BATH, an international network of scholars dedicated to the study of baths and bathing in the ancient world (using common water) has been oficially launched the last month.
Coordinated by Konogan Beaufay (CSCA-University of Cambridge) and Sadi Maréchal (Ghent University), BATH (BAlnea & THermae) is an international research network in ancient baths and bathing habits. The aim of the network is to facilitate contacts between bath scholars worldwide, to stimulate cooperation and knowledge transfer among international scholars and to promote the research on baths among scholars and among a wider audience.
According with their letter of introduction, “this new network was created in the wake of the international conference ‘Roman Baths and Agency’, which took place in the Academia Belgica in Rome, 18-20 October 2023. It follows in the footsteps of the International Association for the Study of Ancient Baths (IASAB) which was active in the 1990s and published the newsletter Balnearia. The driving forces behind IASAB, Inge Nielsen and Janet DeLaine, kindly gave their support to this new network and have permitted us to publish the issues of Balnearia online. The initiative also has the support of an advisory board composed of several prominent international scholars in the field of bath studies”.
This BATH core group have created a website to act as a portal for the network and a research tool for scholars and a wide audience.
As they indicate: “There you will find info about the network, blog posts, bath-related news, announcements of events and research tools (a glossary, a listing of regional studies, the Balnearia archive). The website will also become the gateway to access the online open access database of baths in the Roman Empire. We are now in the process of data-entry and are also still looking for people interested in joining our data-entry team, so please do contact us if you want to collaborate”.
If you need more information, please click here.
Congratulations to our colleagues! A new website to learn and enjoy about Roman Bath establishments! We are looking forward to further collaboration!
By: Silvia González Soutelo
