Thanks to 71 different and well-preserved stamps, the Italic terra sigillata pottery findings from the Hellenistic-Roman quarter have made it possible to identify the origin and understand commercial relations in the city. Testimonies have confirmed that Agrigentum was part of an extensive distrib...

Most coins from ancient Akragas had a depiction of an eagle on the obverse and a crab on the reverse. The eagle was one of the symbols of Agrigento, the bird of Zeus, the greatest power; while the crab was likely connected with the name Akragas, which sounds similar to the word karkinos, Greek for...

Emporium is a Greek word (ἐμπόριον) derived from the term ἔμπορος (emporos), meaning merchant, in turn derived from πόρος (poros), meaning passage. In ancient times, the term emporium referred to wholesale trading centres located mainly on the coast....

From some surveys carried out by Schmiedt and Griffo in the 1950s, it is reasonable to assume that the coastline bent slightly inland, with a small natural port created by an inlet. Recent geological surveys have confirmed the hypothesis and also reveal flooding and silting that would have cove...

In the gymnasiums of the thermal bath facilities it was common to spend time playing a ball game before bathing. This object, common even in today’s games, was often filled with sand (harpastra) or feathers (paganica), and was used for a game similar to volleyball in which the participants excha...

Initially, the entry price to the thermal bath facilities was a quadrans, or a quarter of an as, a bronze coin that was widespread during the Republic and the Roman Empire. In 33 BC Agrippa, in order to make his magistracy immortal, decided to bear the cost of entry to the public baths of Rome, ma...

According to some sources, the acronym SPA derives from the Latin words salus per acquam, with the meaning of “health through water”. Though the phrase perfectly reflects the health benefits of spa treatments, of which the ancient Romans were well aware, it is difficult to establish whether th...

The hypocaust was a type of central heating used in ancient Rome that used the circulation of hot air, produced in the praefurnium (a large furnace fired up by slaves), inside empty spaces specifically constructed in the floor or walls of the rooms to be heated. The floors were called suspensurae b...

The limekiln, from the Latin calcaria, was a rustic kiln used for cooking limestone, a material widely available in the Agrigento area. It could be in the shape of a truncated cone or pyramid....

Pliny the Elder tells us that the calidarium, together with tepidarium and frigidarium, was one of the main rooms of the spa that housed pools with very hot, moderately heated and completely cold water respectively. The bathers would enter the calidarium after they began to perspire in the sudator...