Sadi Maréchal. Archaeology of Northern Europe 2. Turnhout, Brepols, 2023. ISBN: 978-2-503-60066-6; 302pp., illus.; Price: €90.00.
Review by Dr Giacomo Savani
University of St Andrews
After experiencing a ‘golden age’ in the ’90s and early 2000s, the study of Roman baths somehow lagged in the last decade or so. For instance, baths surprisingly played a marginal role in the debate about the process of cultural change promoted by Rome in her provinces, especially in the northern regions of the empire. This publication, for the first time, attempts a comprehensive investigation of the development, adoption, and adaptation of Roman baths in the northwestern regions of continental Europe, comprising present-day Belgium, the Netherlands, northern France, and western Germany. Maréchal has meticulously gathered archaeological evidence from local publications and antiquarian reports, offering a large-scale overview of the architecture, technology, decoration, and social function of baths in this remote corner of the empire.
The structure of the volume is simple and effective. The introduction presents the book’s research questions – revolving around the differences and similarities between the baths in the case study area and their Mediterranean counterparts – before briefly discussing the methodology and the geographical and chronological frameworks. The Civitates Menapiorum, Nerviorum and Tungrorum form the case study area that Maréchal investigates diachronically from the reign of Claudius to the end of the fourth century. The final section discusses the terminology used, sometimes with a level of detail that one would expect from a ‘Note to the reader’ (e.g., p. 24: ‘the term ‘elite’ is used to indicate the powerful and wealthy layer of society’).
Ch. 1 offers a helpful and up-to-date overview of some of the main themes underpinning the study of Roman baths, ranging from their Greek and Italic origins to the reasons behind their popularity in the ancient world and the differences between public, private and thermo-mineral baths. Maréchal introduces some important issues discussed in more detail in later chapters, such as the blurred line between private and public facilities, especially in rural contexts, and the role of the army in the development of the bathing habit in the provinces.
Ch. 2 is a comprehensive literature review on Roman baths in the northwestern provinces of the empire, starting with a summary of the several antiquarian investigations carried out by local archaeological societies in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Maréchal then stresses how general works on Roman baths have usually neglected the Roman North before listing the few studies dedicated explicitly to the baths of these regions. Since the author includes several PhD theses in his review, I was slightly surprised not to find my dissertation on the rural baths of Roman Britain (2017), which would have perhaps offered some comparisons for the several villa baths discussed in the following chapters.
Ch. 3, enriched by excellent maps and tables, assesses the archaeological evidence from the case study area. Maréchal emphasises how private baths significantly outnumbered their public counterparts, reflecting the region’s low degree of urbanisation and the high number of villas excavated. Significantly, however, some smaller settlements (or ‘central places’, as the author calls them) like Amay and Braives were equipped with baths, an unusual trend in comparison to other Northern provinces like Britain that would have perhaps deserved further consideration.
Chs 4, 5, and 6 deal with the architecture, technology, and decoration of the baths in the case study area. While the data collected by the author will delight many baths specialists, the amount of information squeezed into these chapters can be overwhelming for the non-initiated, especially when the reader is confronted with long lists of sites featuring specific kinds of architectonical or decorative elements (one of the longest at p. 63). There is no space here to list all the peculiarities identified by the author in his reassessment of the archaeological evidence. Among the most significant for someone familiar with the context of Roman Britain, there is the employment of tegulae mammatae – large tiles with protruding knobs to create a hollow space in the wall for the heat to circulate – in the heating system of a few private bathhouses dating to the late first century (p. 69). By this time, this solution was almost everywhere replaced by superimposed, vertically connected box flue tiles, and the use of the tegulae confirms a generally conservative approach to bath technology remarked upon by the author. This conservatism contrasts sharply with the British context, where in the second half of the first century, the baths of villas such as Angmering (West Sussex) showcased an impressive technological innovation studied by Lynne Lancaster: a new vaulting technique that allowed the heat produced by the hypocaust to circulate through the ceiling. Similarly, the rarity of figurative scenes in both mosaics (pp. 81–2) and wall paintings (pp. 83–4) from the villas in Maréchal’s case study area suggests a preference for more abstract and geometric designs, again in contrast with the considerable number of figurative mosaics and, to a lesser extent, wall paintings found in Roman Britain.
Ch. 7 and the Conclusions are the most engaging of the book. Maréchal examines the socio-cultural implications brought by the introduction of Roman-style baths in the case study area, addressing critical issues such as the negotiation between local and classical ideas about health and appearance, the adoption and adaptation of baths by the elite, and how members of this class used these buildings to fuel ‘intra-elite competition’ (p. 90). For instance, the author emphasises the contrast between the few baths and villas identified in the Civitas Menapiorum (broadly corresponding to the modern province of the West Flanders in Belgium) with the large number of these structures found in the southern part of the Civitas Tungrorum (the modern provinces of Namur and Luxembourg in Belgium) (p. 99). Similar distinct trends in relatively close regions can be detected in other parts of the empire – a striking example being the profoundly different settlement patterns in Wales and South West England – and help us reconstruct the various degrees of resistance and negotiation expressed by people brought into forceful contact with Rome.
When zooming in on specific sites, this process emerged from individual choices, as demonstrated by the absence of cold rooms in at least five villa baths in Maréchal’s case study area. By getting rid of one of the essential components of these buildings, the owners deliberately altered the function of their baths, adapting them to their tastes and needs (sp. 89). Similar considerations might account for other peculiar arrangements, such as the duplication of bathhouses, discussed by Maréchal in an illuminating section dedicated to the accessibility of rural baths (pp. 95–8). He proposes that the less ‘private’ of the two baths (usually freestanding buildings or facilities attached to the side of the house) might have been open to the owner’ familia, the household at its largest extent, which included the estate workers. This suggestion aligns with the interpretation I offer in my thesis of very similar contexts in South East England. In those cases where the freestanding baths were particularly large and well-appointed (e.g., at Basse-Wavre), Maréchal intriguingly suggests a gender separation, with the ‘family’ baths used by women and children and the detached baths reserved for male guests. This distinction would have made sense, especially for ablutions taking place in the aftermath of ‘male’ social events such as hunting (p. 97).
The second half of the book is occupied by a substantial catalogue containing descriptions and redrawn plans of 145 bathhouses from Maréchal’s case study area. By making information collected from hundreds of local publications and unpublished excavation reports accessible, this catalogue will undoubtedly be an invaluable resource for bath specialists and Roman archaeologists looking for comparisons.
Overall, this is an important book that significantly enhances our understanding of Roman baths and bathing in the periphery of the empire. Building on a detailed and comprehensive study of the secondary literature, Maréchal places baths and their socio-cultural implications back at the forefront of the current debate surrounding the interactions between indigenous people and the Roman invaders.