Elizabeth Drakes's Site

Fantasy Romance

You are here: Home / Blog

Blog

Research: Food in Ancient Rome

by

I have mentioned before that the backdrop for my fantasy story is grounded more in ancient Rome that more traditional medieval Europe.

RomanFoodTable
Bread. Wine. Fruit. Not much has changed in 3,000 years.

One of the areas I spent some time researching was food. As it happens, the scale of food production would not achieve the same levels in ancient Rome in Europe again until the 18th century. So they were quite advanced on this. Here are a few other things I learned.

Meals

Most people, even slaves, ate three meals a day at similar times to modern breakfast, lunch and dinner. While originally lunch was their largest meal of the day, it would eventually move to supper.

Cooking

Cooking was considered an art, and particularly fine cooking was associated with tasty and unique sauces. It was not uncommon to find wine, oils, vinegar, herbs, spices, and meat or fish juices mixed together to create these sauces. Much of this is known because books were dedicated to these recipes.

Available Foods

  • Cereals – wheat, barley, oats, rye, and millet.
  • Fruits – Apples, figs, grapes, pears, plums, dates, cherries and peaches. The Romans knew how to dry these to preserve their shelf life.
  • Vegetables – Legumes, lentils and peas, were the most common, all of which provided an excellent source of protein and was frequently mixed into bread. Other vegetables included asparagus, mushroom, turnips, onions, cucumbers, artichokes, and lettuce.
  • Olives and Olive Oil – These were so important in ancient Rome that they had their own classification.
  • Meat – This was expensive in ancient Rome and was commonly prepared in small cuts or as sausages. Almost any sort of bird imaginable from quails and pheasants to ostriches and peacocks were served. Most meat we are familiar with today was also on the Roman aristocrat’s table, including pork, veal, mutton, goat, boar and deer.
  • Seafood – Fish was certainly a part of their diet, but supply was irregular. Preservation techniques kept it a useful addition of protein to the Roman diet, and fish and shellfish were even farmed on artificial ponds. Fish sauce (garum) was an extremely popular method of flavoring.
  • Spices – (literally means valuable exotic commodity) were a huge part of good cooking. No fewer than 142 different spices have been identified to date in ancient sources. Some were grown nearby, others imported. This was a huge and sprawling empire, and they were trading with India and Asia.
  • Wine – Wine was served with most meals, frequently watered and flavored with honey. Beer was not served in Rome, and was only found in the northern part of the Roman Empire.

Food Conservation

They were adept at food conservation, and mastered numerous techniques.

  • Fruit and Vegetables were picked in brine or vinegar or stored in honey, wine, or grape juice. Fruits were also dried.
  • Meat was salted, dried, smoked, cured, pickled and preserved in honey

This made sure they could feed their large population and allowed more specialization

Feeding the Poor

Maintaining a regular food supply was very important. There was actually a part of the Roman bureaucracy dedicated to overseeing the regular supply of foodstuffs. In addition, the Romans established a monthly quota of grain at a fixed reasonable price for citizens. Olive oil, pork and wine were also allocated to poorer citizens.

I was surprised doing the research how much closer the ancient Roman diet was to our modern diet than medieval Europe. Now, about clan water…

Writing: Why Vacations Are No Longer “Catch-Up Time”

by

We just recently got back from vacation. Once upon a time, a vacation from work was a relaxing time, a time I could catch up on my writing, maybe even get a little bit ahead. We’d have things planned, of course, and spontaneous things would come up, but there always seemed to be plenty of time to get in a few thousand more words.

Then we had kids.

familyvacation
And I have to people. *shudders*

 

I had thought the four day weekend we had for the Fourth of July or the week of vacation we took would give me some time to work on my writing and maybe do a few other things like update my mailing list. We had quite a bit of time after all. Sure, we had things planned, like a small cook-out with close family and a larger graduation party for my niece. I already had the food planned, and I had selected tasty things with minimal prep. The gift was already purchased. And yes, we were taking the kids to a water park. Wait, what do you mean my expectations weren’t realistic?

But I hadn’t figured that one or the other of my children would want to snuggle the entire vacation. And by snuggle, I mean never leave my side. Even in ninety degree weather.

parentspersonalspace
Can we be any closer, momma?

While this is a gift, and I like snuggling them, by day two, I am getting a bit annoyed. Snuggling literally means they sit on me. Both of them. At the same time. While still cute, they are a lot bigger and heavier than they were. And they squirm. And wriggle. And try to steal more real estate on my lap from each other until they both get tossed off.

And there comes a point where I simply want my space back.

And writing does not happen when there is snuggling. Most of the time, writing doesn’t happen when they are awake and in the house. My oldest one is an avid reader, and despite her age, she can and will read over my shoulder as I am typing. Yeah, not cool, especially if I am “in the zone” and don’t see her right away as I don’t write “closed door” romance.

Reading doesn’t usually happen, either. I don’t read “closed door” romance, either.

MomVacationReading

While I wouldn’t trade these days for the world, I do need to adjust my expectations.

Vacation doesn’t mean what it used to, and if I still want time to write every day, I am going to have to get up at 5am like it’s a work day.

Not that I want to get up at 5am. If left to my own devices, I wouldn’t go to bed until well after midnight then sleep in every morning. But that hasn’t been my life since college. The one and only time my natural sleep cycle meshed with my obligations.

I wish I were a morning person.

Serial Micro Fiction: Redemption

by

OneShotRedemption.jpg

Knight Makayla stared at the strange man.

She could sense the darkness within him, but he was more than a revenant or draugr. Much more.

And she had been in the eastern provinces too long to turn down the aid of someone as skilled as him.

Someone who had already saved her life.

Someone who sought redemption.

“I am Knight Makayla, and I accept your pledge.”

3 Myths About Swords You Probably Believe

by

I talked about armor here, but there’s also a lot of misconceptions about swords. Especially if you play RPGs or watch the History Channel.

 

3 Myths About Swords You Probably Believe

 

1. Swords of the Middle Ages Were Very Heavy

Many of us have played an RPG (role-playing game) in our time, whether in video game form or tabletop. This means we’ve seen the stats on weapons and had to make sure our warrior or paladin was strong enough to wield them.  While strength was important, the weights in these games and quoted on the History Channel may have been there more for game balance than representing fact.

Not exactly like what you see in RPGs, but far more accurate.

Truth: According to the Wallace Collection Museum in London that has dozens of actual swords from the Middle Ages, you’ll be hard-pressed to find any that weighed more than four pounds. Most weighed less than three. Even the large “hand-and-a-half” swords rarely weighed more than 4.5 pounds. Large parade swords only weighed up to eight or nine pounds, but their blunt edges should be a clear sign they weren’t meant for combat.

All of these swords would be easily handled by a man who’d been training with them since the age of seven.

Some of this misconception may come from producing replica swords which are not made the same way they were in the middle ages or with the same materials. Still, it wouldn’t have taken more than a trip to a museum to prove this.

 

2. Swords of the Middle Ages Were Clumsy

In a fencing booklet from 1746, the author talked about how heavy and unwieldy earlier swords were and stated they were designed for brute force. I can’t exclusively blame the Victorians for this one, though in the 1870s, a historian described earlier weapons as ponderous and requiring both hands.

Better for a video game than real life.

Truth: The weapons of the Middle Ages were light, strong, and well-designed. They were agile weapons designed to kill, and they did a fine job of it. They were not clumsy or heavy. They were not “clubs with edges”. Of course they weren’t. Men had been fighting with swords for thousands of years. Improvements were made along the way. Materials got better, and so did forging techniques. Guns would eventually change warfare, but not for a long time, and when it comes to survival, humans are remarkably inventive.

 

3. Swords of the Middle Ages Were Prone to Breaking

Again, not sure where this came from, unless a scholar was holding a 500 year-old sword that had grown brittle with time. Swords did not regularly break in battle. Seriously. If they did, that army would’ve lost, and you can guarantee the victor wouldn’t have adopted their shoddy forging techniques.

When you step back and look at this logically, of course it makes sense that knights and soldiers of the Middle Ages had finely-crafted blades that were light, sturdy and agile. War tends to bring about inventiveness as nothing drives innovation like survival. And the funding from kings and emperors didn’t hurt, either.

 

While video games may show us a visually appealing truth, and RPGs struggle with game balance, the truth about knights, swords and armor doesn’t change. Armor was practical and effective. So were swords. Important things for me as a writer to know, though I wonder if it will be disappointing or unbelievable to see the mundane truth in my work. Something for me to consider.

 Any other myths about the European middle ages out there we all take for granted?

Six Lies about Armor You Probably Believe

by

There are lots of myths that surround knights. Many of their stories have turned into legends, and even now, fantasy is its own genre with its own stories.

knight
I can hear Excalibur calling.

While an author can make up just about any rules for their world if they’re willing to follow them, my stories are loosely based on medieval Europe and Ancient Rome. As such, I do a fair amount of research.

As such, I have learned a great deal of things I thought were true simply weren’t.

Six Lies about Armor You Probably Believe

 

1. Men in armor had to be hoisted into their saddles with a crane.

This is absolutely wrong, and people have proven it by wearing period appropriate pieces and mounting a horse without help. My guess is this misconception was started when a scholar lifted the armor a knight wore. Possibly a Victorian scholar as they seem to frequently be at the root of historical misconceptions. Either way, it makes no sense for a knight to wear something into battle that would make it cumbersome to get on his horse. Being mounted was one of the tactical advantages a knight brought over a foot soldier.

2. Men in armor struggled to move.

Actually, a trained combatant, particularly a knight, had no trouble wearing and moving in a full suit of armor. An entire suit of “heavy” armor weighed between 45-55 pounds. This is less than a fireman carries with oxygen gear, and less than what most men have been carrying into battle since the nineteenth century. Furthermore, this armor was evenly spread across the body, rather than being concentrated on the chest as most modern gear is.

3. Plate armor made moving even harder.

Plate armor didn’t impair movement much at all as it was made up of individual elements for each limb, and each of these were linked by movable rivets and leather straps, allowing for unimpaired movement. A man in full plate armor could run, get up off the ground, and mount his horse without help. To put it in perspective, the French knight Maréchal Boucicault, while in full armor, climbed up the underside of a ladder using only his hands.

knightmeme
Men trained most of their lives to become knights.

4. Only knights wore armor.

Nope, lots of people wore armor. This was war, and most soldiers had some pieces of armor. It’s quality varied greatly, but even foot soldiers had it and wore it.

5. Only men wore armor.

Some interesting stuff is coming out of new grave sites now that we have DNA testing and can use science to prove the occupants are women. Those shield maiden stories appear to be more than just stories. There is also evidence of noble ladies-turned-military commanders, such as Countess Jeanne de Penthièvre (1319–1384). It might not have been common in medieval Europe, but we really don’t know.

viking
I wouldn’t cross her.

6. Armor was so expensive only princes and the very wealthy could afford it.

Again, not true. Even a common foot soldier had some armor. This idea may come from the pieces displayed in museums. And while it could be extremely expensive (an entire armory of an English knight was the equivalent to about five to eight years of rent for a London merchant’s house, or over three years’ worth of wages for a skilled laborer), not all pieces were. Some could be had for much less, depending on quality. This also does not consider how much armor was taken from the battlefield.

 

Lots of misconceptions abound, as I learned with swords. Hopefully, this helped clear up a few about armor.