Bath: history and structure

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

“Every year, on December 31, my friends and I go to the bathhouse …” The famous phrase from the equally famous film firmly connected the New Year with the bath theme, but more often our attention is focused exclusively on the Russian bath or its related Finnish sauna. But, as you know, there are options.

To get warm - so warm up. That the Russian steam room, that the sauna immediately betrays its northern origin with a rather tough character: it is necessary to “warm up the bones” from the frost properly, but you cannot sit in such a bath for a long time. Baths, born in milder climatic conditions, do not work so hard with our body and are more likely to enjoy unhurried warmth than to contrast invigorating procedures.

Baths instead of libraries

The Turkish bath (hammam), as you know, goes back to the Roman (or more correctly, to the Greek-Roman) terms. Following the fate of many of the achievements of Antiquity, the Roman bath was practically forgotten in the West, but in the East, the new owners - dynamic and vigorous nomads - prudently disposed of the legacy of the Romans.

The most characteristic element of the classic Turkish bath is the dome erected over the central room. The dome is dotted with small windows giving the impression of a starry sky. They let in only a small part of the sunlight, and therefore twilight reigns in the bath. Condensation flows down the inner walls of the dome. Another characteristic attribute is kurnas, bowls for ablution. They were carved out of stone and had no drain.

Until the Prophet explained to his followers that a bath was good, and the slaves did not recognize any other washing than pouring cold water. Bathing in the font, in their opinion, was equated with splashing around in one's own mud. However, having invaded the Middle East, which was subjected to the strongest Greco-Roman influence, from Arabia, the children of the deserts were able to appreciate something. But just one thing.

According to some reports, after capturing Alexandria in 642, the Prophet's soldiers made a big bath. The baths were heated for six months without interruption, and in their ovens parchments from the library of the Ptolemies, the Hellenistic rulers of Egypt, burned with a bright fire. At least 700,000 scrolls perished - the price paid by the world cultural heritage for introducing the Arabs to the bath.

Affectionate warmth

I must say that, having borrowed from the Romans the very idea of relaxing procedures in not very hot, but very humid air, the peoples of the East - the Arabs, and later the Turks - made quite significant changes to the design of the bath itself.

Roman civilization loved large volumes and high vaults - the majestic ruins of the baths of the imperial period still boggle the imagination. Turkish baths have shrunk in size and have almost grown into the ground. Small rooms with low domed ceilings dotted with tiny windows, a kingdom of twilight - they looked more like secret sanctuaries than public relaxation facilities.

If the baths stood in an honorable central place in Roman cities, then the first Arab baths were erected on the outskirts, literally in the desert. Over time, baths, which received the Arabic name "hamam", which spread throughout the East, began to be attached to mosques, where they turned into an instrument of ritual purification.

Quite hot water is poured into the font (38 and 43 ° C), so a bath session usually does not exceed 15 minutes. Swimming in the open-air Furaco can be a special pleasure. A dry bath allows for much longer procedures. Lying in hot sawdust soaked in aromatic oils, a person relaxes and sometimes falls asleep.

What first of all unites the Roman and Turkish baths? The fact that, unlike the sauna and Russian bath, the stove here is not located directly in the bath room, but under the floor. In Roman baths, hypocaust (literally "heat from below") was used - a kind of central heating system.

The stove warmed up the air and water, and they, in turn, moving along special channels in the floor and walls, warmed the bath room. The Arabs adopted this technology, although some eastern baths were built on warm springs and used geothermal heat. Another similarity between the Roman and classical Turkish baths lies in the certain stages in the adoption of procedures.

Traditionally, the therma was divided into several rooms with different air temperatures in the halls and water in the pools, and before going to the hottest room of the therma - the caldarium, the Roman always visited the tepidarium - a warm room. There was also a frigidarium, where cool reigned, and a laconic room with dry hot steam, that is, a kind of sauna.

The world of beautiful stone

In classical hamams, this division is partly preserved, however, the tepidarium has turned from an independent room into something like a dressing room for the harara - an analogue of the caldarium, the central hall of the bath. The laconic role was played by special niches in the walls of the Harar, where the air was drier and hotter.

Nowadays, in addition to the classic Turkish baths, built according to all the rules, there is also a modern reduced version in the form of a single room - harara. By the way, an important difference between the harara and the caldarium is that in the center of the latter there was a pool with hot water, and in the Turkish bath in the center of the hall on a pedestal there is a heated marble slab - hebektash.

The visitor is laid down on the stove - here he is lathered with foam and massaged. A necessary structural element of the bath is a dome: moisture from the air condenses on the ceiling, and if it were flat, cool drops would regularly pour over the visitors. In reality, moisture flows down the walls of the dome into special drains.

Of course, in modern baths of the oriental type, not an analogue of hypocaust is used, but electric steam generators. But there is one tradition that the builders of modern hamams not only do not violate, but also develop in every possible way. Technologically, representing a box of brick or concrete, a Turkish bath must be richly decorated from the inside. Contemplation of mosaics with oriental motifs and iridescent textures of colored marble creates a special mood, without which a visit to the Turkish bath would not be complete.

The rich decor, which is especially appreciated in the Muslim Middle East, contrasts somewhat with the traditional laconicism of the Far East, or rather, the Japanese hot bath. Natural wood surfaces reign here.

Sweet dream in sawdust

A Japanese bathhouse consists of four elements: two tubs (furako) and two oblong wooden boxes (dimensions 80x80x200 cm), which are called ofuro. Furakos are filled with water that is unusually hot for a European - in one font it is heated to a temperature of 38 ° C, and in another - to 42-43. As you become more familiar with the Japanese bathing experience, it becomes easier to endure the heat of the furako, but in fact, hot tubs are not designed for long sitting.

A particularly important requirement is that the water level in furako must be below the level of the heart of the person taking the bath. Thus, unlike a hot sauna, the head and heart are not exposed to strong temperatures, which makes bathing in furaco safer for people with vascular problems.

Ofuro, in shape, is closer to our usual bath, only there is no water in them. In such boxes, two types of bath procedures are carried out. The first ofuro, which is placed obliquely, at an angle of 45 degrees, is filled with cedar shavings, sometimes adding aromatic oils to it. Ofuro has a heating device so that the chips are always warm. The second ofuro is filled with large smooth pebbles and is also heated.

The visitor of the bath is offered green tea, after which active sweating begins - it's time to lie down in cedar sawdust. The shavings absorb sweat, simultaneously warming and massaging the skin, which in the meantime is saturated with various microelements. Lying on a warm sawdust bed so relaxes and pacifies the visitor of the bath that it is not uncommon for the client to fall asleep.

Waking up from the bliss, he goes to the shower, washes off the remnants of sweat and shavings and goes to another ofuro, installed absolutely horizontally. A client lying on a heated pebble is massaged with the same pebbles.

Barrels of water and steam

After the ofuro session, you can consistently immerse yourself in furako - first into the one where the water temperature is lower, then into the one that is hotter. There, the visitor is given a massage of the upper girdle of the extremities. It is worth emphasizing once again that furako is not intended for long sitting, although there are those who like to splash in the barrel longer. And it is definitely not the kind of bathhouse where people wash themselves. You should immerse yourself in furako, after thoroughly washing the body, - no washcloths and soap are allowed in the font.

Among the types of baths offered on our market, there is the so-called Altai bath, or phyto-barrel. With the Japanese furako, it is related by the appearance of a wooden barrel, and with the Turkish hamam - by steam. The person sits down inside the Altai bath (only the head protrudes outward), after which a steam generator is turned on, injecting steam into the barrel. On the way, he passes through a stainless steel flask, in which medicinal herbs are placed on a special grid. This phyto-steam is believed to have health-promoting properties.

Returning to the Japanese bath, we can say that the standard duration of bath procedures is about two hours, and the sequence of alternating ofuro and furako can vary. It all ends with a tea ceremony, during which a light meal like fruit or sushi is served with tea.

The design of the elements of the Japanese bath is simple, since it goes back to antiquity, however, since we trust these wooden vessels with our body and health, it would be interesting to know how and from what they are made.

Wood and glue

As we found out, fonts are made of three types of wood: Far Eastern linden, Siberian cedar and teak. Previously, furaco was made from oak, but oak has one serious drawback - its wood contains a huge amount of tannins. Since the baptismal font cannot be covered with any protective layer other than oil (otherwise it will cease to be a baptismal font), tannins appear on the furaco surface and a layer resembling bituminous pitch appears on it.

The Altai bath (sometimes called the Tibetan bath) warms a person with a cloud of steam filled with the aroma of medicinal herbs. An important difference from the Russian steam room is that you do not have to plunge into steam with your head, exposing the vessels of the brain to risky loads.

Sometimes the baptismal font is assembled in the traditional cooper's way: the trapezoidal lamellas in cross-section are made smooth and pressed against each other due to swelling and tightening with hoops. Another technology is the connection of lamellas using the “thorn-groove” method, which adds strength to the structure, which needs to hold up to 2 tons of water.

Wooden planks are glued together with epoxy resin, and only in some joints, instead of resin, silicone sealant is used, which has a certain elasticity, which becomes important when the product swells. After the "barrel" is assembled and hoops are put on it, the necessary equipment is installed inside the font - heating and filtration devices, hydro and air massage.

The requirements for ofuro are not so high, because water is not poured into them and the walls of the box practically do not come into contact with human skin. Oak, teak or linden are used in their manufacture, and here it is not the properties of a particular type of wood that come to the fore, but rather design considerations. Wooden parts are connected with tongue-and-groove piles, as tightness is not required here.

If ofuro is always used indoors, then Japanese bath tubs can also be taken out into the open air, which is often practiced both in Japan and in Russia. In this case, a maintenance-free heat exchanger or an instantaneous water heater is supplied to the hot tub.

No matter how the bath is arranged and from whatever corner of the world it comes, its benefits are obvious: the bath heals the body, allows you to relax, relieve fatigue and at the same time feel a surge of vivacity. And who is nicer - a Turkish stone or a Japanese tree - is a matter of taste and mood. Everything is worth trying.