What they are
The Hamamni are the bath-houses built for Sultan Barghash in the heart of Stone Town, and they are the closest thing the town has to a domestic interior open to visitors. Stone rooms, vaulted and windowless, laid out for hot and cold bathing.
UNESCO’s description of the World Heritage property lists “the Hamamni and other Persian baths” among the town’s major buildings. The phrasing is deliberate. The advisory body evaluation prepared for the inscription records that there are two sets of Persian baths in the Stone Town, of which the Hamamni are the most elaborate, and dates them to the sultanate of Seyyid Barghash, between 1870 and 1888.
More than one building
The plural matters on the ground. When the University of Cape Town’s Zamani Project documented the baths in 2008 it recorded two separate structures, a big Hamamni and a small Hamamni, producing laser-scanned 3D models of each. Zanzibar’s own Department of Museums and Antiquities lists a monument under the name Zanzibar Old Bath.
Visitors are usually shown one building and told it is the Hamamni, which is not wrong but is not the whole of it either. If a guide refers to the baths in the plural, they are being precise rather than loose.
What is there now
These are a monument rather than a working bath-house. Nothing in the heritage record describes them in use, and what a visitor sees is the plan of the building: the sequence of rooms, the vaulting, the channels and the plaster.
The rooms are dark and low. A torch is more useful here than in most of the town’s buildings, and the floors are uneven.
There is a stated intention to change their status. In a brief prepared for the January 2025 UNESCO advisory mission, the Zanzibar authorities described a private developer’s commitment to bringing both the Forodhani and Hamamni bath-houses into a museum route through the town. That is a plan reported to a mission, not a completed change, and it should not be relied on when planning a visit.
Current opening arrangements could not be confirmed. The Department of Museums and Antiquities, which holds the islands’ monuments, has a website that refuses connections outright, so this page records it as unreachable rather than as closed. The baths sit in the alleys near the Hamamni area and are included in most walking routes through the old town.
Common questions
Can you bathe at the Hamamni?
No. They are a monument. Nothing in the heritage record describes them as a working bath-house.
How many bath-houses are there?
The World Heritage evaluation records two sets of Persian baths in Stone Town, with the Hamamni the more elaborate. The Zamani Project documented a big Hamamni and a small Hamamni as separate structures in 2008.
Who built them?
They date from the sultanate of Seyyid Barghash, between 1870 and 1888 — the same sultan who built the House of Wonders and brought piped water to the town.