Russian bathhouse in black style The bathhouse has always been and is for Russian people not just a place where you can take hygiene procedures and cleanse your body of impurities, but a special, almost sacred structure, where cleansing occurs not only on the physical, but also on the spiritual level. It’s not without reason that those who visited the bathhouse, describing their own feelings, say:
How he was born again, became 10 years younger and cleansed his body and soul.
The concept of a Russian bath, the history of its appearance
A Russian bathhouse is a specially equipped room that is designed for water hygiene and thermal procedures for the purpose of prevention and healing of the entire body.
Today it is difficult to judge what prompted ancient man to think about creating a bathhouse. Perhaps these were random drops that fell on a hot fireplace and created small clouds of steam. Perhaps this discovery was made intentionally, and the person immediately appreciated the power of steam. But the fact that the culture of steam baths has been known to mankind for a very long time is confirmed by numerous archaeological excavations and written sources.
Thus, according to the ancient Greek chronicler Herodotus, the first bathhouse appeared in the era of tribal communities. And having visited back in the 5th century. BC. the territory of the tribes inhabiting the Northern Black Sea region, he described in detail the bathhouse, which resembled a hut-hut, with a vat installed in it, into which red-hot stones were thrown.
From the ancient Greek historian Herodotus to the chronicles of Nestor
The ancient Greek historian Herodotus described the baths that the Scythians had. The frame for the bathhouse was poles located at an angle and tied together at the top, which were then covered with woolen felt. This structure resembled a tent in appearance.
In the center of such a bathhouse, a cauldron filled with water was installed, which was heated by throwing red-hot stones on a fire into the water. Climbing into such a bath, they threw hemp seed onto the hot stones, which caused strong steam to rise from the stones. The Scythians, at the same time, screamed with pleasure.
The ancient Slavic chronicler Nestor in his “Tale of Bygone Years” at the beginning of the 11th – 12th centuries describes that while traveling to different countries, the Apostle Andrei, while in Veliky Novgorod, saw how the Slavs were steaming with brooms in a bathhouse
“...And they take the young rod and beat themselves... And they douse themselves with cold water... And then they do a ritual for themselves, and not torture.”
In Russian chronicles, the first mentions of baths are known from the 10th-13th centuries. The ancient Slavic names of the bathhouse are movnya, mov, movnitsa, mylnya, vlaznya.
Unwashed Europe and clean Russia
Later sources indicate that bath culture also existed in Ancient Rome, whose rulers spread it to the conquered territories of Western Europe. However, after the fall of the Roman Empire, both the bathhouse and ablution as such were forgotten in Western Europe. There was a ban on bath culture, which was explained, among other things, by widespread deforestation and, as a consequence, a shortage of firewood. After all, in order to build a good bathhouse and heat it well, it is necessary to cut down a lot of trees. Medieval Catholic ethics also played a certain role, which taught that nudity of the body, even for washing, was sinful.
The decline in hygienic requirements led to the fact that Europe for many centuries was mired not only in its own sewage, but also in diseases. Monstrous epidemics of cholera and plague only for the period from 1347 to 1350. killed more than 25,000,000 Europeans!
Bath culture in Western European countries was completely forgotten, as evidenced by numerous written sources. Thus, according to Queen Isabella of Castile of Spain, she washed herself only twice in her life: when she was born and when she got married. An equally sad fate befell King Philip II of Spain, who died in terrible agony, consumed by scabies and gout. Scabies finally tormented and brought Pope Clement VII to the grave, while his predecessor Clement V died of dysentery, which he contracted because he never washed his hands. It is no coincidence, by the way, that dysentery began to be called “the disease of dirty hands” already in the 19th and 20th centuries .
Around the same period, Russian ambassadors regularly reported to Moscow that the king of France stank unbearably, and one of the French princesses was simply eaten by lice, which the Catholic Church called God's pearls, thereby justifying their senseless ban on baths and the culture of basic hygiene procedures.
No less curious and at the same time repulsive are the archaeological finds of medieval Europe, which today can be seen in museums around the world. Eloquently testifying to the widespread filth, stench and uncleanliness, exhibits are on display for visitors - scratchers, flea traps and saucers for crushing fleas, which were placed directly on the dining table.
Flea catcher - devices for catching and neutralizing fleas; in the old days an essential element of the wardrobe
Today it has already been proven that French perfumers invented perfumes not in order to smell better, but in order to simply hide the smell of a body unwashed for years under the fragrance of floral aromas.
Blokholovka
And all that remains is to sympathize with the daughter of Grand Duke Yaroslav the Wise , Anna , who, after marrying the French King Henry I , wrote to her father at home, saying:
Why did I anger you so much, and why do you hate me so much that you sent me to this dirty France, where I can’t even really wash myself?!
But what about Rus'?
And in Russia, the bathhouse has always existed , at least according to the Byzantine historian Procopius of Caesarea , who back in the 500s. wrote that the culture of ablution accompanies the ancient Slavs throughout their lives.
According to ancient descriptions, the bathhouse was a log structure with a fireplace, on the hot coals of which water was poured from time to time, which turned into steam. According to popular beliefs, the guardian of the bathhouse and its soul is the bannik - a completely naked old man, whose body is covered with broom leaves. Bannik was supposed to be cajoled from time to time by treating him to bread and salt, which once again emphasizes the respectful attitude of the Slavs towards the bathhouse itself and its “essence”, which they literally idolized.
Appearing on the territory of Russia back in the days of paganism, when people worshiped the cult of fire and water, both the bathhouse and the home were deeply revered by the Slavs, as noted in their works by researchers of Russian life I. Zabelin and A. Afanasyev . The bathhouse was not just a place where one could cleanse one’s body of dirt and take hygienic procedures, but also a kind of medical and preventive institution where people of the ancient medical specialty could put any sick person back on his feet.
In turn, the chronicles of the X–XIII centuries. indicate the widespread use of the bathhouse among the Eastern Slavs, starting from the 5th–6th centuries, when it was affectionately called movnitsa, mov, mylnya and vlaznya. And even with the baptism of Rus', when the church began an active struggle against folk healers and all sorts of superstitions, the bathhouse did not cease to exist, but only strengthened its influence, as it became a place for mandatory visiting before performing the most important church rituals - baptism, wedding, communion and others .
“Heat my bathhouse in white!”
The white bathhouse, which V. Vysotsky sings about in his song, appeared in Rus' much later than the black bathhouse, gradually displacing the latter. At first, the Slavs built baths without a chimney, in black style, and a periodically opening door was used as natural ventilation. In a black-style sauna, smoke does not go into the chimney, but into the sauna room itself, from where it exits through an open door, as well as through a special hole in the ceiling or wall (the so-called “pipe”). After the firebox is finished and the coals have completely burned out, the door is closed, the chimney is plugged, and the shelves, benches and floor are washed generously with water to remove soot and the bath is kept for about 15 minutes before use so that it dries and gains heat. Then the remaining coals are raked out, and the first steam is released so that it carries away the soot from the stones. After that you can steam. A black sauna is more difficult to heat and cannot be heated during washing (like a white sauna), but due to the fact that the smoke eats up all the previous odors, a black sauna has its own charm, unattainable in a white sauna.
Later they began to build white baths, where the source of heat and steam was a stove-heater with a chimney.
Vasily Shevchuk. "Russian baths in black style"
In addition, at that time there was another interesting and unusual way to steam directly in a Russian oven. To do this, it was carefully heated and the bottom was covered with straw. Then a person climbed inside the oven, taking with him water, beer or kvass, which he poured over the hot walls of the hearth and took a steam bath, after which he came out and doused himself with cold water. Even the weak and old people did not deny themselves such an unusual pleasure, they were simply pushed into the oven on a special board, and then a healthy person climbed in to wash and steam the weak one, as expected.
LiveInternetLiveInternet
In life, each of us encounters people whom we want to send far and long.
When such a citizen completely pesters us, we tell him: “ Go to the BATH!” “And he immediately miraculously realizes that it’s time to leave us alone. But why do we send the fed-up idiot to the bathhouse? Not in the barn? Not to the barn? Not to the cellar? Or some other outbuilding?
And in general, why was it necessary to cross oneself at the entrance to the bathhouse, but it was strictly forbidden to cross oneself in the bathhouse itself? Why were icons never brought into the bathhouse? Why was it forbidden to go to the bathhouse on church holidays? Why were all bath utensils (bowls, buckets, brooms, ladles) considered unclean and could not be brought into the hut? And why was it impossible to build a house on the site of a collapsed bathhouse under any circumstances? Why?!!! What kind of damned place is this? I remember one story from a simple man that I heard several years ago during a trip to the Vladimir region: “There was one in our village. Damn smart. His bathhouse fell apart. He decided to build a house in its place. Everyone tells him: “You can’t! It won’t be good”... And he: “My land - I build what I want. Be it a house or a club.” And he built it. He was so pleased. His hut just burned down. On the very day he moved into it with his family, it burned down!” Many clearly non-Christian beliefs were associated with the bathhouse, reminiscent of the remnants of Slavic paganism. For example, our ancestors were convinced that one could gain supernatural abilities in the bathhouse. And even become a sorcerer. To do this, supposedly one had to go to the bathhouse and renounce God there - remove the cross, put it under one’s heel (preferably the left one!) and pronounce the cherished sentence. All magical rituals in the bathhouse were performed only after midnight. And woe to anyone who came there at that time without permission. And he even tried to take a steam bath. The death of the traditional breaker was terrible. In the morning they found his cold pink corpse, as if it had just been whipped with a bath broom. Who was it that mocked the man like that? And the bathhouse was the place where Russian love lived. The most famous erotic story in Russian literature is called “Bathhouse”. Its authorship is attributed to Tolstoy. But not Lev Nikolaevich, but Alexei Nikolaevich - the one who, in addition to “Bathhouse”, also wrote “Peter the Great”, “Walking through Torment”, and for children - “The Golden Key, or the Adventures of Pinocchio”. There was a writer! The envy of all colleagues! First anti-Soviet, and then Soviet. From a popular White Guard publicist, he overnight turned into an even more popular Soviet prose writer and added the nickname “Red Count” to his hereditary count title. By the way, one of Stalin’s favorite writers. The discoverer of the famous advice to aspiring writers: “Your wife, my friend, needs to be changed. For a wife and a romance!” And also the immortal phrase: “The district will remain from us, and the Russian land will come from there!” Officially he was married three times, not counting fleeting hobbies. And he respected the bathhouse very much. Both as a place where you can take a steam bath and as an object for literary inspiration. I remember how during my adolescence, at the end of Soviet power, Tolstoy’s forbidden “Bathhouse” was copied by hand and read to each other under terrible secrecy in the school locker room. And now they freely publish in anthologies with sonorous titles, like “Russian Erotic Prose”: “Froska quietly entered the bathhouse and stopped indecisively. The master was lying on a bench on his stomach, and two girls - Malashka and Natasha - also stood naked on the sides, taking turns fiercely whipping a broom on his hot crimson-red back, glistening with sweat. - New girl! - exclaimed the master. - It’s good, there’s nothing to say! Your girl’s task is to teach her all your wisdom”... So, this is what happens. The bathhouse is both a scary and spicy place. And you can get crazy in it, and get acquainted with the entire Russian Kama Sutra.
Roman baths. Were a place where they steamed, loved and killed political rivals
But in other cultures, it was in the bathhouse that many terrible and most seductive things happened. Queen Amalasunta, the ruler of the Ostrogothic state in Italy, was killed in the bathhouse by her political opponents. This happened in 535 AD. e. The conspirators locked their queen in the bathroom where she was bathing and literally steamed her to death. This sophisticated type of murder, which did not leave external traces of violence, was borrowed by the barbarian Goths, along with baths, from the civilized Romans. For several centuries, the Romans had been killing political opponents who lost in palace intrigues in this way. It was in the bathhouse that the ancient Roman satirical writer Petronius, nicknamed the Arbiter of the Graceful, opened his veins. He did this after receiving information that Emperor Nero gave the order to put him to painful execution. But in the bathhouse, the ancient Romans not only washed and killed. According to the historian Suetonius, Emperor Tiberius gathered a whole harem in his personal baths on the island of Capri. This predecessor of Silvio Berlusconi staged his orgies right in the pool. And he jokingly called his group sex partners, swimming in schools in the warm water, his “fish.” Now do you understand why Lenin and other Bolsheviks were so drawn to Capri? They were called there by the spirit of the Roman Emperor Tiberius, who harmoniously resolved the sexual and political issues of the “current moment” in the bathhouse. However, the Russian Social Democrats did not possess the dissolute fantasy of the Roman tyrant. Therefore, they organized the usual boring party gatherings in Capri, planning to soar the whole of Russia in a bloodbath. But it is reliably known that Ilyich also went to a regular bathhouse. A few years ago, a scandal broke out in St. Petersburg when the Udelnye Baths were closed for renovation. In them, the future leader of the proletariat washed himself in 1917 before running away to a hut in Finland to hide from the Provisional Government. The public demanded that the Udelnye Baths be preserved as a historical relic. The authorities even had to reassure fans of Comrade Lenin. The then governor of St. Petersburg, Valentina Matvienko, stated: “With all due respect, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin washed there, this bathhouse is still from 1834. And it closed not because it was sold, but because it was simply in disrepair. But, of course, nothing threatens the fate of this bathhouse. After reconstruction, it will still remain a bathhouse, only in a good, civilized form.” What a pity that Lenin never visited Kyiv! How many bathhouses would survive! And of the pre-revolutionary Kyiv baths, only the Central Shopping Baths on Malaya Zhitomirskaya Street near Maidan Nezalezhnosti have survived to this day! Before the revolution, Maidan was called Dumskaya Square. By the name of the City Duma, which was located here. At first, the deputies (they were called vowels of the City Duma) fussed over the resolutions. And then they went to take a steam bath in this bathhouse. But since next to the Lyadsky Gate there was also a city exchange for sexual services, the Central Trade Baths were called almost the same as the Lyadsky Gate - “Bl...dskie baths.” Having picked up the juicy girl, she was taken to these baths in a separate room to “steam” in every sense. But the bath business in our area reached such sophistication only in the 19th century. Then the famous Sandunovsky baths were built in Moscow. And in Kyiv, the issue of washing was resolved. But even during the Hetmanate there were no public baths in Kyiv at all. Even in the Kiev-Mohyla Academy (in the Temple of Sciences!) there was no bathhouse! The students did not wash there. That's why Lomonosov fled from there to study in Germany. But under autocratic despotism, the baths in Kyiv, on the contrary, immediately flourished. As soon as the Hetmanate was liquidated, baths in Kyiv immediately began to grow like mushrooms. The autocracy cared about the purity of its loyal subjects! Kyiv baths under the autocracy. As a result, the directory “All of Kyiv for 1914” lists ten commercial baths as “the mother of Russian cities” - including the Dnieper on Andreevsky Spusk, Moskovsky on Konstantinovskaya, 22, Pechersky on Moskovskaya Street, 22, and even Levinson’s baths with a note in brackets “Jewish” on Yaroslavskaya Street. In 1914, it was already possible to call some of the Kyiv baths by telephone. For example, Central Trading had a telephone number 474. And most importantly, what progress! Under the hetmans there was not a single bathhouse in Kyiv. And in one hundred years of tsarist power, ten appeared at once! How many more would have been added if the First World War had not happened! An ordinary Russian bathhouse was much simpler than these luxurious city baths. It was a log cabin. This hut was divided into two rooms - a dressing room and a steam room. They undressed in the dressing room. In the steam room, they steamed, stretched out on a special bed called a “shelf.” The temperature in a Russian bath reaches 70 degrees. To do this, the bathhouse is heated with a special wood-burning stove. And the smoke is discharged into the chimney.
Russian bath. The surroundings are simpler, but the steam is 20 degrees hotter than in Rome
The famous Russian word izba is a diminutive of istok, which comes from the Old Russian istba (istobka), which means “house, bathhouse.” Having separated from the dwelling and becoming a separate building, the bathhouse retained all the signs of the ancient, pagan veneration of the dwelling. But all this applies to the so-called white bath. With the very pipe through which the smoke came out. The white bathhouse arose only in the 18th century. And before her, the Slavs took a steam bath for more than a thousand years. There was no waiting room in the black bathhouse. And the stove was an open stone hearth. It warmed up not only the heater, but also the walls of the bathhouse. The smoke simply came out through the door or through a hole in the ceiling. The logs inside the bathhouse were heavily smoked, and the walls were black, truly a hellish color. It was during the time of the monopoly of the black bathhouse that all the beliefs and prohibitions associated with what we call a bathhouse today arose. When the bathhouse was heated black, smoke poured out of all its cracks as if from an inferno. Can you imagine this horror? To use the sauna in a black way, one had to follow the strictest safety rules. Having heated the bathhouse, it was mandatory to ventilate it by opening the door wide. They also washed the soot from the ceiling. It was there that carbon monoxide accumulated, killing lazy or drunken bath attendants. For the same reason, there was a ban on the “fourth steam” - the fourth entry into the bathhouse, when it was possible to get burned there. Where does the faith in Bannik come from? When wood burns in a sauna, invisible, colorless and tasteless carbon monoxide CO is released. It can cause hallucinations, a person thinks that he is being strangled, etc. And the phenomenon of “post-mortem blush” of corpses causes the combination of carbon monoxide with hemoglobin - forming carbon-hemoglobin, which blocks the access of oxygen to a person’s blood and gives his skin such a pleasant shade to the eye . Carbon monoxide was discovered only in 1776 by the French chemist Jacques de Lasson, who saw its characteristic blue flame. How could the illiterate ancient Slavs, who never went to school for a day, know all this? The mechanism of action of the mysterious carbon monoxide was unknown to them. What we denote by the chemical formula CO, they called “bannik”. The ancient Slavs believed that it was the bannik that killed violators of bathhouse traditions. And yet, why was it impossible to bring icons into the bathhouse and, especially, to take a steam bath on church holidays? There is a reason. The Slavs, of course, are not the ancient Romans. The modest size of the rustic Russian bathhouse did not allow it to unfold as in the Roman baths of Caracalla. But the mysterious Slavic soul is wide! Nothing human is alien to her. And where else could we have sex in winter in our by no means tropical climate, if not in a hot bathhouse? The entire cycle of human life from birth to death was associated with the bathhouse. Peasant women gave birth in baths, as this was the most disinfected place in the village. The soot that settled black on the walls of the bathhouse played the role of an antiseptic. Before the wedding, the newlyweds also went to the bathhouse. This was part of the wedding ceremony. And after death, the deceased was also washed in a bathhouse. Moreover, once a year on Maundy Thursday, which falls three days before Easter, the bathhouse was specially heated for the night, but they did not steam in it. It was a bathhouse for the spirits of ancestors. This is how the Slav maintained contact with previous generations. In pre-Christian times, in addition to the well-known pagan gods, like Perun or Veles, the Slavs also believed in small demons - goblin, brownies, mermaids. In the barn there lived a barn-keeper, in a barn there lived a barn-keeper. And in the bathhouse there is a bannik. After baptism, all idols were destroyed. The only surviving pagan temple was the one that could be used for dual purposes - a bathhouse. And he washed himself and served the demons of the flesh. Dual faith and double standards are still inherent in almost all Christians. Not only the Slavs. The smoky black bathhouse, from which smoke poured out every week, was ideal for a home pagan temple - a habitat for all sorts of demons. Therefore, it was forbidden to bring icons into the bathhouse, and all objects located here were forbidden to be brought into the house. Like, don’t confuse the sinful with the righteous, or the broom with the cross. After the baptism of Rus', it became a little inconvenient for our ancestors to keep icons in one corner and household devils in the other. But giving an uninhabited bathhouse to the unclean is always possible! It seems like we took them all out of the house, but at the same time we keep them close at hand so that they don’t run away too far. To God - God's, and to the devil - Devil's. If you don’t sin, then how can you repent? That is why we send all the subjects who are fed up with us to hell - that is, to the bathhouse, hinting that it is time for them to cleanse themselves of bodily and spiritual defilement.
Oles Buzina
A bathhouse for a Russian is more than love!
The bathhouse accompanied every Russian person from birth to death. In no other culture in the world has it become as widespread as in Rus', where visiting it was elevated to an obligatory cult and had to occur regularly.
Not a single celebration could take place without it, and when meeting even a random guest, the owner first of all invited him to visit the bathhouse, and then taste the treat and spend the night. It is no coincidence that in Russian fairy tales, in addition to shelter and dinner, travelers are always offered a bathhouse.
Hen and stag parties, as they would say today, necessarily ended with a visit to the bathhouse, and the young people themselves, having become spouses, were obliged to take it regularly, every time after marital intimacy, if they went to church the next morning. It was necessary to go to the bathhouse with almost any ailment, especially if it was a cold, runny nose, cough and joint diseases.
The therapeutic effect of this simple and pleasant procedure is comparable to the strongest effect on the entire human body. When every cell of the body receives an unimaginable charge of energy, forcing it to work in a new way, thereby restarting the natural processes of regeneration and self-renewal. And alternating high temperatures with cold, when after visiting the bathhouse it is customary to jump into the snow, an ice hole, into a river, or simply douse yourself with ice water - this is the best way to harden and strengthen the immune system.
As for the special love of Russians for the bathhouse, it is embodied not only in folklore, but also reflected in historical documents. Thus, the Russian historian and researcher of the customs and life of the Russian people N.I. Kostomarov repeatedly notes in his works that people went to the bathhouse very often in order to wash themselves, heal, and just for fun. According to him, for a Russian person, visiting a bathhouse is a natural need and a kind of ritual, which neither adults, nor children, nor the rich nor the poor can violate.
In turn, foreigners who visited Rus' were surprised to note the habit of the Russian people to wash themselves very often and for a long time, which they had not encountered either in their homeland or in other countries. In fact, as a rule, we washed once a week, on Saturdays. But for foreigners who almost never washed, it seemed “very often.” For example, the German traveler Adam Olearius once wrote that in Russia it is impossible to find a single city or even a poor village where there is no bathhouse. They are simply here at every turn, and they are visited at every opportunity, especially during periods of ill health. And as if to summarize, in his writings he noted that perhaps such a love for the bathhouse is not without practical meaning, and that is why the Russian people themselves are so strong in spirit and healthy.
As for Europe, for the revival of the custom of steaming and washing regularly, it should be grateful to Peter I and the Russian soldiers, who, terrifying the same French and Dutch, steamed in a hastily built bathhouse, and then jumped into the icy water, despite to the frost that reigned outside. And the order given in 1718 by Peter I to build a bathhouse on the banks of the Seine completely horrified Parisians, and the construction process itself attracted onlookers from all corners of Paris.
HOW TO STEAM CORRECTLY
For maximum healing effect and excellent well-being after a bath, it is recommended:
- Avoid visiting the sauna on an empty stomach or after a heavy meal
- use a cap or towel to protect your head from overheating
- take a warm warming shower before starting bath procedures
- do cold douches or swim in the pool between visits to the steam room. Such procedures help normalize heart rate, harden the body and improve skin condition.
