Bathing Culture of Anatolian Civilizations

Because of their architectural value and function as places of hygiene, relaxation and interaction, bathhouses have always played a prominent role for civilizations in Anatolia and its neighboring regions. As architectural spaces and important cultural institutions, baths have been continously shaped by social and historical change on many levels and thus constitute a rewarding subject of study for archaeologists and historians in many different sub-fields of the discipline. The outcome of a symposium organized by Koc University's Research Center for Anatolian Civilizations in Istanbul, the essays in this volume examine the evolution of the building type and its cultural context, Seljuk hamams, Ottoman hamams in the capital as well as the provinces of the empire, Safavid and Mughal baths from a comparative perspective, the Turkish bath in the West, and hamams in the painter's imagination.