Bars and Restaurants in Ancient Rome [9:02]

Transcript
· Introduction
0:08 · There were no fancy restaurants in ancient Rome. Wealthy Romans ate at home,
0:14 · attended by regiments of cooks and servers. The poor, by contrast,
0:20 · lived in apartments that usually lacked kitchens, fireplaces, or any other facilities
0:26 · for preparing meals. If they wanted hot food, they usually had to get it from a local bar.
0:33 · Just as the English words "bar," "tavern," and "pub" have similar meanings but slightly
0:39 · different connotations, the Latin terms taberna, popina, caupona, and thermopolium seem to have
0:47 · been almost, but not quite, synonymous. Some of these establishments only served food; others,
0:55 · only wine. Some had seats for customers, others only service counters. Some doubled as hotels,
1:03 · brothels, or both. Without losing sight of those distinctions, I'll use taberna
1:09 · as a generic term for the places where most Romans drank their wine and ate hot meals.
· The bars of Pompeii
1:16 · The majority of what we know about Roman bars comes from the excavations at Ostia,
1:21 · Herculaneum, and – above all – Pompeii. Pompeii had more than
1:27 · 160 tabernae – roughly one for every 60 inhabitants.
1:31 · Almost all of Pompeii's tabernae were open to the street, with heavy wooden
1:35 · shutters that could be closed at night. Inside was a waist-high service counter,
1:41 · usually L- or U-shaped. For greater visibility, the front of the counter was often veneered with
1:47 · marble or coated with stucco. The counter of Pompeii's most recently-excavated bar
1:53 · was painted with scenes ranging from a nereid riding a seahorse to a fierce-looking guard dog.
2:00 · The counter was sometimes complemented by the Roman equivalent of a pub sign,
2:05 · painted on a wall near the entrance. Next to the Caupona of Euxinus in Pompeii, for example,
2:12 · was a fresco of a phoenix – apparently the name of the bar – with the caption:
2:17 · "the phoenix is happy, and you can be too!"
2:20 · Equally eye-catching, at least to modern observers, were the elaborate lamps and
2:25 · windchimes hung over the counter, which often featured an apotropaic phallus or two.
· Fine dining
2:32 · Although some Roman bars only served food to-go,
2:35 · most had a seating area for customers who wanted to eat and drink on the premises. Usually,
2:41 · this was a small room adjacent to the service counter, provided with wooden stools and tables.
2:47 · A few bars had private rooms and gardens. At the Praedia of Julia Felix in Pompeii,
2:54 · for example, patrons could recline on masonry couches that imitated
2:58 · those in the triclinia of elite houses. The Caupona of Euxinus had a private vineyard,
3:04 · complete with shady alcoves that were probably reserved for guests.
· Wines on tap
3:09 · Wine came to tabernae in delivery carts wobbling with wineskins. It was stored in amphorae,
3:16 · which were lined along walls and stacked on racks. Servers poured wine into pitchers or
3:22 · cups (ideally made of bronze or glass, but often simple pottery). This wine was usually cheap,
3:29 · local, and weak; bartenders were routinely accused of adding water to save money.
3:36 · Some establishments, however, served – or claimed to serve – more expensive vintages.
3:43 · A sign outside a Pompeiian bar advertised the famous Falernian variety, available for
3:48 · four times the cost of ordinary wine. At another bar in Pompeii, amphorae containing wines from
3:55 · every part of the empire were stacked around the bar, ready to be served to discerning patrons.
· Bar food
4:02 · Earthenware containers – dolia – filled with food were often embedded in the
4:06 · service counter. Although it used to be theorized that they held soups and stews,
4:11 · this seems unlikely, since few containers were waterproofed with pitch. At Herculaneum,
4:17 · vestiges of carbonized grain, chickpeas, and beans were discovered in dolia.
4:24 · Analysis of the most recently-excavated Pompeii bar found duck, fish,
4:30 · goat, and pig bones in a single container, along with a few snail shells. Unless these
4:36 · were the remains of an extremely unorthodox dish, they should probably be identified as scraps,
4:42 · tossed aside by the bar staff or customers. Another dolium in the same bar contained fava
4:48 · beans, which the Romans sometimes used to "purify" spoiled wines.
4:54 · A fresco in Pompeii shows sausages, cheeses,
4:58 · and dried fruit hanging from the rafters. Cooked foods were also on the menu:
5:04 · a Roman poet mentions pike being grilled outside a taberna. Heated or otherwise,
5:10 · the average quality of bar food does not seem to have been high. One poem describes it as "greasy;"
5:16 · another alludes casually to the cockroaches that flourished around service counters.
· Open all night
5:23 · Insalubrious though they may have been, Rome's bars seldom lacked customers. Some were open all
5:29 · night; a late antique urban prefect tried in vain to prohibit the sale of wine before mid-morning.
5:36 · At any time of day, bars were places to gather, talk, and relax over a cup of wine. A comic
5:44 · strip-like fresco in Pompeii's Caupona of Salvius captures the atmosphere. Two men throw dice and
5:51 · banter with a serving maid. Another pair, playing a game similar to backgammon, argue over the
5:56 · score. In the final panel, the squabbling players are thrown out by the bartender.
· Barmaids
6:03 · Women who worked in bars were widely regarded as promiscuous. Some bars functioned as brothels. In
6:10 · an inscription set up by a pair of tavern-keepers who jokingly called themselves Lucius Callidus
6:17 · Eroticus and Fannia Voluptas, the services of a girl are tallied on a customer's bill
6:23 · alongside bread and wine. To judge from the graffiti describing the bedroom prowess
6:29 · (and prices) of various barmaids in Pompeii, this sort of accounting was far from exceptional.
· Dives
6:37 · Literary descriptions of Roman bars dwell on their seediness. Juvenal described a bar in Ostia as a
6:44 · place where thieves and fugitive slaves drank with eunuchs and undertakers. Centuries later,
6:51 · the historian Ammianus Marcellinus complained that Rome's lower classes spent half their lives
6:57 · in bars, gambling, arguing about chariot races, and – for some reason – snorting.
7:05 · Some of the bars in Rome's rougher areas were genuinely dangerous. A praetor was
7:10 · murdered in one by his political enemies, and at least two future
7:14 · emperors – Nero and Lucius Verus – had their eyes blackened while slumming in tabernae.
7:21 · Bars owed much of their bad reputation, however, to elite snobbery. To wealthy
· Bad reviews
7:28 · Romans, the brawling, boisterous bars of the commoners always seemed unsavory, immoral,
7:34 · and more than a little threatening. It was a criminal offense to bring the young son of
7:40 · a respectable gentleman into a bar. A series of emperors, convinced that tabernae were potential
7:46 · hotbeds of conspiracy and unrest, limited the foods they could serve or closed them altogether.
· Where everybody knows your name
7:54 · Ultimately, the bars of ancient Rome were nothing more or less than restaurants, meeting places,
8:00 · and refuges for the hundreds of thousands who had few other places to gather. As today,
8:06 · each bar was different. But many Romans would have found something
8:10 · familiar in the epitaph of a woman from Tivoli who had – the inscription
8:14 · claimed – drawn visitors from far and wide to the haven of her bar.

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the services of a girl are tallied on a customer’s bill alongside bread and wine.

Ahh...the service charge on restaurant bills they still have today in Italy..

LOL

Appreciate you posting the narration. Many thanks.

The Art of Pompeii - Alison Balsom plays Neruda and Haydn Trumpet Concertos
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yChKbCT_z-w

Pompeii - Temple of Isis - Echoes of Ancient Rome, Michael Levy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_czaMpInPWc

Pompeii - House of the Faun - Echoes of Ancient Rome, Michael Levy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zGWHMgY4mA

Pompeii Watercolors of Luigi Bazzani - Vaughan Williams
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWrMl4DDbvs

Pompeii - House of the Vettii - Echoes of Ancient Rome, Michael Levy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clGB-gTbhJc

Pompeii - House of Mysteries - Echoes of Ancient Rome - Michael Levy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFHNcH0xtZQ

Two Scythians walk into a bar...................

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/tbgetc/this_bar_joke_from_ancient_sumer_has_been_making/

Read later.

My pleasure, and thanks for the links!

Better than making everything a la carte. :^)

The third one ducks.

https://freerepublic.com/focus/chat/4127534/posts?page=19#19

Transcript
	·	Introduction
0:08	·	There were no fancy restaurants in ancient Rome. Wealthy Romans ate at home,
0:14	·	attended by regiments of cooks and servers. The poor, by contrast,
0:20	·	lived in apartments that usually lacked kitchens, fireplaces, or any other facilities
0:26	·	for preparing meals. If they wanted hot food, they usually had to get it from a local bar.
0:33	·	Just as the English words "bar," "tavern," and "pub" have similar meanings but slightly
0:39	·	different connotations, the Latin terms taberna, popina, caupona, and thermopolium seem to have
0:47	·	been almost, but not quite, synonymous. Some of these establishments only served food; others,
0:55	·	only wine. Some had seats for customers, others only service counters. Some doubled as hotels,
1:03	·	brothels, or both. Without losing sight of those distinctions, I'll use taberna
1:09	·	as a generic term for the places where most Romans drank their wine and ate hot meals.
	·	The bars of Pompeii
1:16	·	The majority of what we know about Roman bars comes from the excavations at Ostia,
1:21	·	Herculaneum, and – above all – Pompeii. Pompeii had more than
1:27	·	160 tabernae – roughly one for every 60 inhabitants.
1:31	·	Almost all of Pompeii's tabernae were open to the street, with heavy wooden
1:35	·	shutters that could be closed at night. Inside was a waist-high service counter,
1:41	·	usually L- or U-shaped. For greater visibility, the front of the counter was often veneered with
1:47	·	marble or coated with stucco. The counter of Pompeii's most recently-excavated bar
1:53	·	was painted with scenes ranging from a nereid riding a seahorse to a fierce-looking guard dog.
2:00	·	The counter was sometimes complemented by the Roman equivalent of a pub sign,
2:05	·	painted on a wall near the entrance. Next to the Caupona of Euxinus in Pompeii, for example,
2:12	·	was a fresco of a phoenix – apparently the name of the bar – with the caption:
2:17	·	"the phoenix is happy, and you can be too!"
2:20	·	Equally eye-catching, at least to modern observers, were the elaborate lamps and
2:25	·	windchimes hung over the counter, which often featured an apotropaic phallus or two.
	·	Fine dining
2:32	·	Although some Roman bars only served food to-go,
2:35	·	most had a seating area for customers who wanted to eat and drink on the premises. Usually,
2:41	·	this was a small room adjacent to the service counter, provided with wooden stools and tables.
2:47	·	A few bars had private rooms and gardens. At the Praedia of Julia Felix in Pompeii,
2:54	·	for example, patrons could recline on masonry couches that imitated
2:58	·	those in the triclinia of elite houses. The Caupona of Euxinus had a private vineyard,
3:04	·	complete with shady alcoves that were probably reserved for guests.
	·	Wines on tap
3:09	·	Wine came to tabernae in delivery carts wobbling with wineskins. It was stored in amphorae,
3:16	·	which were lined along walls and stacked on racks. Servers poured wine into pitchers or
3:22	·	cups (ideally made of bronze or glass, but often simple pottery). This wine was usually cheap,
3:29	·	local, and weak; bartenders were routinely accused of adding water to save money.
3:36	·	Some establishments, however, served – or claimed to serve – more expensive vintages.
3:43	·	A sign outside a Pompeiian bar advertised the famous Falernian variety, available for
3:48	·	four times the cost of ordinary wine. At another bar in Pompeii, amphorae containing wines from
3:55	·	every part of the empire were stacked around the bar, ready to be served to discerning patrons.
	·	Bar food
4:02	·	Earthenware containers – dolia – filled with food were often embedded in the
4:06	·	service counter. Although it used to be theorized that they held soups and stews,
4:11	·	this seems unlikely, since few containers were waterproofed with pitch. At Herculaneum,
4:17	·	vestiges of carbonized grain, chickpeas, and beans were discovered in dolia.
4:24	·	Analysis of the most recently-excavated Pompeii bar found duck, fish,
4:30	·	goat, and pig bones in a single container, along with a few snail shells. Unless these
4:36	·	were the remains of an extremely unorthodox dish, they should probably be identified as scraps,
4:42	·	tossed aside by the bar staff or customers. Another dolium in the same bar contained fava
4:48	·	beans, which the Romans sometimes used to "purify" spoiled wines.
4:54	·	A fresco in Pompeii shows sausages, cheeses,
4:58	·	and dried fruit hanging from the rafters. Cooked foods were also on the menu:
5:04	·	a Roman poet mentions pike being grilled outside a taberna. Heated or otherwise,
5:10	·	the average quality of bar food does not seem to have been high. One poem describes it as "greasy;"
5:16	·	another alludes casually to the cockroaches that flourished around service counters.
	·	Open all night
5:23	·	Insalubrious though they may have been, Rome's bars seldom lacked customers. Some were open all
5:29	·	night; a late antique urban prefect tried in vain to prohibit the sale of wine before mid-morning.
5:36	·	At any time of day, bars were places to gather, talk, and relax over a cup of wine. A comic
5:44	·	strip-like fresco in Pompeii's Caupona of Salvius captures the atmosphere. Two men throw dice and
5:51	·	banter with a serving maid. Another pair, playing a game similar to backgammon, argue over the
5:56	·	score. In the final panel, the squabbling players are thrown out by the bartender.
	·	Barmaids
6:03	·	Women who worked in bars were widely regarded as promiscuous. Some bars functioned as brothels. In
6:10	·	an inscription set up by a pair of tavern-keepers who jokingly called themselves Lucius Callidus
6:17	·	Eroticus and Fannia Voluptas, the services of a girl are tallied on a customer's bill
6:23	·	alongside bread and wine. To judge from the graffiti describing the bedroom prowess
6:29	·	(and prices) of various barmaids in Pompeii, this sort of accounting was far from exceptional.
	·	Dives
6:37	·	Literary descriptions of Roman bars dwell on their seediness. Juvenal described a bar in Ostia as a
6:44	·	place where thieves and fugitive slaves drank with eunuchs and undertakers. Centuries later,
6:51	·	the historian Ammianus Marcellinus complained that Rome's lower classes spent half their lives
6:57	·	in bars, gambling, arguing about chariot races, and – for some reason – snorting.
7:05	·	Some of the bars in Rome's rougher areas were genuinely dangerous. A praetor was
7:10	·	murdered in one by his political enemies, and at least two future
7:14	·	emperors – Nero and Lucius Verus – had their eyes blackened while slumming in tabernae.
7:21	·	Bars owed much of their bad reputation, however, to elite snobbery. To wealthy
	·	Bad reviews
7:28	·	Romans, the brawling, boisterous bars of the commoners always seemed unsavory, immoral,
7:34	·	and more than a little threatening. It was a criminal offense to bring the young son of
7:40	·	a respectable gentleman into a bar. A series of emperors, convinced that tabernae were potential
7:46	·	hotbeds of conspiracy and unrest, limited the foods they could serve or closed them altogether.
	·	Where everybody knows your name
7:54	·	Ultimately, the bars of ancient Rome were nothing more or less than restaurants, meeting places,
8:00	·	and refuges for the hundreds of thousands who had few other places to gather. As today,
8:06	·	each bar was different. But many Romans would have found something
8:10	·	familiar in the epitaph of a woman from Tivoli who had – the inscription
8:14	·	claimed – drawn visitors from far and wide to the haven of her bar.