Roman Baths & History of Life – Siena Tracey, The Tiffin Girls’ School

The audio guides are informative and interesting, and the story-based version for children makes the experience accessible for everyone. 

As soon as you enter the baths, the views are astounding, with statues of Roman leaders not from the original baths, but constructed afterwards by architects trying to emulate the style. 

Any fear of a lack of authenticity disappears the further you go in, with real artefacts such as inscriptions, coins, mosaics, and statues. 

All of this helps to tell the wonderful and enchanting story of how these baths came to be, the lives of the people who came here throughout centuries, and what exactly they did. 

The Roman name for what is now known as Bath, Aquae Sulis, means Water of Sulis in Latin. The ‘Sulis’ is referring to Sulis Minerva, a conflation of the Celtic goddess Sulis and the Roman goddess Minerva, to whom the spring was sacred. Gifts to the goddess, such as jewellery and coins, can be found in the baths. 

What is more entertaining, though, is the messages sent to the goddess that were inscribed on pewter tablets and tossed into the spring. They were often curses, with people asking the goddess to punish someone who had offended them in any way. 

The remnants of a statue of Sulis Minerva can also be found at the site. While only the head remains, it still paints a powerful image and goes to show the extent of the worship that would have taken place in the temple on the site. 

The actual baths have different sections, with information on who would go where and what would be done in each second. For example, there were some areas of the baths where just men would go, and areas of the baths where just women would go, because mixed gender bathing was not overly popular at the time. 

There are rooms in the baths for exercise, and there’s information in the site on the kind of games that people would’ve played, such as ancient ball games that do in fact mirror games that we still play today. 

By far the most interesting, at least in my opinion, is the hot springs. The natural spring of hot water has been in Bath long before the Romans arrived, and it’s still here millenia after the Romans. With water so hot that you can literally see the steam rising off of it, it’s a wonder to all.

Finally, when you have gone through the temple; seen all the artefacts; read and listened to all of the information; marvelled at the different baths; and most of all gained an insight into the day-to-day lives of Romans living in Bath, or Aquae Sulis, all those years ago, you arrive at the end. 

With quotes on the walls from literary mentions of the water of the hot springs, its fame and notoriety is clear. One conical paper cup later, and you have experienced drinking from them. Experiences of the water are varied, but personally I would say it’s something to try, although I don’t think it’s going to become a staple of my everyday life. 

The Baths, though, are an experience I don’t think I ever will and frankly I don’t want to forget. The insight it offers into the past is twice as intriguing because of how mundane it is: it is not a historical monument immortalising a war or a famous event, it just shows us an aspect of normal life, which I think is what makes it so special.