Thanks for the interest in this topic, all. I'm still looking for some reference to one of the houses, I think in Pompeii (may have been one of the other towns) that was built in a gap between two larger, older homes, and consisted of a grand front door and used some Trompe l'oeil approaches to distract visitors from the fact that the whole structure was basically a hallway. :')
Almost three dozen bakeries are known from Pompeii (much of the city remains unexcavated) and in one of them the ovens preserved the bread that had been put in to bake. It's, uh, a little burned. Probably not worth taking a bite out of it.
Charred bread excavated from the ancient Roman city of Pompeii still shows the maker's mark
