The Architecture of the Public Baths of Tunisia: A Typological Analysis

The Punic, Roman, Byzantine and Islamic civilizations contributed with their architectural knowledge to the development of different public baths design. Based on previous historical work on the collective baths in the Mediterranean basin, and in particular Tunisia, this study aims to explore and analyse the hammams (Islamic public baths) of Tunisia. This study uses a semantic and representative approach to help define the components of the historic public bath, and to reveal its integration modes in the urban fabric of the medina, and eventually represent the functional diagrams of bathing practices. It clarifies how the functioning mode of the bath is in direct relation with the evolution of the society (its lifestyle, its culture and its own paradigms) and classifies these building types according to a semantic division of the architectural places. Hence and in order to analyze the hammam spaces, a matrix of incidence [An analytical tool which quantifies the relations existing between the spaces of the same building] has been used. As a result of this analysis, three typologies of Tunisian hammams have been identified.

Bouraoui, Ines. "The Architecture of the Public Baths of Tunisia: A Typological Analysis," in ArchNet-IJAR: International Journal of Architectural Research, vol. 2, issue 3 (2008).

Ines Bouraoui

Public Domain