You need a Bath!

Yes, you, the Roman over there, you need a bath! Oh, I see you've built one already...1700 years ago. What's that? You mean, they're even geothermally heated? Rock on! Can I swim? What's that? I could have 40 years ago but not today due to dangerous bacteria? Ok, fair enough. It's still fun to tour and is fascinating to all in our family.

 

Most of the building around the baths was built in the 18th century and the statues surrounding it were designed and installed in the 19th century. But everything it still old by our standards!

Our personal "Arm's length" photo

And one for the whole family

Notice the two things wrong in the picture?

An interesting array of items that were discovered in the baths were many etched pieces of lead - or Curse Tablets. These were purposely thrown into the baths as messages or requests to the Roman gods - specifically asking to curse different people who have done your wrong. "The person who stole my bronze pot is utterly accursed." I assume it was a pot for cooking, but I guess someone might be equally as angry to lose their chamber pot.



This was both Dave and Christine's favorite part. See the intricate lion carving? Well, it's carved on the back of a rounded gemstone. The gem is on the left and is perhaps 1 cm wide - the picture on the right is magnified. The gemstone was found, along with many others, in the bottom of the baths. Imagine in ancient times, rich Romans were swimming and enjoying the bath with their valuable jewelry on when a gemstone loosened and fell to the bottom. Just incredible the level of detail they included...the original gemstone.

Something Dave discovered and found fascinating is that the Romans and Greeks generally had their sculptures painted - we see so many examples today of mono-colored classical works, that this makes sense.  But it was neat to see the recreation of the colors which might have been used for the Gorgon's head which would have greeted visitors as they arrived to the temple.