2.5 Everyday Life

Leisure.

\There is a range of evidence for other leisure activities: banqueting, bathing, painting, playing or listening to music, gambling and games, and prostitution.

Painting

Women are shown painting in the two frescoes below. The first is from the House of the Surgeon in Pompeii, the second from an unrecorded location in Pompeii. Both paintings are in the National Archaeological Museum (NAM) in Naples.

Music

Music was for religious ceremonies and theatrical performances and also played during gladiatorial games. It was also a leisure activity as shown in the following frescoes.

From an unknown location in Pompeii, the fresco above shows a woman, surrounded by other young women, sitting on a couch, with a harp on her right and a kithara on her lap.

The fresco above comes from the Palaestra at Herculaneum. Two musicians on the right play a double flute and a lyre for a seated woman who appears perhaps to be keeping time.

There are a range of musical instruments from Pompeii on display in the National Archaeological Museum. Below are pan pipes, a flute, The systrum and cymbals were also used during religious ceremonies especially with the Cult of Isis.

Games

Evidence for games. Below are dice, game pieces in the shape of chickens, and bones.

A fresco from an unrecorded location in Herculaneum (excavated in 1746), shows a mythological scene with a group of women playing bones.

Gambling and drinking

There are many cauponae and tabernae in Pompeii and Herculaneum. Frescoes and graffiti record the pleasures of drinking and gambling.

Graffiti: "Set out the wine and dice. To hell with him who cares for the morrow."

A fresco from the Caupona of Salvius (below left) shows two seated men. One calls to the serving woman, “Here!”, and the other says, “It’s mine.” The second fresco from the same location shows two men gambling.

Prostitution

Prostitution was present in both Pompeii and Herculaneum. There is only one building in Pompeii identified specifically as a brothel, though there is also graffiti which suggests that upstairs rooms of shops were used for the purpose, potentially because some of the tavern bar maids were slaves so potentially their owner could also require them to work as prostitutes if required. Frescoes in the Suburban Baths show scenes which may indicate that prostitutes may have also worked there.

Graffito from the rear entrance vestibule of the House of Menander: “At Nuceria, look for Novellia Primigenia near the Roman gate in the prostitutes’ district.” (CIL IV 8356)

Graffiti of a more lewd nature is often found in Pompeii Prostitution was legal and taxed. (23 April: prostitutes' holiday!)

There was no stigma attached to visiting a brothel for men. Prostitutes were stigmatised: "lupa" = "she-wolves"; "lupanar" = "brothel".

Prostitutes were usually foreign slaves.

The famous lupanar in Pompeii (VII, 12, 18) has five rooms and a small latrine on the ground floor and five more rooms upstairs. "This is the only building known to us which existed specifically for this trade. All the other places of prostitution were either single rooms opening off the street or rooms on the upper floor of an existing house."

Everyday life: leisure activities

Text Chapter 10 "Relaxation, Entertainment and Sport"

p.145 "Visiting the Baths"

p.149 "Attending the Theatre"

p.152 "Training at the Palaestra"

p.158 "Drinking and Gambling"

Past HSC Question - 2013

What do Source A and other sources reveal about the diet of people in Pompeii and Herculaneum? (3 marks)

Source A: Foods from Pompeii, preserved by the eruption of Vesuvius

Past HSC Question - 2006

Food/diet/health

Using Source 2, describe how food was prepared and sold in Pompeii and Herculaneum. (4 marks)

Source 2: Photograph of a food bar in Herculaneum.

Food

There is much evidence in Pompeii and Herculaneum for the types of food eaten.

Still-life frescoes in many houses depict the food that could be served to guests. Below are frescoes from the House of the Deer in Herculaneum.

Mosaics from the House of the Faun in Pompeii depict marine life. Sea food would have been widely available in Pompeii and Herculaneum.

Epigraphic evidence

A list from the atrium of the house at IX.7.24-5 shows a wide range of food that may have been available at the attached shop or had been bought for the household: cheese, bread, oil, wine, onions, porridge, beef, sausages, leeks.
A person recorded his expenditure on a wall of a cubiculum of the house VII.2.30: items include bread, cabbage, beetroot, mustard, mint and salt.
A graffito in the large palaestra refers to lard, wine, cheese, oil, bread and pork.
Labels on various amphorae in Pompeii show the contents: Barley, bay, chick peas, fennel, figs, honey, lentils, nuts, olives, pepper and pickling brine. For example, an amphora fragment from the peristyle of VII.7.5 is labelled: “Honey of Gavia Severa from bees fed on thyme”.

Carbonised food has been found in various parts of the cities. Types of food are loaves of bread, figs, dates, prunes, almonds, chestnuts, walnuts, olives and pomegranates. Below are carbonised nuts and olives on display in the Antiquarium at Boscoreale.

Dining

Most people ate simply. Petronius’ The Satyricon and the 4th or 5th century cookbook by Apicius are not reliable sources for dining in Pompeii and Herculaneum.

Not all houses had kitchens. Food would have been bought from the thermopolia, taken home and kept warm on a brazier. Below are a square and a round brazier on display at the National Archaeological Museum at Naples.

Commercial oven for bread

Below- domestic kitchen in larger houses. Wood fired stove top where food was cooked in bronze vessels.

For the wealthy households, dining was a different matter. A dining room was called a triclinium. The triclinia from the large houses are lavishly decorated, and often open onto the peristyle, showing the importance of entertaining and impressing guests.

The triclinium below is a reconstruction – note that it does not come from Pompeii or Herculaneum.

Below is a 19th century reproduction of a wall from the Ixion room in the House of the Vettii. The room is thought to have been a formal dining room. It opened onto the peristyle garden with statues and water features.