When we imagine what it would be like to
eat a meal in ancient Rome, we often think of enjoying an elaborate banquet in reclined
luxury. But while this might have been common among the upper classes it doesn’t reflect the
experiences of the majority of Rome’s urban plebs. Instead these individuals would
hit up their local fast food joint for a dine in or take out experience with
friends and family. We have some evidence of this from a variety of archaeological sites,
the most exciting of which is the recent find at Pompeii which shows the fantastically
preserved remains of an ancient snack shop. In this video we will seek to bring
the Roman fast food experience to life by rebuilding these establishments,
diving into their menus, and taking a seat with their customers.
Along the way we will also be joined by Max Miller from Tasting History who can
offer some valuable insight on the topic. So today let’s explore what
it actually would have been like to experience the street
food culture of Ancient Rome. as we dive into the variety of food
from the ancient world also consider the huge diversity of units which exist in
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prizes like the iphone 12 pro max and more enjoy We can begin by resetting our expectations
of the home life for your average Roman. All too often courses and books leave the false
impression that Rome’s residential areas were filled with copy-pasted versions
of the standard Roman domus. These were buildings whose floor plan provided
most of what you’d expect from a home today: a main entrance, a living room, a storage
area, a kitchen, a bathroom, a dining room, a study, and some bed rooms, all of which
were set around a central atrium and garden. In reality though most people would
NOT have lived in such a place. Rather they would have lived in the Roman version
of an apartment building known as an insula. These multi-storied dwellings filled the city and are
what allowed it to boast such a large population. But without any regulations on their construction,
these insulae ended up providing only small, cheap, cramped spaces for their occupants. In such
a setup there was no room for fancy dining let alone cooking. Thus the vast crowds of apartment
dwellers had to turn elsewhere for their meals. What developed was a massive food service
industry made up of thousands of businesses spread across Rome. These fit into
every nook and cranny of the city. For instance public buildings like baths and
markets often had storefronts built into them while the first floors of apartments and
even the fronts of wealthy houses had shop space that could be run by the owners or rented
out to businesses. These stores and workshops, known collectively as tabernae, provided
all kinds of goods and services. You’d find metalworkers, woodworkers, potters,
barbers, tailors, cloth makers, wine sellers, butchers, fishmongers, produce merchants, and
many more professions. For the purposes of today’s video we will be focused on the tabernae which
specifically provided food and beverage services. For most of the day, the tabernae would be
open for business and bustling with activity. At closing time they would be boarded
up and locked down for the night. The shopkeeps might then walk home if they were
renters or head to the back of the building if they were owners. To give you a sense for just how
common these were, archaeologists at Pompeii have identified some 200 bars, taverns and shops where
you could buy fast food. In total it's estimated that about 40% of Pompeii’s 12,000 citizens
had a tabernae attached to their residence. So what did these shops look like on the inside?
Well we get our best evidence from the preserved remains of Ostia, Pompeii and Herculaneum. Here
we find that the most common form of establishment was the snack bar known as the popina. Its
entrance was a large, decorated doorway meant to draw in customers. Immediately facing
the street would be an L-shaped counter. It stood around waist height and had a marble or stone
top. This is where customers would place their orders. As such it had several key features. The
primary one was the presence of holes which gave access to in-built round amphorae known as dolia
which might hold all manner of food or drink. These in turn were often heated by a small
stove beneath the bar while lids were present to cover them while not in use. The end effect
was something quite like a modern shawarma shop. Another feature of this front bar was a small
set of stepped shelves built along the wall. It would have been used to hold plates, cups,
glasses, and amphorae meant for serving customers. Just behind the bar would have been
a couple other useful service items. Often you’d see a small oven for food preparation,
a sink like basin filled with water to clean dishes, a rack of amphorae for drinks or sauces,
and raised wooden rails for hanging meat, vegetables, fruit, herbs, and cheese. Depending on
the size of your popina, the store might end there with the curtained doorways leading to the
owner’s residence. Larger establishments though might have some additional floorspace
which would be filled with tables and chairs. So what would be on the menu at these sorts of
places? The answer would vary from shop to shop and meal to meal. Broadly speaking though
you could find almost anything your Roman appetite might desire. The store owners were
keen to play into your growling stomach and often decorated their stores with evocative
paintings of the sorts of goods for sale. Examination of the sewers of Herculaneum
reveal the extent of the Roman diet. Here are a few tables summarizing this
which you can pause to check out in detail. At the very low end of the menu would
be dirt cheap items like porridge, nuts, beans, and boiled or roasted chickpeas.
This equivalent of the dollar menu would have cost you little more than an As, Rome’s tiny
denomination coin made of bronze and later copper. The rich often looked down on
the poor who ate from this menu, calling them derisively a ciceris
emptor or “buyer of roasted chickpeas”. At a tier slightly above this you
would start to open up your options. Paying a sestertius, or 2 ½ Asses, you could get
porridge with flavorful additives like honey and spices or real bread and pastries. You could also
get all kinds of produce imported into the city or grown locally in the urban gardens. These would
include hazelnuts, almonds, grapes, olives, dates, figs, cabbage, beats, apples, pears, and all
manner of other fruits, vegetables, and legumes. A clever owner might put the
best of these in a bowl of water to appear even juicier for his customers. These
might be eaten raw, boiled, pickled, or fried. Starting at this price you could also
start to get access to animal products. This might mean getting straight up cuts of meat
like pork, mutton, beef, duck, hen, and fowl. Alternatively you could get other desired bits and
pieces of the creature like goose liver and sow vulva or byproducts like eggs and cheese. Seafood
was also present with things like sardines, anchovies, mackerel, cod, eel, squid, cuttlefish,
mussels, oysters, urchins, crab, and more. Each of these items may have been sold
individually and garnished with a selection of sauces and spices, the most common seasonings
being salt, garlic, pepper, and of course garum. However it was quite common to see separate
ingredients combined into fast food meals. For instance, at a slight premium,
one could easily purchase stews, skewers, sausages, wraps, and sandwiches. Another important menu item would be
the drink selection. Rather than soda, your go-to refreshment would have been wine. One
of its cheapest forms was as Posca. This involved mixing wine-vinegar with water, and some herbs.
Another popular form of drink was the Conditum. This involved mixing warmed wine and water with
honey, pepper, and various aromatics. An As might get you a small bowl’s worth of these beverages
while a couple more coins could get you a pitcher. If you had a sestertius or two to spend, the
shopkeep would let you buy a bottle of one of his table wines. A few more coins and you could
start to entice them to bring out the good stuff. Ancient Romans had both red and white wines which
came from various regions around the Empire. Just as today, each region had its reputation.
To give you a sense of the pricing, here is an inscription we’ve found at Pompeii, it
states: "For one As you can drink wine; for two, you can drink the best;
for four, you can drink Falernian." Now that we’ve laid out the options, we
can move on to the dining experience. For starters it must be said that the
Romans usually had 2-3 meals a day. The first, ientaculum, occurred in the morning.
It was quite light, typically consisting of bread dipped in wine or olive oil and perhaps
a few small bites of cheese and fruit. The second, prandium, occurred at noon.
For the rich it was just a light snack meant to tide them over to dinner. However for the
poorer labor class it was usually far more hefty. This is when you’d get your bread, meat, nuts,
vegetables, and fruit to replenish your energy. The final meal, cena, took place in the
evening. For the upper classes, they would enjoy an elaborate, multi-course feast. The poor
however didn’t have that kind of money to spend and thus would have had a relatively lighter cena
or eaten nothing at all. The fast food restaurants would have provided food for these various meals
based on the sort of clientele they catered to. At this point I want to pass you over briefly
to our friend, Max Miller from Tasting History, who can give you some insight on what
it would have been like to experience Roman cooking from both sides of the kitchen: Thanks for the insight Max. Now in terms of the actual dining experience,
you’d start by forming a line in front of your place of choice. At peak hours this could stretch
around the block. While we don’t have evidence to support this, it's possible that there may have
even been ancient chains of fast food restaurants. I’ve conjured up a few franchise ideas for
when I finally get that time machine working. As you approached, you would be treated to all
manner of sights and smells that further worked up your appetite. Upon reaching the counter
you’d then place your order. The menu would be listed on the wall, made apparent by the food
before you, or be described by the staff. Once you made your selection you would pay up. Prices
again might be listed or communicated to you. For some items it was a fixed price
while for others you paid by weight. It seems that the coinage would go into a
cash register of sorts behind the counter which was usually just an empty pot. At
the shop of Vetutius Placidus in Pompeii, archaeologists for instance have found around
680 sestertii, the likely earnings for the day. For the truly fast food shops your food and drink
would be ready almost immediately, scooped up from the amphora as you watched. For others it might
take a couple minutes of patience for a waiter to bring you the order. Meal in hand you could
then decide where to eat. Should you dine in or take out? Small shops only really offered a
bench or two and otherwise might have a few stools spilling out into the street. These would fill
up quickly. Larger shops probably had a room or two of tables where you’d be more likely to find a
seat. Space was still at a premium so you wouldn’t expect to be reclining unless it was evening
at one of the more high end establishments. Should you choose to stay you’d be
in for a quite lively environment. People would be chatting and laughing
while music might play in the background. If you left, your food would often be carried
out in a to-go bag. These would typically be made from cloth or random bits of paper. Martial
jokes that it was the fate of all bad poetry to end up as a “greasy food wrapper.” This food might
be taken all the way back home to the apartment as evidenced by the remains we find in the latrines
of these structures. More often than not though, take out food would be consumed along the streets.
Afterall there was tons of room here where you could meet up with family and friends. As people
relaxed they also played games. We have evidence of such boards being scratched out into the
stones of the streets. The scene would be quite reminiscent of the thriving street food cultures
found in places like India or Vietnam today. If you really wanted to make meal time a
social event then you’d head over to the inns. These also served food and drink,
though not as much as the snack shops, but offered significantly more floor space.
The wine flowed freely in these establishments, and they were often associated with all of
the vices that philosophers would criticize: drunkenness, rowdiness, prostitution,
and filth. Gambling in particular was a major attraction despite the fact that
it was technically illegal on most days. As one might imagine, these places could
quickly get rowdy. Notices have been found in common rooms, with innkeepers impotently
declaring that no violence was tolerated. It's no surprise that the elite derided
these eateries for the common folk as greasy, sleazy establishments. There was definitely some
class bias at work here. However to some degree they did have a point. At one inn for instance
we find the following note scrawled by a customer “We have pissed our beds. I admit,
host, that we shouldn’t have done it. But if you should ask us why, it’s
because there were no chamber pots.” In addition the food itself was likely quite
questionable. There were none of the health codes, regulations, or inspections that we expect
today. Admittedly some Emperors did actually try: multiple laws were passed throughout the
first century AD to regulate the foods and the quality thereof. These did things like
banning the sale of rotten meat. Unfortunately, the laws themselves were toothless without
proper enforcement and were widely ignored. Nonetheless people continued patronizing
the tabernae and popinas and anyone attempting to sanction them was met with open
hostility: they were just a part of life. We hope you’ve enjoyed this
episode on Roman fast food joints! I’ve absolutely loved digging into this aspect
of daily life in the past and can’t wait to cover more episodes on the topic. Do you think
you would go to a taberna, given the chance? What kind of ancient foods would you like to
try? Leave your thoughts and comments below. A huge thanks to the patrons for sponsoring
this video and to the researchers, writers, and artists who made this episode possible!
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