In March and April 2018, a field season of the project “Bathing Culture and the Development of Urban Space: Case Study Pompeii”, running within the research framework of the TOPOI Excellence Cluster 264 of the German Research Foundation (DFG), was carried out in the Stabian Baths (VII 1, 8) at Pompeii in order to clarify questions regarding their early development, further assess the phasing of standing remains and complete the catalogue of all employed building materials and decorations.

Excavations were carried out in 8 areas of the Stabian Baths, both reopening areas investigated by earlier researchers and opening new areas: in the praefurnium, the palaestra, the northern part of the complex and the service sector.

Three trenches in the northern sector of the baths (L, M’, L16; room numbering according to Eschebach 1979, pl. 2) confirmed that the first phase of the baths included all currently visible parts with the exception of a domus in the SW corner of the plot.

Excavations in two large areas in the palaestra, complimenting the work carried out in 2016, have shown several phases of the early occupation of the site, with northern and western walls of earlier palaestrae as well as further evidence for the above-mentioned domus. The trenches excavated in 2016, 2017, and 2018 in all accessible areas of the Stabian Baths from W to E now show not only the development and reworking of the natural terrain, but also the complex development of the different phases of the baths. Like in 2016 and 2017, no trace of any Altstadt fortification could be identified this year, in the palaestra and room L.

Work in the East wing (VI, VIII) aimed to reconstruct the development of the heating system in different phases of the baths. It could be shown that at the time of eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79 the main furnace of the baths (VI) was not in function and that this crucial area of the baths had been remodelled at least three times. A feature in room VIII that had previously been interpreted as a furnace for the women’s caldarium could be identified as part of an unusual, probably somewhat experimental water supply system that was implemented when the baths were connected to the aqueduct in the early Imperial period. Cleaning of parts of the Natatio (D) and the Frigidarium (IV) provided further information regarding the water management, which certainly functioned for some time after the earthquake of AD 62.