Megalopsychia Mosaic Border, Bottom: Private Bath
Part of the border of the Megalopsychia Hunt Mosaic, which depicts a "day in the life" of fifth-century Antioch and Daphne and provided a guided tour from one to the other. This is a scene along the bottom border as you face the Megalopsychia, as here (it would be upside down to the viewer).
This portion of the tour is in Daphne, the resort suburb of Antioch. On the left is the Olympic Stadium, with a tower and a monumental entrance gate. A rider approaches a private bath, an establishment that, unlike a public bath, charges an entrance fee. Labeled the "Private Bath of Ardabourios," it has two domes and a garden symbolized by foliage on the left. A servant on foot clears the way before the rider. On the right, a servant carries a bundle toward the entrance to the bath.
On the far right is the spring "Kastalia," represented by a tree and the colonnaded semicircular reservoir in which the water of the spring was received. Beyond that (not shown), another spring called "Pallas" flows into a reservoir in which a swimming figure symbolizes the deity of the spring.
450-75 AD, Yakto village near Daphne. Antakya Museum, inv. 1016. Photo © Dick Osseman. Information from Glanville Downey, Ancient Antioch (1963), illustration 58.
