Baths
The bath or hammam was an essential element of Andalusi urban development.
There is special concern for cleanliness and hygiene in the Islamic culture owing, among other reasons, to the requirement to purify the body by performing the ablution that is inherent in the religious ritual. Cleansing the body is a religious precept that Muslims must observe prior to the five daily prayers, which are preceded by their corresponding ablutions.
In Andalusi Cordoba partial ablutions were performed at the fountain or pavilions near the mosques; the complete ablution was performed in the hammam, a public bath which was usually located in the proximity of the mosque.
There were several public baths in some cities. In the 10th Century, Cordoba had between 300 and 3,000 public and private baths.
The baths were separated into men’s and women’s quarters. When size did not permit this division, certain times were established for each sex or, otherwise, different days of the week.
The hammam inherited its structure from the Roman thermal baths and it was also a gathering and resting space.
The hammam could be considered as a veritable beauty salon or spa of modern times. On entering the enclosure, the client accessed the dressing room where he was welcomed by a boy who looked after the clothing and sold soap or rented out towels and wooden clogs.
In the cool room, the bather rinsed at the basins. There he rested and conversed while the barber cut his hair or trimmed his beard. Then he went to the warm room, the most lavishly decorated and largest space of the hammam. The client ended his ritual in the hot room to open skin pores by sweating. There he was attended by tellak boys who soaped him and rinsed him with buckets of very hot water. This room was next to the aljibe which reached very high temperatures due to a system of underground boilers, stoked by wood and manure.
The ceilings of the baths were usually vaulted, dotted with small windows, sometimes star-shaped with coloured crystal, to give the sensation of the firmament.
Ciudad Al-ManSur has its own hammam which visitors may enjoy as in by-gone times, and where they can receive relaxing massages with the application of scented oils.
