For the extensive changes made in the earlier part of the first
century B.C. we have the evidence of an inscription, which had been
cast aside and was found in one of the smaller rooms. It reads, _C.
Uulius C. f., P. Aninius C. f., II v. i. d., Laconicum et destrictarium
faciund. et porticus et palaestr[am] reficiunda locarunt ex
d[ecurionum] d[ecreto] ex ea pequnia quod eos e lege in ludos aut in
monumento consumere oportuit faciun[da] coerarunt eidemque
probaru[nt]_. The form of the letters and the spelling point to the
time of Sulla as the period in which the inscription was cut. The
syntax is confused, but the meaning is clear: a Laconicum and
_destrictarium_ were built, the colonnade and palæstra repaired, by
the duumvirs Gaius Ulius and Publius Aninius, in accordance with a
vote of the city council; and they furnished the means for this work
in fulfilment of their obligation, incurred by the acceptance of the
duumviral office, to spend a certain sum upon either games or
buildings.
The destrictarium--a room for removing dirt and oil with the strigil
after gymnastic exercises--is easily identified (D), as are also the
palaestra and colonnade; but in our survey of the baths, we have
found no separate chamber to which the term Laconicum could properly
be applied. In order to arrive at a solution of the difficulty, we
must note the successive steps by which, as shown by an examination of
the remains of the masonry, the heating arrangements were extended and
improved.
At first, in the Baths as originally constructed, there were neither
hollow walls nor hollow floors. The heating was done by means of
braziers; and there were niches or lockers in the walls of the
caldariums and tepidariums similar to those now found in the dressing
rooms, but in double rows, the upper niches being larger, the lower
smaller.
Later, a hollow floor was built in the men's caldarium. Later still,
this room was provided with hollow walls, which were extended to the
crown of the ceilings and the lunettes, the tepidarium being still
heated with braziers.
Finally, a hollow floor and hollow walls were constructed at the same
time in the men's tepidarium, but the hot air chamber was not carried
up into the ceiling or the lunettes.
A similar transformation was gradually accomplished in the women's
apartments; but owing, it would seem, to a desire for greater warmth
in the tepidarium, the hot air chamber here, as in the caldarium, was
extended to the lunettes and the ceiling.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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