Bazna Bath

Bazna (Translyvanian Saxon: Baußen, Bassen; German: Baassen, Brassen, Oberbassen; Hungarian: Bázna, Felsőbajom, Bajom)) is a commune located in Sibiu County, Romania.

Bazna was mentioned for the first time in 1270, year in which the king Stephan the 3rd gave a domain to a nobleman, Bozouch son of Inok, from the Bazna village. Bazna was documentary attested in 1302. The German colonists established on the western side of the village, on the Rorii Valley, near Boian, and later, when they discovered the beauty of Bazna Valley, they moved here and built a village with an impressive fortified church in the center.


The discovery of the natural gases and of the salty springs with iodine drew the attention of the Transylvanian researchers from the 18th century. Rudolf Rothens, in Memorabilae Europae (1749), mentions Bazna by referring to the mineral waters which can be found in this locality. Salty water springs have been studied in 1752, for the first time, by the pharmacist Georg Bette from Sibiu, and then by others, too. The priest Andreas Caspari left a manuscript with his observations dating from 1762-1779. He described more therapeutic springs which he baptized “The Church Bath”, “The Beggars’ Bath”, and “The Sour Fountain”. In 1808 the government from Vienna sent a group of physicians and chemists in Bazna to study the curative effects of the salt and climate.


In 1814, the Evangelic-Lutheran Church took over the mineral lakes, deciding to build a spa, and in 1843 four citizens from Medias founded a company whose purpose was to build a resort in Bazna. Two years later, 637 patients were cured in Bazna. In 1905 the Evangelic community took over the resort and transformed it in a “pearl among the Transylvanian spas”. During the same year, people could find here a drugstore and a therapist. At the same time, people started to produce the famous salt of Bazna. From 1949, the Bazna Baths were administrated by the Ministry of Health, becoming a spa, with a permanent character.

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