Droitwich Spa

Droitwich Spa is a town in northern Worcestershire, England. The town is situated on massive deposits of salt, and salt has been extracted there since ancient times. In the time of the Romans, it was known as "Salinae", and a Roman road ran to the town.

Salt was extracted by pumping up saturated brine from the salt deposits, and evaporating the brine; over the years the removal of enormous quantities of salt from the substrata of the town led to considerable, if gradual, subsidence in some parts of the town; one photograph from the early 20th century shows one Droitwich house tilted at a considerable angle from the vertical.

In the 19th century, Droitwich became famous as a Spa town; unlike other places, the medicinal benefits were not derived from drinking the spa water (which is almost saturated brine); but from the muscular relief derived by swimming and floating in such a dense, concentrated salt solution, at the town's Brine Baths (first opened in 1830)