 |
|
|
THE LATEST PROGRAMME |
|
|
|
|
Using contemporary accounts from all levels of society, from the chattering classes to humble foot-soldiers, from senators to slaves, The Roman Way explores different aspects of everyday life, two millennia ago.
|
|
|
|
|
Filling the Day
We have an image of Roman citizens living in spacious villas, the floors and walls decorated with mosaics, and with courtyards and fountains. In fact, the vast majority of urban people lived in cramped and dingy flats, paying rent on a daily basis to landlords who cared not a jot for their welfare, and paid scant attention to the structural integrity of their own properties.
|
Wall painting of Ulysses and the Sirens, from a villa at Pompeii
picture copyright The British Museum
From the morning visit to one's patrons, to the afternoon baths, how did Romans, both rich and poor, spend their days? What were the working hours of the lower orders and, though there was no such thing as a weekend, what sort of free time did they have? And what did they do with it?
|
Painted roundel with portraits, from a villa at Pompeii
picture copyright The British Museum |
The Romans had interior design fads and polite dinner-parties, but were feasts and orgies as commonplace an occurrence as legend insists, and what were the dining rooms like?
And, though pretty well everyone went to the baths at some point in the day, the whole business involved a great deal more than just washing.
Further reading
Peter Jones
An Intelligent Person's Guide to Classics
Duckworth
P Jones & K Sidwell
The World of Rome
Cambridge 1997
Jerome Carcopino
Daily Life in Ancient Rome
Penguin
Fergus Millar
The Roman Empire and Its Neighbours
Duckworth
Anthony Birley
Garrison Life at Vindolanda - A Band of Brothers
Tempus
Pliny (tr) Betty Radice
The Letters of the Younger Pliny
Penguin Classics
Marcus Aurelius (tr) Maxwell Staniforth
Meditations
Penguin Classics
Seneca (tr) Robin Campbell
Letters from a Stoic
Penguin Classics
Tim Cornell & John Matthews
Atlas of the Roman World
New York: Facts on File c1982
|
|
|
|
Listen to the programme 3 
