"Actually, I can trace my Royal lineage back to Roman Emperor Stromboli".
Posted on 06/19/2007 4:25:23 PM PDT by blam
Ancient Romans Preferred Fast Food
Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News
June 18, 2007 — Just as a U.S. Presidential state dinner does not reflect how most Americans eat and socialize, researchers think the formal, decadent image of wining and dining in ancient Rome mostly just applied to the elite.
According to archaeologist Penelope Allison of the University of Leicester, the majority of the population consumed food "on the run."
Allison excavated an entire neighborhood block in Pompeii, a city frozen in time after the eruption of volcano Mount Vesuvius in 79 A.D.
Historians often extend findings from Pompeii to other parts of Italy, particularly Rome, given the city's proximity to the Roman Empire's center.
"In many parts of the western world today, a popular belief exists that family members should sit down and dine together and, if they don't, this may represent a breakdown of the family structure, but that idea did not originate in ancient Rome," she told Discovery News.
Her claims are based both on what she did not find during the excavation, and what she did.
Allison noticed an unusual lack of tableware and formal dining or kitchen areas within the Pompeii homes. Instead she found isolated plates here and there, such as in sleeping quarters.
"Similar to how children today bring a plate of food to their rooms before watching TV or playing on the computer, my guess is that Roman youths would tote food to certain areas where they possibly engaged in other activities," she said, adding that kids might also have dined with slaves in nanny or caretaker roles.
What she did find in the homes were multiple mini barbecue-type fire boxes, suggesting that "BBQ or fondue-style dining" often took place.
Allison outlines her findings in the new Oxford University Press book, "The Insula of the Menander at Pompeii Volume III."
Stephen Dyson, one of the world's leading authorities on ancient Rome, is a professor of classics at the University of Buffalo who formerly served as the president of the Archaeological Institute of America. Dyson told Discovery News that the new book "was meticulously researched" and that his own work in Pompeii and Rome supports Allison's conclusions.
He said, "We've also found numerous fast food restaurants in Pompeii and other parts of ancient Rome."
Dyson likened these places to a cross between "Burger King and a British pub or a Spanish tapas bar." Open to the street, each had a large counter with a receptacle in the middle from which food or drink would have been served.
"Most Romans lived in apartments or rather confined spaces, and there is not much evidence for stoves and other cooking equipment in them," he said.
Dyson thinks "fast food" restaurants became popular because they were plentiful, the same way modern New Yorkers often eat out due to the panoply of affordable choices. Additionally, many of Rome's and Pompeii's residents, who worked as artisans, shopkeepers, weavers and such, made enough money to support these places.
Grabbing food to go, either in a house or on the street, also seems to match the energy and flexibility of the Italian mindset.
Dyson said, "Italy's vibrant street and bar scenes today, along with the often multipurpose design of homes with bedsteads stacked in a corner, or kitchenettes in surprising places, reflect the wonderful, slightly chaotic, aspects of early Roman life."
GGG Ping.
I recall in a past life I liked eating at BurgerEmperor
Eat Caesar Salad for better health.
They renamed the Gaul Fries to Republic Fries after they sided with Hanibal.
It’s not Romans particularly. The tradition has continued all along in Napoli. Which is actually just up the road from Pompeii or vice versa.
Oh God,we really do emulate the Roman Empire. What’s left, the fall I guess !!!
"Actually, I can trace my Royal lineage back to Roman Emperor Stromboli".
Many ancient Romans in Rome didn’t have kitchens. It was a fire hazard for one thing. And living space was so expensive, most Romans lived in little one or two room flats. So they had to eat somewhere. By the same token, most Roman dwellings didn’t have indoor plumbing, hence the public toilets.
So, I think this “on the go” attitude had a lot to do with their living space.
Did they wear shirts made of synthetic material while doing the chicken (’50s dance) in front of the candy store? Did they urge all of their kids to become lawyers?
The Colosseum or the Acropolis with the Mac arches in the back ground?
I'm waiting.........
They likely ate Porchetta, which puts hamburger to shame.
As a matter of fact, they invented the golden arches...
I studied this in Classical Archaeology back in 1975.
An excellent book by Joseph Deiss was one of our texts. It detailed the various little food shops all around Herculaneum, with photos of the lunch counters and even carbonized food that had survived a couple of thousand years under the lava flow.
In ancient Rome, the Hamburglar would have met his fate in the Coliseum.
MMM...carbonized...
The Roman Empire (West) lived until 476 AD and the East until 1453. If you start from the origin of the city until the end of the Eastern Empire (Byzantine) it lived over 2000 years.
Guess who conquered the Eastern Empire? It was the Muslim Turks!
In the original, you can still make out the baker's stamp on the segments of the loaf.
McRoma, over MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMXXXII served.
I find this so fascinating. I would imagine that ancient Rome would be in some ways quite foreign to us but in some ways very familiar.
I read several years ago about the discovery of an Ancient Roman “shopping mall”. It had two levels and many stalls selling all sorts of goods with the food stalls grouped together – “the mall food court”. I can just imagine the stores: Togas to Go, Sandals R Us, Best Buy Flutes, Just in Time Sundials.
I’m not sure that the three meals a day with dinner being the biggest meal is healthiest way to eat. Besides, so many of us skip breakfast, do a working lunch and work late and have things to do right after work that by the time we get home and try to cook the traditional big three course American meat and potatoes dinner, we’re tired, cranky, starving and eating at 9:00 or 10:00 then going to bed- that’s a recipe for overeating, eating all the wrong things, gaining weight and having digestive problems.
Many believe that 5 to 6 smaller meals spaced throughout the day is better because it doesn’t cause the blood sugar swings.
The traditional Mediterranean diet is perhaps even healthier - eat a small but satisfying breakfast with an espresso, go to work, then have the biggest meal in the middle of the day with the family along with a long siesta and even a nap perhaps, then go back to work refreshed, working into the early evening followed by a late night small meal out with friends with maybe a glass of wine and a long walk. Plus in Europe, vacations are often three weeks long. That sounds a lot more civilized than my schedule.
Being a single, hard working gal, I don’t have time to cook every night and it’s hard to cook for one. I do some extra cooking on the weekend but I also eat out and do carry out a lot, but “carryout or fast food” doesn’t have to be unhealthy if you make the right choices. One night I might do sushi with a seaweed salad then I might do the grocery store salad bar or a grilled chicken salad from my favorite restaurant with the dressing on the side. It’s not all about Mickey D’s (which I never go near, it makes me physically ill).
How..dee!
Romans went to war on diet of pizza, dig shows.
The Scotsman | Mon 26 Aug 2002 | John Innes
Posted on 08/26/2002 5:20:42 PM EDT by vannrox
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/739684/posts
Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on or off the
"Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list or GGG weekly digest
-- Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
Gods, Graves, Glyphs (alpha order)
Those would still be really solid marketing ideas. :’)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1527209/posts?page=4#4
Stuffed Dormice A Roman Favourite
BBC | 7-21-2003
Posted on 07/21/2003 7:18:11 PM EDT by blam
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/950141/posts
It's not a Roman thing, heck it's not really even a human thing. Think back in time, we, any species really, pretty much survived by eating on the run. Fast food has always been the norm. We've just dumbed it down (Micky D's) like so many other things in the last 60 years or so.
Not that sitting down to meals is not good from a social perspective, I'm just saying; from a basic survival, production point of view: eat when you need to.
That looks like a fossil of a Pizza :-D
Walmart lol!
Really? Gee, I figured everyone in the classical world lounged around sipping wine, while young concubines dangled grapes in the mouths.
What was she expecting to find a Frigidair side by side?
Pub = public house for eating and drinking because of the hazards. And what about the left overs?
Shopping carts. Not the customers but the vendors. Hot dog vendors would be the proper image. Everything sold on the street from carts, or from merchandise laid out on the side of the road. Vegetables, wooden spoons, fans.
“photos of the lunch counters “ -— Formica formed from Mica?
“...even carbonized food that had survived a couple of thousand years.” -— Now that was loaded with preservatives!
paid for with a credit card ...
Visus Maximus! Don’t leave Rome without it!
What’s in yer toga?
And I always thought it was Roman Meal bread.
This was a wine shop, they put the amphorae in the large jars set into the counter. You can see the lares (tutelary deities) and the good-luck serpents in the wall painting in the back. And I think that's a good-luck winged phallus in the pediment . . . they have them everywhere in Herculaneum and Pompeii.
:’) Bread, wine, salt...
Somebody has to post the pic from Life of Brian where he’s selling gerbil snouts (or whatever) in the arena.
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