ANCIENT ROMAN FOOD AND FOOD TODAY

1. ANCIENT ROMAN F OOD AND
F OOD TODAY
Lanza Luca, Francesco Manca, Marco Mantovani, Luigi Panio, Giulia Peroglio
STRIPS

2. ANCIENT ROMAN FOOD
• Ancient Roman cuisine changed over the long
duration of this civilization.
• The Roman diet of the archaic age and the early
Republic was simple and poor. It was based on
vegetables, legumes (legumina), cereals
At the beginning, the
(frumenta), cheese and fruit. differences between
social classes were not
• During the Imperial age meat (caro), fish very great, but disparities
developed with the
(piscis), game (caro ferina) and baked sweets were
empire’s growth.
introduced.

3. FOOD TODAY
• Nowadays, in Italy, our cuisine is based
on the “Mediterranean diet”.
• This diet includes high consumption of
legumes (legumina), cereals (frumenta),
pasta, rice, oil, vegetables and fruit
and a low consumption of meat.
• In Ancient Roman meals, there were
cereals and vegetables that we still use
today, except for corn, tomatoes,
potatoes, peppers that were introduced
from the New World, after Christopher
The word diet comes from Greek and Latin 3
Columbus’s voyage. « diaeta» for «way of life», «mode of living»

4. MEALS
Ancient Romans ate three meals
during the day:
2.Breakfast (ientaculum)
3.Lunch (prandium)
4.Dinner (cena or coena)
The Romans ate little during the day.
Dinner was the main and the most
important meal of the day.

5. BREAKFAST IN THE PAST: BREAKFAST TODAY:
IENTACULUM ( 6 o’ clock): BREAKFAST ( 7 o’clock)
For breakfast poor people ate bread We have coffee, biscuits, tea and chocolate.
and milk. Ancient Romans didn’t know coffee, tea and
chocolate.
The rich ate bread, flat cakes, milk, Coffee was imported from Arabic countries,
fruit, cheese, eggs, honey and even chocolate from the New World after
meat. Christopher Columbus’s voyage and tea
The Romans usually ate leftovers from East and South Asia.
from the previous meals.

6. LUNCH TODAY:
LUNCH IN THE PAST :
LUNCH (12 – 1 pm)
PRANDIUM (10 -11 am):
•Fast food;
•At lunch Roman people ate
•Street food;
eggs, onions, bread, cheese,
olives , grapes and figs. •Brunch;
•Ancient Romans, often, ate •Happy Hour;
standing, walking up the street •Take away.
or went to taverns Salads and sandwiches: they are the
usual lunch of businessmen and working
(Thermopolium). people

7. DINNER IN THE PAST DINNER TODAY
COENA (time: 3-5 pm): DINNER (time:7 -8 pm):
The most important and In Italy, for dinner, we have
generous meal was dinner. pasta, pizza, meat, salad and
This was eaten in the fruit.
afternoon or in the early
evening.

8. DINNER: RICH PEOPLE
Pullus farsilis! Lepus madidus! Patina piscium!....
Dinner consisted of different sorts of snacks,
starters, meat and fish.
They ate wild boar, sausages, pork, lamb, duck,
chickens, small birds and a wide variety of fish.
Dinner was made up of three courses:
•1st course (gustatio): starters like salads,
mushrooms, shellfish;
•main course (prima mensa): fish and meat; Meat was eaten only by the
rich: it was a mark of
•Dessert (secunda mensa): cakes sweetened with luxury.
honey, apples, nuts, grapes and figs.

9. The slaves must serve at least
40 dishes tonight!!!
THE BANQUET Rich Romans organized banquets
(symposia or convivia)
In these banquets there were even more
than 100 dishes. (fercula)
The banquet lasted a long time: 6 -8 hours.
These dinners would include conversation,
music, dancing and singing by professional
musicians.
The Romans of the upper After dinner entertainments might include
class were called Patricians a “commissatio”(a drinking party).

10. Pulmentum and
DINNER: POOR PEOPLE
legumina, tonight.
Plebeians fed themselves with
legumes, (legumina), pulses, flour
pie (pulmentum) and vegetables
(olera), if available.
It was too dangerous (fires) for the
inhabitants of insulae to cook
indoors, so they, often, ate cold
The Romans of the lower class dinner or bought food from shops.
were called plebeians

11. HABITS AT THE TABLE
• The Roman dining room was called “triclinium”.
• Here, rich people would lie on a special bed, the lectus triclinaris and
lots of slaves had to serve them.
• The food was taken with fingers and hands.
• During the banquet they threw scraps of the food on the floor.
• At the end of the banquet, guests asked for bags to take home dishes
and leftovers that they had enjoyed.

12. TAVERN
S
The poor, often, ate at taverns (thermopolium), where the rich
never went.
The tavern was the poor’s canteen.
Here, the Plebeians had their only hot meal of the day.

13. I am sick and tired of
always having puls and
hard bread.
Luckily I am coming
back to Rome and to its
taverns!!!!
BREAD AND DRINKS
In Ancient Rome there were four different types
of bread :
3.rustic or brown bread (panis plebeius);
4.wholemeal bread (autopyrus);
5.white (panis secundarius);
6.special or de luxe (panis candidus).
One of the favourite drinks was called “mulsum”
which was a mixture of wine with honey.

14. SALT, HONEY, SPICES AND GARUM
• Salt was used only a little because it
was very expensive.
• Ancient Romans used honey to sweeten.
They didn’t know sugar that was
imported, later, from Arabic country.
• Many meals were served with sauces.
• The most popular sauce was “garum” or
“liquamen”, a type of fermented fish
sauce.
Ancient Romans used herbs and
spices to cover the unpleasant
smell and flavour of spoiled meat
and fish.

15. «Esse oportet ut vivas, non vivere ut edas»
(Eat in order to live, don’t live in order to eat)
Cicerone