The Baths of Caracalla, built in 216 AD near the Via Appia, are one of the most imposing monuments of Roman antiquity. The outer enclosure measured more than 320 meters on each side. Despite centuries of depredations of building material, they are still preserved to a considerable height.

The Baths had a heated and a cold part. The hot part begun with the warm dressing rooms (Apodyteria) and then other more heated ones, the Tepidaria, ending into a huge and burning Caldarium, with a circular water basin, 34 meters in diameter.

The Frigidarium had a rectangular swimming pool of cold water (Natatio) 50 x 22 meters. The walls were decorated with precious marble columns and capitals, and had niches for statues.

The Baths of Caracalla were like a SPA or "Wellness Center" of today. In fact, you could spend the whole day there, because in addition to the fitness and spa facilities, other services were available: massage and beauty treatments, catering and commerce, music and entertainment, even Libraries.

There were also subterranean service corridors, over two kilometers long, meant for the slaves working in the heating systems of water and air, and were used to bring wood and other supplies. Today the corridors are partly open to the public and house an Antiquarium with some precious capitals and marbles that once decorated the Baths.

Recently an ancient roman Domus with frescoes was reconstructed and opened to the public: it had been destroyed to build the Baths.

Some of the most outstanding sculptures of Roman antiquity have been found in the Sixteenth century in the Baths of Caracalla: the Farnese Hercules and the statuary group called "Toro Farnese” (Farnese Bull).
Today they are in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples, because in 1735 the Bourbons (heirs of the Farnese) moved to Naples their extraordinary collection of Roman sculptures and antiquities.

The largest SPA or Wellness Center of antiquity!