What Was Daily Life Like in the Roman Empire?
The Roman Empire fought great wars and raised ruthless commanders, but how did ordinary people live in this state? What did they eat, what did they drink, what did do to have fun? Let’s talk about things that aren’t often mentioned in history books.
The Roman Empire was the most powerful state of the time, which has grown continuously since the first days of its establishment and expanded its borders from the Mediterranean to England and ruled Europe.
Although the upper authorities are always praised in this empire, those who kept the state alive were its citizens who are never remembered today. Greeks, Syrians, Jews, North Africans, Spaniards, Gauls and Britons, and small minorities also lived in the Roman state. These people woke up in the morning, took care of their work, rested, ate, and continued their lives. Some information for those who are wondering what daily life was like in the Roman Empire:
Population density
In the towns and small farms outside the cities, people lived a fairly simple life and lived a life by the business. The daily routine of the people living in the city was very different. Cities such as Rome, Pompeii, Antioch, and Carthage were centers of attraction for people living on small farms and towns, and those who wanted to live a better life came here.
However, not everyone could earn enough to lead a comfortable life, so they were forced to live in the poorer parts of the city. Often those who could not find the job they were looking for were left homeless. There were jobs for the newcomers to the city, but these jobs were very difficult to get. Slaves were often used for physical work, but they also assisted teachers, doctors, surgeons, and architects. Free people, on the other hand, carried out various occupations such as baker, fisherman, or carpenter. Poor women were often engaged in hairdressing, midwifery, or tailoring.
House
As in the farm, the home was the center of daily life in the cities, and for this reason, the first goal of a person who came to the city was to determine the place to live. Since the city of Rome was the capital, land prices were quite high, and many people did not pay much attention to where they would live when they first arrived in the city. They settled in a house of dilapidated apartments called the insulae. The vast majority of Roman citizens lived in these ruins, and not all of them were poor people. In 150 BC, there were 46,000 insulae houses in the city of Rome. Many of these dilapidated dwellings were inhabited by large numbers of people, often resulting in catastrophic situations such as fire, flood, or collapse. The roads leading to these houses were also very narrow and broken, so it was very difficult to escape or bring help in case of disaster. After the great fire, Emperor Nero widened the roads leading to these places and added balconies, making it easier to respond in emergencies. These apartments were usually between five and seven floors, but since these houses were thought to be unsafe, Emperor Augustus and Trajanus prohibited these apartments from being multi-story with the law they enacted, but this law was not very followed.
Poverty in the city was evident because of the person’s lack of education or the clothes one wore. The people living in these ruins mirrored this situation. The floor where the person lived was determined by his income. The ground floors of these apartments were much more comfortable than the top floors. The lower floors were large, spacious, and had different rooms for actions such as eating, sleeping, sitting. The rents of the houses on the lower floors were paid annually, while the rents of the houses on the upper floors were paid daily or weekly. Often a family lived in only one room and had constant fears of being evicted. These floors lacked natural light sources and were hot in summers and cold in winters. There was no water coming into the houses, so there were no toilets inside the houses. Although the first sewer system of the city appeared in the 6th century BC, the people living on the upper floors could not use this system. Those living on the upper floors often threw their garbage from their homes onto the street, so the streets both smelled bad and produced diseases. Few people went out in the evenings, as the crime rate increased. The absence of street lights, the buildings on the verge of collapsing, and the fear of disaster combined made the lives of those living on the upper floors very difficult.
Private villas
Rich people who did not live in villas outside the city lived in houses called domus. These houses were located close to the government house. There was a shop in front of these houses and the owner of the shop was making money from it. There was a courtyard at the back of the shop, where the guests were put on hold, then greeted by the shopkeeper, and business deals were made. There was usually a small temple in this courtyard. The roof of the courtyard was open, and there was a triangular pool on the ground. On rainy days the pool was filled with water and the water here was used in the domus house. On the other side of the courtyard were small rooms called cubiculums and used as bedrooms, libraries, or offices. Domuses also had separate sections for the kitchen and dining room. On the side of the domus, was the family garden.
Family
The basic social unit of the empire, regardless of rich or poor, was the family, and the family’s existence was shaped by the concept of paterfamilias since the early days of the empire. According to this concept, the leader of the house was the man and it was entirely up to him to decide whether everyone in the family lived or died. If the child was ugly, unsure that he was the father, had more than one daughter, or for some other reason, the father might not accept the child. He could sell his children into slavery if he wanted to. However, this full authority of the man over his child would diminish over time and would come to an end later. However, the authority of men over their wives was valid until their death.
The house was ruled by women. When the country was first established, it was forbidden for women to appear alone in public, so women managed the house and educated their children until a private teacher was found. In the last period of the empire, women were allowed to dine with their husbands, go to the baths, and go to the theater, but not at the same time as the men. Later, women were allowed to work as bakers, pharmacists, or tradesmen. Again, in the last period of the empire, women’s rights had advanced and women were allowed to leave their spouses of their own accord.
Food
The meals that the citizens ate were determined according to their economic status. Food availability for poor people was determined by the monthly distribution of grain. For many Roman citizens, the main meal of the day was eaten between four and six o’clock. Breakfast and lunch were served with light snacks or just bread. Since there was no refrigerator, shopping was done daily from horse carts or shops in the streets. Today, none of the foods special to Italian cuisine were present in the early periods of the novel. There were no potatoes, tomatoes, corn, peppers, rice, sugar, oranges, grapefruit, peaches, or apricots. Wealthy citizens used imported spices in their meals, slept on soft pillows, and had slaves serving them. The poor and homeless people, on the other hand, had to eat moldy grains or slurry. Others’ daily foods included grain, bread, vegetables, and olive oil. The meat was quite expensive for the average budget, but sacrifices were made to the gods on special occasions, and since only the internal organs of the victims were used in these rituals, the rest of the meat was sold at affordable prices during these times. The wine was widely consumed. Poor people drank water from public fountains.
Work and leisure
For rich people, the day was divided into working time and leisure time. Working hours were in the morning hours. Most Romans worked six hours a day. They were opening their shops at dawn and closing at noon, but some shops could reopen in the early evening. The city’s forum area was empty in the afternoon because those were the resting hours for everyone. In their spare hours, people were going to the theater or the bathhouse or watching the organized games such as wrestling and chariot races. Poor people could also attend these events because the government thought that these people also needed to have fun.
As the borders of the Roman Empire grew, the Roman influence was seen in cities such as Antioch, Alexandria, Carthage, and Cartagena, and amphitheaters and arenas were built in these places. The city of Pompeii had three public baths, two theatres, an amphitheater, and a basilica. In those days, there were no holidays such as weekends. Emperor Claudius had enacted a law stating that 159 days of vacation would be spent during the year, but Emperor Marcus Aurelius thought that this time was too much and decided to work at least 230 days a year.
Baths
After the work was done and the games were watched, the Roman citizens needed to relax and they provided this relaxation in the baths. Bathing was important to the Romans, with citizens often going to the baths once or twice a week. Baths were used for socializing and sometimes for business dealings. While there were 170 baths in the city of Rome in 33 BC, the number of baths increased to 800 in 400 BC. The more baths an emperor built, the more he was loved. The baths contained a gym, a health center, a swimming pool, and sometimes a brothel for the wealthy. The entrance to the baths was very cheap and it was free on public holidays. There were three different rooms in the baths, the relaxation room called the tepidarium, the hot room called the caldarium, and the cold room called the frigadarium. Slaves were employed to keep the room warm and fulfilled the needs of the wealthy who came to the bathhouse. Roman citizens, who were relaxing in the bath, were going home in the evening and eating their meals.
The daily life of Roman citizens depended entirely on their economic situation. In the city, the rich and the poor could side by side in many places. The rich could use slaves to serve themselves or educate their children. The poor, on the other hand, had no access to education, lived in ruins, and followed the donations.
Historians put forward two theses for the collapse of the Roman empire. Did the empire collapse because of faith or because of barbarian tribes? However, considering that there were too many poor and unemployed people living in the city, the crimes and diseases that emerged were also laying the groundwork for the collapse of the empire.
