Excavations at Pompeii reveal a large private bath built 2,000 years ago

Archaeologists in PompeiiAn ancient Roman city buried by ash and lava in 70 AD has found a private bathhouse built more than 2,000 years ago, officials announced Friday.

The find includes lavish mosaics and is equipped with a series of hot, warm and cold rooms and a huge spa-style plunge pool.

“Here we have perhaps the largest thermal complex in a private house in Pompeii,” said Gabriel Zutschriegel, director of the Pompeii Archaeological Park. “Members of Pompeii’s ruling class created enormous spaces in their homes to host banquets.”

The spa-like baths were discovered in an area called Reggio IX, a still unexplored central area of ​​Pompeii Park, where the most important archaeological monuments are located. Archaeological excavations Reveals new aspects of Pomians’ daily life.

“These spaces are actually part of the Pompeii effect. It’s as if people left just a minute ago,” Zutztregel told CBS News Partner. BBC News.

Pompeii’s wealthy residents often bathed first and then held a banquet, so the private spa complex allowed this to be done within the same house, Zutstrigel said.

“There is room for about 30 people who can do the whole routine, and it can also be done in public bathrooms. So there is a calidarium, which is a very warm environment and also a large bathtub with cold water,” he said.

Recently, archaeologists working in the same area found a bakery, a laundry, two elephants, and the bones of three people. Who died during the eruption of Mount VesuviusWhich destroyed both the ancient Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum.

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) reported that the bodies belonged to a woman who was holding jewelry and coins, and a young man in his teens or early twenties.

“A lava flow from Vesuvius came along the street just outside this room and caused a wall to collapse, crushing him to death,” Pompeii archaeologist Sophie Hay told the BBC. “The woman was still alive while he was dying – imagine the shock – and then this room filled with the rest of the lava flow, and that’s how she died.”