Bad Bertrich Hotels

The Imperial terms.
The Imperial terms (Kaiserthermen) were built in the IV century. Today, everyone is welcome to visit this sight. Roman terms are more like our modern saunas. People were supposed to wash in them moving from very cold to very hot rooms. In the end a visitor of these terms was required to dip in a cold pool. Then a visit was ended with a massage and gymnastics. However, the terms also had another important function - they served as a meeting place. There was even a large library in them. Slaves and freedmen did the massage and cleaning. By the way, the imperial terms in Trier were never used for their main purpose even by the Roman emperor, for who they were built. When the Roman era was over, the baths were used as a castle of a Frankish duke, and later - as a bastion of the medieval city wall.

The Amphitheatre.
The oldest Roman building in Trier, the Amphitheater , is located in Olewiger Strasse. It was built in 100 AD from limestone. However, in the Middle Ages the amphitheater was used primarily as a quarry, where locals got the material for construction of their buildings. That is why only small remnants of the amphitheater have survived till our days. However, even these details give us an approximate idea of the original look of the structure. Its eastern part was carved in a steep slope of a mountain, and its western part was artificially raised. The arena was 75m long and 50m wide. Approximately 25,000 Romans and Trevors could watch gladiators fighting in this arena. In the III century the amphitheater was a part of the defensive wall of the city. At that time the north gate was the main entrance to the city. One can see a wonderful view of the amphitheater when walking up the hill in Vikingen Strasse.
Continue reading

This article about Trier is written by the orangesmile.com editorial team and is protected by the copyright law. The article can only be re-used with a direct link to www.orangesmile.com