Hot Saunas Spa Tub
Hot Saunas Spa Tub
A Brief History of the SPA
The medicinal uses of heated water baths have an impressive lineage. This paper attempts to provide a brief overview of the history of the spa.
By Any Other Name…?
Spa comes from the Walloon word “espa” meaning spring fountain. This, in turn, came from the name of the Belgian town Spa, a famed site of healing hot springs, Spa has been frequented as a watering-place since as early as the 14th century. Though other sources of healing hot mineral springs have become famous throughout the world, it is the town of Spa which has become eponymous with any place having a natural water source that is believed to possess special health-giving properties, as a spa. The word spa is still used, although in some regions of Europe the term “thermal waters” is preferred. The concept of submerging in heated water for therapeutic purposes has many names, e.g. balneotherapy, spa therapy, hydrotherapy, but for this articles purposes, spa shall do just fine.
Ancient Egypt
It is thought that the Egyptians used baths for therapeutic purposes as early as 2000 B.C. Evidence of actual spa construction also exists from Phraortes, King of Media, in 600 B.C. The earliest forms of hot tubs were simply a caldera in which sizzling stones had been placed to heat the water.
Ancient Greece
The ancient Greeks believed in the therapeutic benefits of hot bath and mineral waters. They even indulged in the practice in bathing in the ocean for medicinal uses. Although largely reserved for the wealthy class, the concept soon came out to the public in the form of public baths whereupon they rapidly became worship centers for resident deities.
In Homeric times, bathing was primarily used for cleansing and hygienic purposes. By the time of Hippocrates (460–370 BC), bathing was considered more than a simple hygienic measure; it was healthy and beneficial for most diseases. Hippocrates proposed the hypothesis that the cause of all diseases lay in an imbalance of the bodily fluids. To regain the balance a change of habits and environment was advised, which included bathing, perspiration, walking, and massages. The baths were often combined with gymnastics and education, the precursors of the gymnasium.
Today there are vestiges that still remain of Greek hydrotherapy, The Ancient Spa of Therma in Ikaria: The island of Ikaria has an abundance of the highly therapeutic radio- energized springs. They are regarded as the best in the world. Historically Therma in Ikaria has been a very popular place particularly for hydrotherapy ever since the 4th century BC.
There are basically 3 main therapeutic springs in Therma. The hot springs have curative properties and can heal a variety of illness like rheumatism, arthrology, arthritis, neuralgia as well as infertility.
Therma derives its name from the pre-historic town of Thermae. In the past, the residents of Thermae were popularly referred to as “Asclipians” after the name of “Asclipios” who happened to be the god of medicine. There is the"Xalasmena Therma" which is located in close proximity to the Therma town where even today one can see the vestiges of the ancient spa.
In the past, it used to be a seaside town strategically built on a small cape and was one of the most popular spas. The remains of wrecked marble bathtubs along with a pre-historic aqueduct that have been unearthed from this area bear ample testimony of the place’s popularity in the ancient times.
Ancient Everywhere
Japan
Distinct spa traditions grew out of different cultures worldwide. In 737 A.D., Japan's first "onsen" (hot spring) opened near Izumo, and centuries later the first "ryoken" (inns) were built, offering fine food, accommodations, Zen gardens, outdoor baths and indoor soaking tubs called cypress ofuro.
Finland
Saunas began appearing along the Baltic in Finland as early as 1000 A.D., inaugurating a rich Finnish spa-going tradition - including a prescription of sauna-induced sweating, icy lake plunges, and plenty of beer or vodka - that continues to this day in a nation that offers one sauna per every two Finns. And of course the Ottomans were famous for their domed and beautifully mosaic hammam, the crowning example being the Baths of Roxelana (built in 1556), with its massive towering steam rooms, private washing quarters, and sprawling massage platforms. Typical of hammam throughout the Empire, Roxelana became an important social center, particularly for Muslim women.
When In Rome…
Well, unless you live under a rock, you’ve heard of the proverbial “Roman Bath Tub”, basically, a large tub in the newer and more expensive homes. Though, this term is not without its history.
Taking the lead from the Greeks, Romans embraced bathing as a regular regiment for health. However, Romans considered the baths more important than the gymnastics alone. Besides cleansing, exercises, socializing, relaxation, and worship, medical treatment was also applied extensively. Now as opposed to the Greeks who used Spas as a practice following intense Gymnastics, the Roman Spas also had a medicinal emphasis and were used largely as recuperation centers for the wounded military soldiers. However, recuperative also included therapeutic centers for the healthy soldiers as well. Water applications to the ailing body were a general practice among the physicians in the ancient world. Spa treatment consisted of application of water to afflicted parts of the body, immersion of the whole body in the water (especially for rheumatic and urogenital diseases), and drinking excessive quantities of water.
In Rome, there were primarily three types of baths. There were baths at home (balnea), private baths (balnea privata), and public baths (balnea publica) that were run by the state. With the advent of the aqueducts, the concept of the “public bath” exploded to glorious edifices (thermae) with a capacity for thousands of people. The consumption of water leaped during this period, from roughly 12 litres to 1400 litres of water per person per day, mainly for bathing. The practice was so engrained that the Roman legions, during their long occupations in foreign lands, built their own baths at mineral and thermal springs in the newly conquered lands. Examples are found all over Europe.
Although as everyone knows, the therapeutic and hygienic practices of the Roman public bath slowly lost ground to the social and gatherings of ill repute as the Roman morality went on the decline in the later years.
The Dark Ages, Indeed…
The research on the common views of bathing are conflicting at best during this period. However, with the fall of the Roman Empire in 476 and the rise of Christianity, it’s widely believed that among the common polulation, the cleanliness regiment went to the wayside, for the Church viewed that the practice of bathing was a prelude to forbidden behavior;
Georges Duby , in an article in A History of Private Life , suggests:
Bathing and grooming were regarded with suspicion by moralists, however, because they unveiled the attractions of the body. Bathing was said to be a prelude to sin, and in the penitential of Burchard of Worms we find a full catalog of the sins that ensued when men and women bathed together... Lambert of Ardres, the historian of the counts of Guines, describes the young wife of the ancestor of his hero swimming before the eyes of her household in a pond below the castle, but he is careful to indicate that she is wearing a modest white gown. ... were suspect because they were too public; it was better wash one's body in the privacy of one's own home. Scrupulous, highly restrictive precautions were taken in . . . monasteries. At Cluny the custom required the monks to take a full bath twice a year, at the holidays of renewal, Christmas and Easter; but they were exhorted not to uncover their pudenda.
Bernard Rudofsky , in a speech reprinted in Interior Design , gives a more cheerful picture:
In the Middle Ages, bathing scenes woven into tapestries leave no doubt that bathing was indulged with equal gusto by prince and pauper. In the morning, the opening of the public baths was announced by the sound of trumpets and drums, whereupon the good burghers proceeded to them naked--a precaution against theft. For the stay-at-home a wooden tub was brought to the bed-chamber and filled with hot water. If the chronicles are to be believed, the wealthy had elaborate installations with pipes made of gold and silver, and one Heinrich von Veldecke, an epic poet, sang the praises of a golden tub. In the spring, bathing parties would move to outdoor pools and ornate basins, amid statuary and flowering trees. Dark ages indeed!
The early Irish considered baths a major part of hospitality, and to not offer a guest the opportunity to bathe, or at least wash hands and feet, was an insult. Irish baths were filled with cold water and then heated by dropping rocks, heated in a fire, into the water. There are some suggestions that such heated rocks may have been used to heat saunas. Bathing in tubs was done in private homes, in monasteries, and in communal bath-houses, which were very common in cities. In the late 13th
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The History of Hot Tubs and Saunas
History of Hydrotherapy Earliest Use of the Hot Tub Introduction to Modern Hydrotherapy Understanding the properties and characteristics of water
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