ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an overview of medicinal uses of bathing recommended by Graeco-Roman medicine, with particular focus on Late Antiquity, and examines the similarities and differences between the descriptions of treatments that involved bathing by the succession of medical authors. Assembling together the various passages and remarks on bathing will, hopefully, assist those interested in examining ancient therapeutic methods from a medical perspective. The extent of continuity in the medicinal uses of water and bathing throughout antiquity is quite remarkable –from the Hippocratic Corpus all the way to the compendia of Late Antiquity. Associations of Hercules as a ‘helper’ deity led to associating him with medicine as well, and Herculean motifs often appeared on both medical instruments and bathing utensils. The chapter explores the medical principles and assumptions that were used to design a regimen for people who did not suffer from any particular diseases.
