Ancient Rome was the
greatest power of its era and one of the
most spectacularly impressive empires in history. But then one day,
it all collapsed. While no one knows exactly
why the empire disappeared into history, at
least one researcher has proposed that the culprit
might be something as simple as lead exposure. And while recent studies have
uncovered high levels of lead in Imperial Rome's
drinking water, the real danger might have
been an artificial sweetener. Today we're going to take a look
at how Roman aristocrats might have poisoned themselves
with artificial sweetener and destroyed the whole
empire in the process. But before we get started,
be sure to subscribe to the Weird History channel. And let us know in the
comments below what other ancient investigations
you would like to hear about. OK, so you have a sweet
tooth and a palate for lead. Hmm, let me think. Ah, I have a video
you're going to love. [MUSIC PLAYING] The Roman Empire had an
incredible amount of wealth. And like pretty much
all rich people, wealthy Romans loved
to throw a good feast. Showing off one's bankroll
by hosting elaborate dinner parties was basically
standard operating procedure for the Romans. Another was to sweeten the
food with a thick grape syrup called sapa. The flavoring was made
by boiling and skinning grapes, then mashing
them through a sieve, and mixing the paste with sugar. Sounds pretty yummy, right? Well, the problem
is that Romans would cook the sapa in lead pots. The lead would then mix into
the syrup, making it toxic. So while the sapa made
the wealthy Romans' food tastes better, it was also
slowly poisoning them. Bittersweet, indeed. Sapa may have been
toxic, but the Romans loved it and used it for more
than just sweetening foods. It was also used
extensively in winemaking. Sapa was used to preserve wine,
which had the unfortunate side effect of infusing the
wine with poisonous lead. The Romans, much like a Real
Housewife of Beverly Hills, had a large appetite for wine. The average Roman drank a
liter of this stuff each day, which adds up to around
100 gallons of wine a year. That is a lot of lead. And we're just talking
about the average Roman. Elite Romans drank
even more heavily. For example, the
Emperor Elagabalus was rumored to literally
drink from a swimming pool full of wine. Not going to invite
him to my next party. [MUSIC PLAYING] Romans used sapa as a
sweetener because it worked. The flavor does make wine
and food taste better. But today, we know that
the syrup was toxic. Modern science has determined
that due to being made in lead pots, the
mixture contained a compound called lead acetate,
also known as Sugar of Lead. We probably shouldn't take
something so deadly and name it something that sounds so sweet. Downing as much lead acetate as
the Romans did is not healthy. The side effects
of the poisoning include dementia,
infertility, and eventually complete organ
shutdown, which is pretty bad because your
organs are important. [MUSIC PLAYING] In the 1980s, research
scientist Jerome Nriagu recreated sapa using
ancient recipes that detailed the methods
the Romans used to make the artificial sweetener. His results confirmed what
he had long suspected, that the sapa turned
out to contain a dangerous
concentration of lead. Quantities ranged from
240 to 1,000 milligrams of lead per liter. That's way more lead
than I like in my liter. Nriagu explained that even
one teaspoon of such a syrup would have been more than
enough to give a person chronic lead poisoning. The Romans, of course,
were ingesting far more. How dangerous was
ancient Romans sapa? Well, it was so bad that
if it existed today, it would be outlawed
in the United States. And we're talking
about a country that loves Big Macs and Four Loko. In fact, the modern threshold
for lead is far, far lower. The Environmental
Protection Agency will take action when drinking
water reaches lead levels of 15 parts per billion. By comparison,
ancient Roman sapa was practically
exploding with lead, at a terrifying count of
2,900 parts per billion. That's nearly 200 times
the enforceable amount regulated by the EPA today. [MUSIC PLAYING] So if lead pots
were so dangerous, why did the Romans use them? Well, for one, they were
completely oblivious of the danger. The notion of acid in the
wine bonding with lead was a little chemistry
advanced for them. But more importantly, Roman
winemakers specifically used lead vessels
to make the sapa because the end product would
turn out noticeably sweeter. This, ironically, was an effect
of the lead acetate, which despite being a
noxious compound, actually has a sweet taste. There were also problems with
some of the alternatives. One ancient winemaker
wrote that lead pots were better than brass
because in the boiling, brass vessels throw
off copper rust, which has a disagreeable flavor. [MUSIC PLAYING] For Jerome Nriagu, researching
lead exposure in ancient Rome didn't stop at
recreating the sapa. He also researched the diets of
over two dozen Roman emperors from 30 BCE to 220 CE. Based on his examinations,
the scientist found evidence that
as many as 19 emperors had a predilection to
the lead-tainted wine and frequently enjoyed
foods sweetened with sapa. The inescapable conclusion was
that multiple Roman emperors almost certainly suffered
from lead poisoning. That being the case,
it's not a far jump to wonder whether the effects
of the exposure on the emperor might have weakened
the empire itself. As noted previously,
exposure to lead can have many
serious side effects. For example, long-term
contamination can actually impair
decision making. But there were other risks too. Roman emperors,
wealthy aristocrats, and others who consumed
large amounts of lead were also more likely to
have conditions like gout. In fact, multiple
emperors showed signs of having the
affliction during their reign. These included Claudius,
Nero, Caligula, and Tiberius. These particular
emperors were also known for their
odd behavior, which is another thing you would
expect of an individual who contracted lead poisoning. Speaking of odd behavior,
the Roman Emperor Claudius took power after
his nephew Caligula died at the hands of
Rome's enemies in 37 CE. According to the
ancients, Claudius, who evidently wasn't the hero
type, hid behind a curtain while his nephew
was getting killed. After he became
emperor, Claudius's rule was marked by
numerous uprisings. According to Jerome
Nriagu, Claudius had disturbed speech, weak
limbs, an ungainly gait, tremor, fits of excessive
and inappropriate laughter, and unseemly anger. Oh, and he often slobbered. I think I met that guy
at the office party. These are classic signs
of lead exposure, which dovetails nicely with ancient
descriptions of Claudius being dull-witted
and absentminded. Or that last part might just
mean that ancient historians weren't too fond of Claudius. [MUSIC PLAYING] So how often did the Romans use
sapa to sweeten their foods? Well, one fourth century
Roman recipe book known as the Apicius,
or "A-pik-ee-us," if that's how you prefer
your ancient Latin, included no less than 100
different recipes that all, in one way or another,
incorporated lead acetate. They might have used so
much sapa in their cooking because they just
loved the stuff. But there might have been
another, more scientific reason as well. Not too ironically, one
side effect of lead exposure is a metallic
taste in the mouth. If the Romans were
experiencing that taste, it likely would have encouraged
them to use even more sapa to cover it
up, which would lead to a more metallic taste in
the mouth, which would lead to a need for more sapa,
which would lead to-- well, you get it. [MUSIC PLAYING] So despite the repeated
warnings about lead poisoning, it's likely some of
you are wondering if there's a way you
can make your own sapa. Well, don't worry. Pliny the Elder has you covered. Pliny detailed the
recipe and process for making sapa way back
in the first century. Sounding like a hipster
owner of a microbrewery, Pliny wrote, "Sapa is a
product of art, not nature." He then explained
that his "art" began by boiling down the
unfermented grape juice to a third of
its original quantity. He was careful to
distinguish this from defrutum, a
different recipe that called for the grape
juice to be boiled to one half of its volume. Sapa, Pliny stressed,
was more concentrated. This reduction would have
made the sapa much sweeter than grape juice. And the Romans then
further sweetened it by boiling it in lead pots. While we at Weird
History would strongly recommend to not use lead pots,
the rest of Pliny's recipe still works today. Moreover, sapa itself,
to be perfectly clear, is completely safe to consume. Its only toxic if it's been
heated in a lead vessel. [MUSIC PLAYING] So what if they hadn't used
lead pots to cook the sapa? Would history be different? Would the Roman Empire have
lasted another thousand years? It's always hard to
answer hypotheticals, but it's at least
possible nothing would be different because
even without the sapa, Romans still had a lot
of lead in their diets. The water many Romans
drank was spring water that had been transported
across the empire in aqueducts and lead pipes. Those pipes transferred
lead right into the water, exposing the population
to the heavy metal. Sapa or no sapa, the Romans
were swimming in lead. So about that water,
after traveling through the lead pipes,
Rome's water supply would have become
contaminated with lead. How contaminated? Well, researchers recently
estimated that the Roman water supply probably contained
100 times the levels of lead that would have been found
in local spring water. And this wasn't just guesswork. It's science. The researchers actually
compared sediments from local ports
with traces of water found in ancient Roman pipes. The scientists
ultimately concluded that the levels
were probably too low to cause significant harm. But they acknowledged that
drinking water contaminated with any amount of lead can
be dangerous and problematic. [MUSIC PLAYING] Given how widely sapa
was used and enjoyed in the ancient
Roman Empire, it's easy to assume that
lead contamination was a major problem. But not all scholars agree. Oh, come on, scholars,
just agree on something. In fact, when
Jerome Nriagu first introduced the lead poisoning
theory for Rome's decline in the 1980s, he immediately
received a ton of pushback. He argued with other historians
who called his theory a myth. And they claimed the Romans
knew that lead was harmful. Moreover, it was
pointed out that sapa was used for centuries
before Rome's fall, even during its Golden Age,
which makes it difficult to pin the decline on its use. And indeed, modern
researchers who have examined lead levels in
ancient Roman drinking water have dismissed
the idea that lead could have been the primary
cause of Rome's downfall. Nevertheless, many find it hard
to completely reject the notion that centuries of consuming
lead-tainted artificial sweeteners certainly couldn't
have been good for Rome either. So what do you think? How much lead contamination is
in your artificial sweetener? Let us know in the
comments below. And while you're at it, check
out some of these other videos from our Weird History. [MUSIC PLAYING]
