The Only Roman Bath Still Used Today)

There were tens of thousands of baths in the Roman Empire, from the private spas of elite houses to the colossal imperial thermae of Rome. Virtually all are ruins today. A handful of baths have been restored. The famous Roman bath at Bath, England was buried for centuries before being excavated and refilled with water in 1881. Part of the sacred pool at Hierapolis, now Pamukkale, Turkey, is still open, though the Roman structures around it have collapsed into the water. To the best of my knowledge, however, only two Roman baths have been used continuously since antiquity. One is the small bath at Hammam Melegui in Tunisia, built over a hot spring. The other, much larger and more impressive, is Hammam Esalahin, the ancient Aquae Flavianae, now in northeastern Algeria. This April, I led a small group through the Roman ruins of Algeria. Before the tour began, I decided to visit Hammam Esalahin. It isn't an easy place to reach. From Algiers, you have to fly, or take a long bus ride, to Constantine, in the eastern part of the country, where you can get a bus to Bathna. From Bathna, I have read, you can find taxis willing to drive you up to Hammam Esalahin. Fortunately, I was able to skip all this and drive directly to the baths with my friend Rosti, an Algerian tour guide with a deep interest in Roman history. It took about two and a half hours to drive from Constantine to Hammam Esalahin. As in most of northeastern Algeria, the landscape was hilly, with fertile fields in the valleys between. There was little traffic, and the only delays were a few police checkpoints. Finally, we came to a cluster of white buildings, spread across a steep green slope. In the center was a dusty parking lot that smelled faintly of sulfur and the cast-iron gates of the baths. An Arabic sign at the entrance informs visitors that the baths date to the reigns of Titus and Vespasian, and that they were restored by the local governor in 1936. The placard goes on to describe the mineral content and health benefits of the waters, which are apparently capable of relieving rheumatism and other ailments. The buildings near the entrance, which now house the women's baths, date to the 20th century restoration and feature a series of rooms for individual and group bathing. Behind them, the guard showed us the hot spring that courses down from the hills to feed the entire complex. A cool breeze swept clouds of steam over the walkway. Then, at last, we walked down a tiled hallway and entered the ancient part of the baths. It was Friday, the first day of the Algerian weekend, and the pools were packed with men and boys, lounging and swimming. When I entered fully clothed, camera in hand, someone asked Rosti who I was. He told them, and word spread that an American YouTuber had arrived. I became an instant celebrity. People gave me the peace sign, shouted, Welcome to Algeria, asked about my channel, and did cannonballs for the camera. I was invited to hop in. I would have liked to, but unfortunately I had forgotten my swimsuit, so I had to be content with a walk around the pools. The Romans believed that the hot springs at Hammam al-Salahin were sacred and set up dedications to the local nymphs around the baths. They also associated the springs with healing. Statues of Asclepius and Hygiea, the patron gods of medicine, were discovered by the pools. The belief that the springs were sacred persisted long after the Roman period. Hammam al-Salahin means Baths of the Righteous. Nabil, the caretaker of the baths, told me that the name comes from a local tradition that holy men had bestowed healing powers on the water. To judge from their ancient name, Aquae Flavianae, the baths were built in the late 1st century A.D. under the Flavian emperors. They seem to have been popular with the soldiers stationed at the nearby town of Maskula, modern Kenshula. Legionaries from the camp at Lambaisis, a day's march away, may have also visited. More than a century after their construction, the baths were restored. The centurion who supervised the work set up a commemorative inscription rededicating the complex to the emperors Septimius Severus and Clodius Albinus. The main pools have changed little since. The baths are fed by two hot springs. The more important of these was covered with a vaulted chamber to protect it from floods and linked to the baths by a channel 300 meters long. Water still enters the pool via the ancient channel pictured here. Around the perimeter of the baths were several small changing rooms and a sauna with a hypocaust system. Although these are invisible today, the hot pools at the center of the baths are impressively well preserved. The smaller of the two main pools is circular. So was the room around it, which was originally covered by a rotunda fashioned from tubular terracotta tiles. Although the rotunda collapsed during the Middle Ages, the pool and walls of the room are basically intact. The larger rectangular pool was always open to the sky and ringed by a peristyle with vaulted passageways. During the 20th century restoration, a modern two-story structure was built over the ancient pillars. In most places, the masonry of the adjacent wall is only original to about head height. Since the baths were built, 60 generations of bathers have come and gone, speaking different languages, living in different worlds. But the hot springs have continued to flow, filling the ancient channels and pools, and sending up the clouds of steam that drift through the palms of Hammam As-Salahin. To learn more about the group tours that I lead to Rome, Egypt, and other parts of the ancient world, follow the link on screen and in the description. Thanks for watching.