Editing Sauna (section)

====United Kingdom, Atlantic and Mediterranean Europe====
[[Image:Pedra Formosa Briteiros.jpg|thumb|Pedra formosa-lusitanian sauna front stone]]

In the [[United Kingdom]] and much of [[Southern Europe]], single-gender saunas are the most common type. Nudity is expected in the segregated saunas but is usually forbidden in the mixed saunas. Sauna sessions tend to be shorter, and cold showers are shunned by most. In the United Kingdom, where public saunas are becoming increasingly fashionable, the practice of alternating between the sauna and the [[Hot tub|jacuzzi]] in short seatings (considered a ''faux pas'' in Northern Europe) has emerged.{{cn |date=August 2024}}

There is a fast-growing new British sauna culture consisting mainly of 'wild' outdoor spas, popping up all over the UK.<ref name="Guardian2024">{{cite news |last=Tapper |first=James |date=May 12, 2024 |title='It lowers inhibition': how saunas are challenging UK pubs as the place to meet |url=https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/article/2024/may/12/saunas-uk-community-spaces |work=[[The Guardian]] |url-access= |access-date=August 1, 2024 |quote=Saunas in the UK have until recently been afterthoughts in hotel spas or places where getting steamy had another, seedier connotation. But after Liz Watson and Katie Bracher created a pop-up Finnish-style sauna on Brighton Beach using a converted horse box in 2018, a wave of mobile or permanent saunas have appeared, mostly at the seaside or beside lakes. There are more than 100 around the UK and Ireland, according to the British Sauna Society}}</ref>

In Portugal, the steam baths were commonly used by the [[Castro culture|Castrejos people]],<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Garcia Quintela |first1=Marco |title=Iron Age Saunas of Northern Portugal: State of the Art and Research Perspectives |journal=Oxford Journal of Archaeology |date=February 2015 |volume=34 |issue=1 |page=68 }}</ref> before the arrival of the Romans in the western part of the Iberian Peninsula. The historian [[Strabo]] spoke of [[Lusitanians|Lusitans]] traditions that consisted of having steam bath sessions followed by cold water baths. Pedra Formosa is the original name given to the central piece of the steam bath in pre-Roman times.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Prociuk |first=Nadya H. P. |date=8 September 2018 |title=Protection and Purity: Symbolic Functions of the Iron Age Saunas of the Iberian Northwest |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/cambridge-archaeological-journal/article/protection-and-purity-symbolic-functions-of-the-iron-age-saunas-of-the-iberian-northwest/388D888007F74EC9E7DC5AB04327722A |journal=Cambridge Archaeological Journal |language=en |volume=29 |issue=1 |pages=125–140 |doi=10.1017/S0959774318000422 |issn=0959-7743}}</ref>