 6th century, when the eco-nomic crisis affecting the entire region started tohave effects on these buildings which, albeit notdeveloping in dynamic form, nevertheless con-tinued to function until the mid-8th century, at theend of the Ummayad period. It seems that thethermae survived only because of an ‘architecturalinertia’ linked to their scale and size, as well astheir place at the centre of cities.

Recent fieldwork carried out at Bosra (SouthernBaths), at Jerash (Central Baths),25 Apamea (North -ern Baths)26 and Petra (Great Temple Baths),27

analyses the evolution of great baths during the7th and 8th centuries AD, and allows one to grad-ually differentiate main trends. The decrease insize of pools, transformed into individual tubs, orof heated rooms (through the abandonment ofcertain hearths or of entire sectors), tend to bringthe thermae closer to countryside models, despitea disproportionate architectural overlay inheritedfrom previous periods.

At the beginning of the 8th century AD, thebaths also remained an urban phenomenon, evenif examples of buildings founded during thisperiod are quite rare in comparison to the bathsassociated to ‘Desert Castles’. At Anjar, a new cityfounded at the beginning of the 8th century, thebath was considered one of the necessary facilitiesin a newly-built town. At Andarin, in the Syriansteppe, an entire new bath was also constructedduring the Ummayad period,28 just some tens ofmeters away from the Proto-Byzantine buildingthat was destroyed by an earthquake and subse-quently reoccupied by craftsmen’s installations.29

In both cases, baths are listed among the vitalfacilities offered by city life. These two examples,to which should be added Qasr el-Hayr el-Sharqialso located in an urban setting, show that archi-tectural models were perfect replicas of thosecharacterizing baths of the countryside. The planof these Ummayad urban foundations are identi-cal or scarcely larger than those of hammam bathsof the ‘Desert Castles’. In both cases, the steambath technique had been adopted.

At Anjar, the two baths were constructed in theperiphery of the city, aside from the main street,far from the political and religious heart formedby the palace-mosque group. At Jerash, the Byzan -tine ‘Central Baths’, transformed during the 7th

century, were destroyed at the beginning of the8th century when the great Friday mosque wasbuilt.30 These two examples appear to indicatethat in the Ummayad, period the baths’ role in thecities and mentally had evolved. Baths kept theirsocial importance, but their urban dimension in -

herited from Rome, and their role as a showcaseof classical culture, as explained in their buildingsize during the imperial period, eventually dis-appeared from the cities having survived through -out the Proto-Byzantine period. It is neverthelesspreserved in palace baths, but on a more privateand reduced scale, and in cold rooms which stillreflect this care for power representation.

The economic crisis of the 6th century, followedby the Ummayad period conquests, did not initi-ate a break but rather gave the opportunity tobridge the gap that had formed between urbanbaths on the one hand, and rural or private ones onthe other. The distinction between large and small-scale baths observed throughout antiquity lost allmeaning at the end of the Ummayad period. Allbaths followed the same architectural model lead-ing to the Mediaeval hammam. The technique ofsteam production gradually improved and ren-dered hypocaust devices and heating walls unnec -essary. These were transformed into nothing buta small group of heating canals. Likewise, thanksto these technical improvements, immersion bathswere progressively replaced by steam baths, a fac-tor explaining the disappearance of tubs in favorof basins and vats.

This transformation of techniques and monu-ments allows one to follow the evolution of ther-mal practices, but raises non-architectural issuessuch as what role did religion, both Christian andMuslim, play in these evolutions? What place dideconomic constraints, usually put forward to ex -plain the reduction in size of basins and the adop-tion of the steam bath, have in the evolutiontowards the hammam? These are questions that,among others, the Balnéorient program attemptsto answer, both collectively and by applying re -sults from several complementary fields. The ar -chaeological and architectural study will enable areconstruction of practices that other approacheswill probably explain.

NOTES

1 The Balnéorient project (http://balneorient.hypotheses.org) is a three-years project funded by (2007-2009), andextended till May 2010, by the French National Agencyfor Research (ANR). Headed by Marie-Françoise Boussac(Univ. Paris Ouest - Nanterre) it consists of four teams:1) Maison de l’Orient et de la méditerranée (MOM) - inLyon, supervisor M.-F. Boussac; 2) Institut français duProche-Orient (Ifpo), project supervisor T. Fournet(with G. Charpentier); 3) Paris 4 - Sorbonne, laboratoryof Islamology, (Resp.: M. Barrucand till 2008; J.-P. VanStaevel thereafter ); 4) IREMAM (MMSH Aix-en-Pro -vence), project supervisor Michel Tuschcherer. The IFAO(French Institute of Oriental Archaeology, Cairo) is also

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scientifically associated to the Balnéorient project (super -visor for the IFAO: S. Denoix). Close cooperation agree-ments have been worked out with the General Direc -torate of Antiquities and Museums of Syria (DGAMS),which co-organises the 2009 symposium in Damascus,the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA, Egypt), theDepartment of Antiquities of Jordan and the Depart -ment of Antiquities of Lebanon.

2 Charpentier 1995.3 Bosra Guide 2007.4 Hoss 2005.5 Fournet-Redon 2009.6 Hoss 2005, mainly in Beth-Zur (Kh. Et-Tubeiqa), Cat. n°

24.7 Hoss 2005; Netzer 1999.8 The best known examples, roughly assigned to the 1st

century AD are in Petra (Zantur and Wadi Musa, seeAugé forthcoming) and Wadi Rum (Dudley/Reeves1997).

9 Hoss 2005.10 Fournet 2010.11 Dura 1936.12 Fournet 2008.13 Parker 2006.14 This building, excavated since 2008 by the Syrian

Directorate of Antiquities of Palmyra (Ing. W. As’ad),is shortly presented on the Balnéorient website (http://balneorient.hypotheses.org/744). It was presented indetail at the conference in Damascus, November 2009.

15 Thebert 2003.16 Charpentier 1995, see also an Egyptian example in

Castel 2009.17 Charpentier 1995.18 Bosra Guide 2007, 219-224.19 Bosra guide 2007, 243-253.20 Lepaon 2008.21 Broise 2003.22 Mazor 1999.23 Yegül 1992.24 Mazor 1999.25 Blanke forthcoming.26 Viviers/Vokaer 2009.27 Joukowski 2007.28 ‘Aqada 2008.29 Mundel-Mango 2008.30 Blanke forthcoming.

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