Public Baths

In Bath, England, the old Roman bath is about one floor down from street level. The Roman Bath has a swimming pool size “hot tub” (no longer used), and around it are various rooms including a sauna and steam room, and a restaurant.

Mineral baths, expensive hotels, and the oldest and most famous gambling casino in Germany, are located in Baden-Baden. Water is supplied by twenty-nine hot springs with temperatures as high as 150° Fahrenheit. Emperor Caracalla came to Baden-Baden to cure his rheumatism in Roman times, and people from all over the world still find excuses to visit.

Sea water thermal baths were used by the Romans in Carnac, France, in 100 AD, and it is still in the sea water and thermal medical treatment business. The seaside resort is highly recommended by the medical profession for holidays for the whole family. Dax, France, is famous for its hot (nearly 150°) springs and mud baths, and the old town is a center for Gallo-Roman archeology.

The twenty-seven hot springs (117° to 150°) in the public baths of Wiesbaden, are highly advertised for the treatment of rheumatism and other ailments. Cures are advertised for all kinds of ailments and the German government’s health insurance will pay for a patient’s doctor-prescribed visit. About fifteen miles north of Frankfurt, Bad Homburg (Bad is German for Bath) is filled with baths, spas, casinos, castles and churches, and a large modern building filled with stores and offices.

The tourist brochures for Bad Kreuznach, Germany, show people sitting in tubs of water, others coated with mud, some exercising in large pools, and still others relaxing on chaise lounges lined up inside a tunnel. The brochure says something like “The oldest radiation (Radon) bath tunnel in the world.” In the US, Radon gas is considered a health hazard.

It’s certainly not difficult to find one of the 250 registered Spas and Health resorts in West Germany.

Terme di Caracalla (Caracalla Baths), in Rome, built in 206 BC, covered 27 acres, had 1,600 marble seats for bathers. Around the central building, which measured 722 by 374 feet, stood gymnasiums, broad porticos and a stadium. In an official register of 354 AD, Rome’s 952 public baths, used 300,000,000 gallons of water each day.