[3] The Stabian Baths are located at the intersection of two main streets in Pompeii: the Via dell'Abbondanza to the south and the Via Stabiana[5][6] to the east (the latter gives them their modern name), taking up the whole insula.

In their final phase the layout was as follows: the main (men's) entrance was from the Via dell'Abbondanza, through a vestibule (1) into the palaestra (2), a large open-air exercise ground or gymnasium.

[12] The destrictarium (4) (room for preparing before, and cleaning after, gymnastic exercise) adjoining the nymphaeum (5) in the southwest corner of the palaestra has an exterior wall covered with elaborate stucco decoration, once brightly painted.

The walls were painted in white with a red base, and above them the vaulted ceiling is plastered in elaborate stucco, made up of octagonal, hexagonal and quadrangular panels.

The walls are inset with 4 niches containing fountains and were painted with a beautiful garden fresco, showing vegetation, birds, statues, and vases against a sky-blue background.

125 BC, as commemorated by a sundial with an inscription in Oscan found on the site, a magistrate had the first bath building constructed using fines levied by the local administration.

The building contained two sets of bath suites each with apodyterium, tepidarium and caldarium, a latrine and, for the men, two laconica (dry-sweating rooms) and the rectangular palaestra with Doric porticoes on three sides.

[26] When Pompeii became a Roman colony in 80 BC, the baths were extended by the duoviri (city magistrates) Caius Uulius and Publius Aninius as recorded in an inscription.

[27] The destrictarium (room for scraping the body clean with strigils, and the only place this is known in the Roman world)[28] was built north of it in the portico and this probably also served as the entrance to the laconicum.

The Stabian Baths were damaged in the AD 62 Pompeii earthquake, but were rebuilt, significantly enlarged and remodelled to today’s visible size to make them even more luxurious.