From βαλανεῖα to thermae: unveiling the transition from Greek to Roman architectural models by technological and provenance archaeometric studies

So far unexplored, the introduction and the spread of the Roman thermal buildings in the First Roman Province are widely debated in the current archeological studies. Mainly due to the lack of systematic excavations and intensively technological studies, the assessment of thermae in the Hellenistic-Roman Sicily has been thus far interpreted as a new social and architectural experience. However, a more careful archeological investigation would suggest a gradual transformation of the architectural landscape from the purely Greek bath tradition to the canonical thermae types (i.e., characterized by hypocaustum oors and aligned rooms usually identied as apodyterium, frigidarium, tepidarium and caldarium). The aim of this paper is therefore to study the classical hot bath culture and, in particular, the transition from Greek to Roman architectural models (from to thermae) by applying an archaeometric approach on brick and tile samples from three Sicilian archaeological sites -Solunto, Taormina, Tindari- recently proved to be among the rst towns in Sicily (the latter ones being coloniae) in which Roman thermae were established, in the Early Empire. Petrographic, mineralogical (XRD) and geochemical (XRF) analyses has been performed on a selection of bath building remains (comprising suspensurae, tiles, bricks) to answer the following archaeological questions: when were they built? How and until when have they being used? What was the technology involved? How were the technical skills acquired? The obtained results have allowed to identify local productions and to distinguish them from imports, redrawing some aspects of the historical, economic, social and technological- construction context of Roman Sicily.