Ancient peoples
The first information about the bath is found in the works of Herodotus - the ancient Greek historian, who in 400 BC. described the first prototype of the bath. It was used by the Scythian-Sarmatian tribes - the effect of a steam room was achieved thanks to glowing fires and hemp seeds.
The following references are associated with the Arab traveler Ibn Zeta, who described the life of the Bulgarians. Baths in ancient Bulgaria were used in winter as the main dwellings. They were well heated and did not allow the house to cool down.
Among the Indian tribes of America, the bath played a ritual value and played an important role in conducting rituals. The bathhouse for Native Americans was a place where they interacted with spirits and meditated using herbs and mushrooms with hallucinogenic properties.
Roman baths
Roman baths or baths became an important milestone in the development of the "art" of baths. They were divided into several rooms:
- apoditerium (pre-bath room);
- tepidarium (steam room with temperatures up to 40 degrees);
- callidarium (steam room with a temperature of up to 80 degrees);
- frigidarium (aroma room with a cold pool).
In Rome, a system of public baths was developed, which were visited by residents of the city. They had full-fledged central heating systems. The baths housed massage rooms, communal pools, gymnasiums, and even libraries.
Muslim baths
Steam rooms in Muslim countries are a separate branch. Baths were conventionally divided into two groups:
- ritual - associated with ritual ablutions, which were performed in the context of Sharia;
- secular - were places for relaxation, which included steam rooms, massage rooms and bathing tubs.
The attitude of Muslims to the bath is rather ambivalent, since Islam prohibits taking baths and swimming in the pool, since the water poured there is considered unclean. A number of theologians called secular baths the place of the devil, but this did not diminish their popular popularity.
Bath in Russia
The bathhouse was first mentioned in chronicles in 900 years - in connection with the trip of Oleg the Prophet to Constantinople and in connection with the burning of Drevlyan ambassadors by Olga in baths. Old Russian baths are wooden (sometimes stone) buildings that were inlaid with mosaics and laid with slate floors.
The difference between the ancient Russian bath and the European one was in an innovative approach to "gender differences". In Russia, both women and men took a bath at the same time, while in other countries a rigid separation of the sexes was assumed.
Finnish sauna
The word “sauna” has a Finnish genealogy and comes from the word “sauna”. For the Finns, the sauna was not so much a bathroom as a place to relax and spend time. Due to the sterility in the sauna, the sick were nursed, and the women gave birth to children. They were engaged in saunas and cooking malt, smoking meat.
The Finns sometimes used the bathhouse as a dwelling when the main house was being built or renovated. A visit to the bathhouse was one of the methods of psychotherapy, as evidenced by the Finnish proverb “when the black organ of the stove sings, you forget the sorrows of everyday life”.