The Antiquities of Constantinople: With a Description of Its Situation, the Conveniencies of Its Port, Its Publick Buildings, the Statuary, Sculpture, Architecture, and Other Curiosities of That CityGilles, Pierre
History
The Antiquities of Constantinople: With a Description of Its Situation, the Conveniencies of Its Port, Its Publick Buildings, the Statuary, Sculpture, Architecture, and Other Curiosities of That City
Gilles, Pierre
Istanbul (Turkey) -- Antiquities; Istanbul (Turkey) -- Description and travel; Turkey -- Antiquities
shall only describe the Mens Baths; because the Womens are like them.
The first Place you enter is the Room where they undress. From hence
you pass into the hot, and from thence into the cold Bath. They all
stand in one Range, and are only separated by Walls from each other.
The Room where they undress is a square Structure, built of square
Stone up to the Roof, which is arch’d and built with Brick; the Inside
of which, measuring two hundred and fifty eight Foot in compass, is
surrounded with an Ascent of Stone, above six Foot broad, and three
Foot high. The Wall of this Room, from the Pavement to the Bottom of
the arch’d Roof is thirty seven Foot high. In the Middle of the Floor,
which is pav’d with Marble, there’s a large Marble Bason, which is
thirty seven Foot in compass, and three Foot deep, which is always
supply’d from a Fountain of Spring Water. There are two Doors out of
the stripping Room into the hot Bath. This Apartment is a hundred Foot
in compass in the Inside of it, and is supported with four Arches,
which bear up a _Dome_ at the Top. It contains eight _Cells_ or bathing
Rooms; one of which, not above half so large as the rest, has some
Privies behind it, which are cleans’d by an Efflux of all the Waters
which are turn’d out of the Bath. Six of these _Cells_ have, each of
them, a bathing Cistern, and are built in such a Manner, that two of
these Arches hang each of them over one bathing Room; from whence you
may pass, on the Right and on the Left, into another. The _Cells_ under
the other two Arches are so form’d, that that Arch which is nearest
the Doors which lead out of the stripping Room into the hot Bath, hangs
over a very large bathing Room. ’Tis pav’d with Marble, and the _Turks_
wash their Linen in this Place. A plain Wall arch’d at top parts the
hot from the cold Bath. In the Middle of the hot Bath there is a Bason
with a Fountain playing. There is but one Door which leads out of the
hot into the cold Bath. This Apartment has eight Arches which support
its _Dome_, and contains eight bathing Places, which project beyond the
Sphere of its _Dome_, and encircle the whole _Bagnio_, which is about
ninety Foot in compass. The whole Pavement of it is lay’d with Marble,
and in the Middle of it is built an Ascent in the Form of an _Octagon_,
which is fifty seven Foot, and nine Inches in Circumference, and two
Foot and four Digits high. Round the _Octagon_ there runs a Channel of
Water, which is of the same Depth with the Height of the _Octagon_.
The four inward bathing Rooms are situate in four Angles, and are each
of them every Way eleven Foot and three Digits broad, and these are
call’d the _Hot-Houses_ or _Sweating-Bagnio’s_. The Dimension of the
two Bathing Rooms, which are situate without the two Arches, is the
same. The other six Bathing Rooms are of a Semicircular Figure, and
stand under six Arches within the Circle of the _Dome_ of the hot Bath.
At the Bottom of the Pillars which support the Arches, they are eleven
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account