SPARTA - 2000

Sparta. Pitanis Street (O.T. 6, M. Dagré property). A. Themos (Ε' ΕΠΚΑ) reports the discovery of part of a Roman bath with walls in opus testacaeum.

The hypocausts of the three heated rooms, A, B and Γ, of stone and plaster, were tiled with tegulae bipedales. The pillars of the hypocaust (mostly round but occasionally square especially in the corners) were preserved sporadically across the three rooms. In the southern part of room A was a plunge bath with a dedicated praefurnium to the west (with a connecting air conduit). A small adjunct room outside the bath building, and to the south of the praefurnium of room A, was perhaps a wood store.

An air conduit linked the basement of the room A with room B (which also contained support columns for the suspended floor). The basements of rooms B and Γ were also linked by two air conduits (room Γ continues under the modern street). A terracotta water-pipe and a small sink-pit lay south of room Γ. A sewer line below the south side of the plunge bath probably belongs to an earlier building.