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The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

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Re: The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

#21

The Celtic feasts that the Roman banquets displaced were just the same as what's described in the title: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power. Putting on feasts have always been a way for the wealthy to display their wealth and power, to curry favor with their underlings and to give others the opportunity to do so with them. They are also a way for a community to bond together over food, whether hierarchical…

We forget the practicality of eating. A feast was the one time most people would ever feel full. For the romans, those in the city of Rome, it may have been display. For many of the celts a feast was precious calories. By feeding, the lord may well have been keeping his people alive. For soneone sick and under-fed (everyone) a single big meal ever month or two would be the difference life or death. They saw attendenc…

I don’t think this was the case for Rome. The republic and the empire had officials whose job was to make sure that Rome had enough food. Also by this time, the Public grain dole was important and would later expand to include meat and wine.

Re: The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

#22
post #9

For anyone interested, may I recommend the History or Rome podcast. At over 150 episodes, each running roughly 25 minutes, the listener is taken from the city's founding by Romulus to the end of the empire at the hands of the Germans. https://thehistoryofrome.typepad.com

As a listener to this podcast, I have to say that your characterization of end of the empire "at the hands of the Germans" is a just bit of an oversimplification.

I'm sure. I'm not even half way through. I was just trying to come up with a single sentence that would coax some people into subscribing.

Re: The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

#23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the Romans, those in the city of Rome, it may have been display. For many of the Celts a feast was precious calories. Going by the information in one of Terry Gilliam's documentaries on the ancient world, for many of the Romans, it was somewhat the same as for many of the Celts. Many city dwelling roman citizens didn't have extravagant diets, and might well have been satisfied in macro-nutrients, but lacking in o…

This is a preposterous claim. Neither Roman nor Celtic peasantry existed in a state of perpetual famine. There was certainly the occasional period of inflation and/or famine, but the norm was absolutely for pretty much everybody to be well-fed. They were certainly not malnourished, either. Yes, they had simple diets, but not bad ones.

This is one of the benefits of an agrarian economy. For example in the rural South during the great depression, virtually everyone was dirt poor, but almost nobody went hungry. Of course that meant eating squirrel, crow, possum, and such, plus garden vegetables.

Re: The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

#24
post #3

Here's a quote about Mark Antony from "Caesar, Life of a Colossus" by Adrian Goldsworthy. Good book. "Antony returned to Italy after Pharsalus and was effectively the supreme authority there from January 47 BC until Caesar's return in the autumn. He was a gifted subordinate, but his behaviour became less and less restrained during these months when he was largely left to his own devices. He feasted often, both lavish…

I've seen only clips but HBOs Rome series had an actor who played Mark Anthony (James Purefoy)...kinda like that.

Re: The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

#26
When rich people invite beyonce to perform at their daughters bat mitzvah, or wedding, or fly everyone to dubai and give them a rose-coloured diamond, is this really any different?

I mean (I guess) is there any substantive difference between conspicuous consumption like this, and what the 0.01% do nowadays?

Re: The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

#27

The Celtic feasts that the Roman banquets displaced were just the same as what's described in the title: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power. Putting on feasts have always been a way for the wealthy to display their wealth and power, to curry favor with their underlings and to give others the opportunity to do so with them. They are also a way for a community to bond together over food, whether hierarchical…

We forget the practicality of eating. A feast was the one time most people would ever feel full. For the romans, those in the city of Rome, it may have been display. For many of the celts a feast was precious calories. By feeding, the lord may well have been keeping his people alive. For soneone sick and under-fed (everyone) a single big meal ever month or two would be the difference life or death. They saw attendenc…

The Celts and Germans ate much better than the average Roman. The Germans during Arminius’ period were up to a foot taller than the Romans. Some of that is genetic but most of it was better diet. The average Italian was a peasant who ate grain, grain and more grain, like most peasants. The Germans (and Celts) were at least as much pastoralists as agriculturalists and they are much more dairy and meat.

The only groups of people that often see stunting in growth are farmers at the Malthusian margin. Hunter gatherers and pastoralists either starve or kill each other quickly enough that you don’t see the kind of years long periods of insufficient calories that don’t actually kill you that are common in peasant societies. Pastoralists always and everywhere raid, skirmish and steal each other’s livestock. They’re preadapted to warfare because of mobility and once they get horses basically all adult men are cavalry, in cases like the Huns, Mongols and Scythians. Even people without too many horses but who live and die by cattle are far more mobile than grain farmers.

Re: The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

#28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the Romans, those in the city of Rome, it may have been display. For many of the Celts a feast was precious calories. Going by the information in one of Terry Gilliam's documentaries on the ancient world, for many of the Romans, it was somewhat the same as for many of the Celts. Many city dwelling roman citizens didn't have extravagant diets, and might well have been satisfied in macro-nutrients, but lacking in o…

This is a preposterous claim. Neither Roman nor Celtic peasantry existed in a state of perpetual famine. There was certainly the occasional period of inflation and/or famine, but the norm was absolutely for pretty much everybody to be well-fed. They were certainly not malnourished, either. Yes, they had simple diets, but not bad ones.

In 1914 the U.K. had been the second richest economy in the world for over a hundred years. Nonetheless approaching a third of the male population eligible for conscription were in poor enough health that they were deemed unusable in war. The average American was a foot taller than the average Briton. The members of the House of Lords were noticeably taller than the members of the House of Commons, some of whom, presumably, had had long periods of poor nutrition in their lives.

The norm was not perpetual famine but neither was the average peasant well fed except in transitory times of abundance. Normally the nobility and urban patriciate and cash rich populations like successful merchants would survive famines just fine though food would get more expensive. For the mass of the population lean years where the old, sick or young would die for lack of food would be every five years if they were lucky and about every thirty years a tenth to a third of the population would die in a famine.

The unusual thing about the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s wasn’t that 1/4 of the population died; it was that that was the last time it happened. Famines were so unremarkable before the 1800s, even in Western Europe, that we often need to do archival detective work to figure out they happened. Do we see more people buried in paupers’ graves at this time? Do tree ring data suggest unusually harsh weather? Did grain prices rise? The literate classes weren’t indifferent to the suffering of those on the Malthusian margin of survival but large portions of the population dying of starvation every so often was normal.

Re: The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

#29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a preposterous claim. Neither Roman nor Celtic peasantry existed in a state of perpetual famine. There was certainly the occasional period of inflation and/or famine, but the norm was absolutely for pretty much everybody to be well-fed. They were certainly not malnourished, either. Yes, they had simple diets, but not bad ones.

In 1914 the U.K. had been the second richest economy in the world for over a hundred years. Nonetheless approaching a third of the male population eligible for conscription were in poor enough health that they were deemed unusable in war. The average American was a foot taller than the average Briton. The members of the House of Lords were noticeably taller than the members of the House of Commons, some of whom, pres…

The late 1800s and early 1900s were notoriously terrible in UK and the literal shrinking and weakening of the population due to their diet is documented over time - and it was actually due to increasing trade, industrialization, and globalization. Beforehand things were much better. The expansion of available foods made things much worse.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2672390/

> The fall in nutritional standards between 1880 and 1900 was so marked that the generations were visibly and progressively shrinking. In 1883 the infantry were forced to lower the minimum height for recruits from 5ft 6 inches to 5ft 3 inches. This was because most new recruits were now coming from an urban background instead of the traditional rural background (the 1881 census showed that over three-quarters of the population now lived in towns and cities). Factors such as a lack of sunlight in urban slums (which led to rickets due to Vitamin D deficiency) had already reduced the height of young male volunteers. Lack of sunlight, however, could not have been the sole critical factor in the next height reduction, a mere 18 years later. By this time, clean air legislation had markedly improved urban sunlight levels; but unfortunately, the supposed ‘improvements’ in dietary intake resulting from imported foods had had time to take effect on the 16–18 year old cohort. It might be expected that the infantry would be able to raise the minimum height requirement back to 5ft. 6 inches. Instead, they were forced to reduce it still further, to a mere 5ft. British officers, who were from the middle and upper classes and not yet exposed to more than the occasional treats of canned produce, were far better fed in terms of their intake of fresh foods and were now on average a full head taller than their malnourished and sickly men.

Times of famine were not extraordinarily rare. But I'd be very skeptical of the numbers you're providing. Famines where a lot of people start dying become revolutions and migrations. The Irish Potato Famine was a very exceptional famine in terms of numbers - but it wasn't that 25% of the population died, it's that 25% of the population died or left - there were about even numbers for both. The situation was also greatly worsened by the political situation, which did have major consequent political effects. Large famines are easier to track because of this.

I'm extremely skeptical of your numbers in general. Certainly people always starved: urbanites and social outcasts were at higher risk. What marginal increase are you declaring a famine? Even the 'severe' famine periodicity you mention seems very hard to support among any population groups and historical periods I know about. It's probably true in periods of extreme upset, but not in normal times, and in most stable societies food surpluses were stockpiled and preserved to hedge against such things.

Re: The Lavish Roman Banquet: A Calculated Display Of Debauchery And Power

#30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We forget the practicality of eating. A feast was the one time most people would ever feel full. For the romans, those in the city of Rome, it may have been display. For many of the celts a feast was precious calories. By feeding, the lord may well have been keeping his people alive. For soneone sick and under-fed (everyone) a single big meal ever month or two would be the difference life or death. They saw attendenc…

For the Romans, those in the city of Rome, it may have been display. For many of the Celts a feast was precious calories. Going by the information in one of Terry Gilliam's documentaries on the ancient world, for many of the Romans, it was somewhat the same as for many of the Celts. Many city dwelling roman citizens didn't have extravagant diets, and might well have been satisfied in macro-nutrients, but lacking in o…

The Celts weren’t poor. They were living in one of the great fertile lands of the world.
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