Pompeii · Archaeological Site · Italy

Suburban Baths

historicculturegoogle verified

moderate

9/10

best: morning, afternoon

mysterious, contemplative

A local would say...

Hidden beneath the ash of Vesuvius for 2,000 years, these Roman bathhouse frescoes were so explicit they stayed covered for decades after excavation — they shocked the Vatican when finally revealed.

Just inside the ancient entrance gate of Porta Marina, the Terme Suburbane is a 1st-century-BC Roman bathhouse that scandalised the world when its erotic frescoes were revealed in 2001. The changing room ceiling paintings — hidden for centuries under ash — are among the most explicit surviving examples of Roman erotic art. The frigidarium retains fragments of original stucco and one of the few original roofs to survive at Pompeii.