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Turkish Bath
A hammam (), also often called a Turkish bath by Westerners, is a type of steam bath or a place of public bathing associated with the Islamic world. It is a prominent feature in the culture of the Muslim world and was inherited from the model of the Roman ''thermae.'' Muslim bathhouses or hammams were historically found across the Middle East, North Africa, al-Andalus (Islamic Iberia, i.e. Spain and Portugal), Central Asia, the Indian subcontinent, and in Southeastern Europe under Ottoman rule. In Islamic cultures the significance of the hammam was both religious and civic: it provided for the needs of ritual ablutions but also provided for general hygiene in an era before private plumbing and served other social functions such as offering a gendered meeting place for men and for women. Archeological remains attest to the existence of bathhouses in the Islamic world as early as the Umayyad period (7th–8th centuries) and their importance has persisted up to modern times. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ali Gholi Agha Hammam, Isfahan, Iran
Ali ibn Abi Talib (; ) was the fourth Rashidun caliph who ruled from until Assassination of Ali, his assassination in 661, as well as the first imamate in Shia doctrine, Shia Imam. He was the cousin and son-in-law of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. Born to Abu Talib ibn Abd al-Muttalib and Fatima bint Asad, Ali was raised by his elder cousin Muhammad and was Early Muslims, among the first to accept his teachings. Ali played a pivotal role in the early years of Islam when Muslims were severely persecuted in Mecca. After immigration () to Medina in 622, Muhammad gave his daughter Fatima to Ali in marriage and swore a pact of brotherhood with him. Ali served as Muhammad's secretary and deputy in this period, and was the flag bearer of his army. Numerous sayings of Muhammad praise Ali, the most controversial of which was uttered in 632 at the Ghadir Khumm, "Whoever I am his , this Ali is his ." The interpretation of the polysemous Arabic word is disputed: For Shia Islam, Shia Musl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ritual Purification
Ritual purification is a ritual prescribed by a religion through which a person is considered to be freed of ''uncleanliness'', especially prior to the worship of a deity, and ritual purity is a state of ritual cleanliness. Ritual purification may also apply to objects and places. Ritual uncleanliness is not identical with ordinary physical impurity, such as dirt stains; nevertheless, body fluids are generally considered ritually unclean. Most of these rituals existed long before the germ theory of disease, and figure prominently from the earliest known Ancient Near Eastern religion, religious systems of the Ancient Near East. Some writers connect the rituals to taboos. Some have seen benefits of these practices as a point of health and preventing infections especially in areas where humans come in close contact with each other. While these practices came before the idea of the germ theory was public in areas that use daily cleaning, the destruction of infectious agents seems t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Perspiration
Perspiration, also known as sweat, is the fluid secreted by sweat glands in the skin of mammals. Two types of sweat glands can be found in humans: eccrine glands and Apocrine sweat gland, apocrine glands. The eccrine sweat glands are distributed over much of the body and are responsible for secreting the watery, brackish sweat most often triggered by excessive body temperature. Apocrine sweat glands are restricted to the armpits and a few other areas of the body and produce an odorless, oily, opaque secretion which then gains its characteristic odor from bacterial decomposition. In humans, sweating is primarily a means of thermoregulation, which is achieved by the water-rich secretion of the eccrine glands. Maximum sweat rates of an adult can be up to per hour or per day, but is less in children prior to puberty. Evaporation of sweat from the skin surface has a cooling effect due to evaporative cooling. Hence, in Temperature, hot weather, or when the individual's muscles hea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Loincloth
A loincloth is a one-piece garment, either wrapped around itself or kept in place by a belt. It covers the genitals and sometimes the buttocks. Loincloths which are held up by belts or strings are specifically known as breechcloth or breechclout.U.S. National Park Service Retrieved on 2009-12-22. . Retrieved on 2009-12-22. Often, the flaps hang down in front and back. History and types [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hypocaust
A hypocaust () is a system of central heating in a building that produces and circulates hot air below the floor of a room, and may also warm the walls with a series of pipes through which the hot air passes. This air can warm the upper floors as well. The word derives from Ancient Greek ''hupó'' and ''kaustós'' (compare '' caustic''). The earliest reference to such a system suggests that the Temple of Ephesus in 350 BC was heated in this manner, although Vitruvius attributes its invention to Sergius Orata in c. 80 BC. Its invention improved the hygiene and living conditions of citizens, and was a forerunner of modern central heating. Roman operation Hypocausts were used for heating hot baths and other public buildings in ancient Rome. They were also used in private homes. It was considered proper and necessary by the wealthier merchant class for their villas, throughout the Roman Empire. The ruins of Roman hypocausts have been found throughout Europe (for example in It ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Steam
Steam is water vapor, often mixed with air or an aerosol of liquid water droplets. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization. Saturated or superheated steam is invisible; however, wet steam, a visible mist or aerosol of water droplets, is often referred to as "steam". When liquid water becomes steam, it increases in volume by 1,700 times at standard temperature and pressure; this change in volume can be converted into work (physics), mechanical work by steam engines such as reciprocating engine, reciprocating piston type engines and steam turbines, which are a sub-group of steam engines. Piston type steam engines played a central role in the Industrial Revolution and modern steam turbines are used to generate more than 80% of the world's electricity. If liquid water comes in contact with a very hot surface or depressurizes quickly below its vapor pressure, vapour pressure, it can create a steam exp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Furnace (house Heating)
A furnace (American English), referred to as a heater or boiler in British English, is an appliance used to generate heat for all or part of a building. Furnaces are mostly used as a major component of a central heating system. Furnaces are permanently installed to provide heat to an interior space through intermediary fluid movement, which may be air, steam, or hot water. Heating appliances that use steam or hot water as the fluid are normally referred to as a residential steam boilers or residential hot water boilers. The most common fuel source for modern furnaces in North America and much of Europe is natural gas; other common fuel sources include LPG (liquefied petroleum gas), fuel oil, wood and in rare cases coal. In some areas electrical resistance heating is used, especially where the cost of electricity is low or the primary purpose is for air conditioning. Modern high-efficiency furnaces can be up to 98% efficient and operate without a chimney, with a typical gas fu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caldarium
image:Caldarium.JPG, 230px, ''Caldarium'' from the Roman baths at Bath, Somerset, Bath, England. The floor has been removed to reveal the empty space where the hot air flowed through to heat the floor. A (also called a ''calidarium'', ''cella caldaria'' or ''cella coctilium'') was a room with a hot plunge bath, used in a Thermae, Roman bath complex. The boiler supplying hot water to a baths complex was also called . This was a very hot and steamy room heated by a hypocaust, an underfloor heating system using tunnels with hot air, heated by a furnace tended by slaves. It was also the hottest room in the regular sequence of bathing rooms; after the ''caldarium'', bathers would progress back through the ''tepidarium'' to the ''frigidarium''. A in both public and private baths followed a common plan which had three main parts. The common arrangement would include a warm-water bath -- usually called , but also referred to as or -- sunk into the floor, a semicircular alcove -- ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tepidarium
The ''tepidarium'' was the warm (''tepidus'') bathroom of the thermae, Roman baths heated by a hypocaust or underfloor heating system. The speciality of a ''tepidarium'' is the pleasant feeling of constant radiant heat, which directly affects the human body from the walls and floor. There is an interesting example at Pompeii; this was covered with a semicircular barrel vault, decorated with reliefs in stucco, and round the room a series of square recesses or niches divided from one another by Atlas (architecture), telamones. The ''tepidarium'' was the great central hall, around which all the other halls were grouped, and which gave the key to the plans of the ''thermae''. It was probably the hall where the bathers first assembled prior to passing through the various hot baths (''caldarium'') or taking the cold bath (''frigidarium''). The ''tepidarium'' was decorated with the richest marbles and mosaics; it received its light through clerestory windows on the sides, the front, and t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frigidarium
A ''frigidarium'' is one of the three main bath chambers of a Roman bath or ''thermae'', namely the cold room. It often contains a swimming pool. The succession of bathing activities in the ''thermae'' is not known with certainty, but it is thought that the bather would first go through the '' apodyterium'', where he would undress and store his clothes, and then enter the ''elaeothesium'' or ''unctuarium'' to be anointed with oil. After exercising in a special room or court, he would enjoy the hot room, known as ''calidarium'' or ''caldarium'', then the steam room (a moist '' sudatorium'' or a dry '' laconicum''), where he would most likely scrape the by now grimy oil with the help of a curved metal strigil off his skin, before finally moving to the ''frigidarium'' with its small pool of cold water or sometimes with a large swimming pool (though this, differently from the '' piscina natatoria'', was usually covered). The water could be also kept cold by using snow. The bather wo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Apodyterium
In ancient Rome, the ''apodyterium'' (from , "undressing room") was the primary entry in the public baths, composed of a large changing room with cubicles or shelves where citizens could store clothing and other belongings while bathing.PBS https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/lostempires/roman/apodyterium.html Privately owned slaves, or one hired at the baths (called a '' capsarius''), would look after belongings while citizens enjoyed the pleasures of the baths. A contemporary Roman schoolbook quotes a wealthy young Roman schoolboy who entered the baths, leaving his slave behind in the ''apodyterium'': "Do not fall asleep, on account of the thieves" (''ne addormias propter fures, ''CGL 3.651.10). A wealthy person might even bring more than one slave along, as parading one's slaves at the baths was a way to show one's elevated social status. For wealthy free men and women, slaves carried the bathing paraphernalia: exercise and bathing garments, sandals, linen towels, and a toilet kit tha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Greek Baths
Greek baths were bath complexes suitable for bathing and cleaning in ancient Greece, similar in concept to that of the Thermae, Roman baths. Greek baths are a feature of some Hellenization, Hellenized countries. These baths have been found in Greece, Egypt, Italy, and there is even one located in Marseille, Marseille, France. Some of the first baths have been dated back to the 5th century BCE. The public baths had a gradual development into the flourishing, culturally-significant structures of the Hellenistic age. The multiple locations of the baths throughout the Mediterranean offer different, culturally-unique developments. Greek baths did not have to follow the same design and construction rules as temples or other civic buildings in Greece and, thus, the baths were very innovative. Greek baths were always the same in their functions, but not the same in their designs. Despite the variability dependent on each location and population, there are certain features that have come to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
