The thermal baths of Bath : their history, literature, medical and surgical uses and effects, together with the Aix massage and natural vapour treatment / by Henry William Freeman.

  • Freeman, Henry William, 1842-1897.
Date:
1888
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The thermal baths of Bath : their history, literature, medical and surgical uses and effects, together with the Aix massage and natural vapour treatment / by Henry William Freeman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    was identified in attributions with the Romans* Minerva. We take the fadl as established, that SoHs—how- ever understood or misunderstood by the Romans— represents Sul^ a local and native sacred name, which these waters owned before ever a Roman bathed in them. And with this we return to the consideration of Solisbury or Solsbury. The termination bury signifies a fort or stronghold, and it is to the English language what Arx was to the Latin. It seems then that Solsbury is Arx Solis or Sulis, and that this name sets up a claim as of some special relationship having subsisted between this hill and this city of Aquae Solis or Sulis. This conclusion, which speech-lore alone might justify, looks very secure when surrounded by its evidence—viz., of Inscriptions, Itinerary, local configuration and posi- tion. To what then does this lead ? It leads us to catch a glimpse of an answer to the question with which this chapter opens. It suggests that in the days when this country was occupied by an indefinite number of petty nations, and when these were so commonly in a state of war with each other that the open country was exposed to frequent raids, a position of natural strength exercised on the popula- tion just the same kind of attraction that a castle did in times nearer to our own. How many a modern town owes its existence to a medieval Baron, who chose the then solitary spot to pitch his castle on. So in more remote ages, when an isolated hill was the best refuge, these hills became in like manner the parents of cities. Such is the history of Old Sarum and Salisbury—such is the history of Edin-