The "Sudatorium" was an important element of the Roman bath culture, its health resorts and hot springs. The tradition of the Turkish steam bath "Hamam" has remained in being throughout the centeries until today. This way of bathing was wildely represented in Northern Russia, known as "Banja".
The Greek historian Herodot described already 2500 years ago the steam baths of the Greeks, Romans and Persians as veritable palaces of steam rigged out by extremely complex systems of heating pipes.

We always had our steam baths too. High investment costs and technical problems with the thermostat were impeding a larger spreading at that time.
Then, new technical and electronic developments brought on a steam bath boom in the USA, which spread to Europe.

At present European top hotels and fitness centres offer apart from swimming baths and whirlpools steam baths for their choosy customers too.

Since high-quality and compact steam cabins now can be installed at a good price in nearly every room, they are making their arrival on private living area. Technical sophistication, as well safe and simple operation guarantee an unalloyed steam bath joy.
It is foreseeable some of the "fountains of health", perfectly natural, will make part of the more affluent society in a few years.

The sauna clima is extremely dry and hot. Theoretically the air could absorb very much water at 80 - 90° C. Adding water from time to time however is a drop in the ocean. It doesn't lead to supersaturation, ergo neither to continuous production of steam and mist. Therefore and by the big difference in temperature between body and room, (about 50° C), the body starts sweating seriously to cool down in order to avoid overheat.
Heart and circulation are therefore seriously strained by extreme sweating and high temperature. The sauna bath is medicinically not to be recommended equally to everybody.
By the way, strong sweating as a slimming diet is not advisable. The lost of water is very quickly compensated. Breakdown of fats is only attainable by muscle- and fitness training.

In the steam bath however, exists a damp and mild heat of 45° C. This comes up to a difference in temperature between body and room of about 10° C.
Therefore you're sweating less.
Nevertheless visible liquid is built on your skin. But it touches less upon sweat than vapour from the supersaturated vapour atmosphere, condensed on the colder surface of the body.
During the act of condensing, through the transition from the gaseous state to the liquid, heat is transmitted to the body namely almost the same quantity necessary to produce the steam before.
The mechanism of the steam bath rests on a simple physical rule:
To get the next higher physical state, (solid, liquid, gaseous), heat is added. Recovering lower states heat is set free.