مرکز منطقه ای اطلاع رساني علوم و فناوري

Abstract :

Three questions form the main thema of this study which concerns the eating customs of Roman emperors. Firstly, what did the emperors eat? Secondly, what was their desire for food? Thirdly, what was their attitude and behaviour during the meal, what did the emperor’s meals cost the empire? This topic was chosen in order to examine how much difference occurs in the matter and manner of what is eaten, and in the economic, social and environmental consequences, by the way of investigating the nature of the links between styles of eating and what was eaten, and the management of the Empire by a particular emperor. Sources for this can be found in Suetonius’s biographic work De Vita Duodecem Caesaribus, Cassius Dio’s Rhomaica, Tacitus’s Historiae and Annales. Suetonius’s work includes the emperors between Caesar and Domitianus. Cassius Dio’s work ends in the reign of Alexander Severus, while Tacitus reports on the Iulius-Claudius and Flavius dynasties. An anonymous work, the Scriptores Historiae Augustae (SHA) fills in the chronological lacuna in these works. At the conclusion of this study it was found that those emperors who lived lives of lavish luxury and had extraordinary habits exhibited weakness in the management of affairs, while those who were more frugal were more sensitive