From balnea to Hammams. Late Antique Bath Design in Cyrenaica as Inspiration for Early Islamic Hammams?
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3989/alqantara.2023.006Keywords:
Roman baths and bathing habits, Byzantine baths, Late Antiquity, early hammams, Cyrenaica, North Africa, al-AndalusAbstract
This article examines how a specific late antique bathhouse design in the Roman province of Cyrenaica, operating base for the Islamic conquest of Ifrīqiyah, influenced the development of hammams in North Africa and al-Andalus. The archaeological remains of late antique/Byzantine baths and early hammams are compared to demonstrate the strong similarities in the general plan and the layout of the hot room, pointing to perpetuating building schemes that survive until today in Moroccan hammams. The most distinct feature was a rectangular hot room, heated by a single furnace, which was flanked by rectangular exedrae that could contain rectangular basins. This ‘Western’ hammam design was markedly different from contemporaneous hammams in the East, which in turn continued building traditions of Eastern Roman-Byzantine public baths. Contrary to what has previously been assumed, this article demonstrates how the ‘Western’ design did not originate in (early) medieval Morocco and al-Andalus, subsequently spreading eastwards in the Mediterranean, but rather originated in Roman-Byzantine North Africa, spread westwards and then returned by way of cultural circularity to its birthplace in an adapted form.
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