History

The site of the Schwertbad Rehabilitation Clinic is steeped in tradition. Here, the ancient Romans began the tradition of using the healing waters of Aachen for treatments, one of the medical practises which the clinic has continued and developed ever since.

The Schwertbad’s history begins as early in the first century A.D., where, on the site of the present clinic, the Romans took advantage of the water rising out of the ground at a temperature of 74° C, making it the hottest thermal mineral spring in Central Europe. According to legend, the clinic gets its name from a blacksmith who used the boiling sulphurous waters of the thermal springs to temper his swords. His workshop was close to the hot springs; later a bath house was erected there and christened the “Schwertbad”, or “sword pool”.

 By 1382, a bathhouse had already been built on part of the site of the present clinic, and the name “Schwertbad” was first recorded in 1499. This makes the Schwertbad Rehabilitation Clinic the oldest spa facility in Germany. In 1985, the clinic was modernised and extended, and it has continued to develop into one of the most modern clinics for orthopaedic/rheumatological rehabilitation in Germany.