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Concept
Ancient Roman cuisine
Summary
The cuisine of ancient Rome changed greatly over the duration of the civilization's existence. Dietary habits were affected by the political changes from kingdom to republic to empire, and Roman trading with foreigners along with the empire's enormous expansion exposed Romans to many new foods, provincial culinary habits and cooking methods.
In the beginning, dietary differences between Roman social classes were not great, but disparities developed with the empire's growth.
Most organic foods decay under ordinary conditions, but ashes and animal bones offer some archaeological details about the Ancient Roman diet. Phytoliths have been found at a cemetery in Tarragona, Spain. Imported figs were among the charred foods preserved when Boudica and her army burned down a Roman shop in Colchester. Chickpeas and bowls of fruit are known from Herculaneum, preserved since Vesuvius destroyed the town in 79 AD. Remains of small fish bones, sea urchin spines and mineralized plants have survived in the city's sewers; the plants archaeologists have identified include dill, coriander, flax, lentil, cabbage, opium poppy and various other nuts, fruits and legumes, as well as a diverse variety of fish and shellfish. At Pompeii, grapes, bread and pastry were burned and buried in peristyle courtyard gardens as offerings to household Lares.
Traditionally, a breakfast called ientaculum was served at dawn. At mid-day to early afternoon, Romans ate cena, the main meal of the day, and at nightfall a light supper called vesperna. With the increased importation of foreign foods, the cena grew larger in size and included a wider range of foods. Thus, it gradually shifted to the evening, while the vesperna was abandoned completely over the course of the years. The mid-day meal prandium became a light meal to hold one over until cena. Among the lower classes of the Roman society, these changes were less pronounced as the traditional routines corresponded closely to the daily rhythms of manual labour.
Official source
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