Baths and Bathing

At the heart of this study of ancient bathing and bathhouses is an analysis of the culture of bathing in Roman Israel and what this reveals about the Romanisation of the Jewish population. Stephanie Hoss' thesis includes a discussion of of the origins of public baths and the development of bath building types in Hellenistic Palestine, but she focuses on how Jews reconciled (or not) the Roman taste for public bathing and their own distaste for Roman displays of nudity and communal bathing. The study combines documentary evidence with archaeological evidence with much of the book comprising an illustrated catalogue of the large number of bathhouses and baths that have been excavated in the region. The appendix focuses on miqva'ot , or Jewish ritual baths.