The Wellness Centre of the Popes and Ancient Romans

You would think that there would be something new under the blazing sun of Rome worth getting up for. This is not the case. What hasn't been written about the tennis court and swimming pool of the sporty John Paul II! Only notoriously unathletic pontiffs are spared such attacks of envy.

But anyone who thinks that the popes have always been indifferent to wellness is mistaken. The ‘Roman’ pontiff is naturally proud of his ancient Romans, who were already fond of water and sunbathing. The famous papal chronicle Liber Pontificalis from the Middle Ages, recently honoured by a major publication by the RIGG, provides, as always, reliable information about the chocolate side of papal life.

The splendour and grandeur of the papal palaces were legendary. Pope Hadrian (772-795), for example, had the Lateran Palace furnished with a new tower and an entrance hall with marble and paintings, all for the benefit of the ‘Holy Roman Church’ and for the ‘honour of Peter, Prince of the Apostles’, as the court press reported.

And here's the thing: the vestibule led to a large bathing facility (balneum), no doubt for the Pope. It is not known whether there was also a golden bathtub in it, but it should not be ruled out. It is said that this bath also had a solarium (LP 1, 503).

The Lateran Palace therefore had an entire wellness area! Pope Hadrian is therefore praised to the skies as the ‘most blessed and truly excellent father, as the good shepherd and outstanding bishop’. Back then, there was no need to apologise for luxury, even if bishops have always made sure that their self-interest was balanced as visibly as possible with accompanying social measures for the poor.

But back to the solarium! What does this mean? You can find it in the famous ‘Dictionnaire des Antiquités Grecques et Romaines’, the ‘Daremberg-Saglio’, 4th volume, 2nd part from 1908. Incidentally, the volume in question in the Campo Santo library has a certificate glued in: ‘Donated by the Bavarian State Ministry for Education and Culture on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the College of Priests in the German National Institute of the Campo Santo in Rome in 1927’ - those were the days!

In any case, the encyclopaedia has the keyword ‘Solarium’ (pp. 1386-1387), even with illustrations! According to this, a solarium for the ancient Romans was any area exposed to the sun's rays, especially terraces on a flat roof or above a porticus, where you could enjoy the sun, air and view. Some of these terraces were covered (solaria tecta). Baths had rooms where you could dry off when the sun came in. In Cicero's Tusculum, a tower is simply a solarium. The new tower of the Lateran Palace could therefore also have had a (roofed) solarium at the top.

When Pope Paul VI had a large terrace built on the Apostolic Palace for walking, it was nothing more than a solarium in the ancient sense (see the picture below. The terrace is divided by transverse arches that block the view of tourists on the dome). And the Campo Santo Teutonico also has its solarium tectum (see photo above) - as does pretty much every roof terrace in Rome.

Details
Category: Roman notes