The History of Baths

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Ritualistic Bathing - Part 3

The Greek, but more particularly Athenian ideal of a sound mind and body expressed was expressed as “arete”, or virtue was encouraged and fostered in the gymnasiums, large areas where young men exercised, bathed, socialized, and discussed philosophy. The Greeks employed physical culture as a form of preventive medicine and as a means of recuperating from illnesses and weaknesses. Hippocrates (c. 460–377 BC) believed that diet and exercise would unleash natural forces to heal the body.

Physical culture was almost deified in Western culture in part as a result of the many works of sculpture, which glorified the body. The spectacular Lysippus's 4th-century-BC bronze sculpture of Heracles has been destroyed, but a Roman marble copy known as the Farnese Hercules was found about AD 1546 and demonstrates the ancient ideal of the embodiment of physical development, and this has been an important thread in the idea of physical fitness through the ages.

The humanistic tradition continued with the Romans but they utilised more elaborate facilities, and placed greater emphasis on training for gladiatorial combat and war. This emphasis served as a distraction from everyday events that went wrong and fostered the growth of the empire, by emphasising its power. Baths replaced gymnasiums as venues for public exercise, and the philosophic component waned when compared to the Greek.

During the latter stages of the Roman Empire, a spiritual ascetic ideal came to prevail. Physical culture was relegated to the civilization's pagan past when Christianity spread in the fourth century. For a thousand years after Rome's fall in 476, the body and its form was rejected as sinful. Exercise, for health and fitness was ignored; the only exercise the peasants got was in working in the fields. The knights had jousting contests but the emphasis on physical exercise was not as important as in ancient Greek and Rome.

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