Sexo, vino y chistes, la vida cotidiana del Imperio - Ep.5 (El Imperio Romano)

Un puñado de monedas, unos fragmentos de cerámicas llamadas Terra Sigillata, algunos huesos de aceitunas carbonizadas, restos de enlucidos decorados... son pequeños fragmentos de la historia que nos muestran cómo eran los romanos, en qué pensaban, dónde compraban, cómo eran sus bares, cómo era la vida de un niño en una ciudad y, en definitiva, cómo era la vida corriente. A menudo los romanos nos dejaron muchos relatos e historias; solo tenemos que acercarnos a aquellos rincones de las grandes urbes romanas y tratar de mirar no solo la grandeza de sus construcciones nobles, sino también los barrios pobres y humildes con bloques de pisos donde se apilaban viviendas minúsculas, las callejuelas angostas donde era complicado transitar a ciertas horas sin ser atracado y los baños públicos donde todos defecaban juntos. Escucha la historia completa en el podcast. Déjanos tu comentario en Ivoox o Spotify, o escríbenos a [e-mail] Comparte nuestro podcast en tus redes sociales, puedes realizar una valoración de 5 estrellas en Apple Podcast o Spotify. Texto: Vicente Barba Colmenero Dirección, locución y producción: Iván Patxi Gómez Gallego Contacto de publicidad en podcast: [e-mail]

Episode Transcript

(00:21):
They give great stories of great history. Presents the Roman Empire, chapter five,

(00:41):
sex, wine and jokes daily lifein the Empire, a text by
Vicente Barba Colmenero said a handful ofcoins, fragments of ceramics called stealth earths,

(01:08):
some bones of charred olives, remainsof the decorated lights. They are
small fragments of history that show uswhat the Romans were like, what they
thought, where they bought, whattheir bars were like, what a child
' s life was like in acity and, ultimately, what ordinary life
was like. The Romans often leftus many stories and stories. We just

(01:40):
have to approach those corners of thegreat Roman cities and try to look not
only at the greatness of their constructions. Noble, but also the poor and
humble neighborhoods, with blocks of flatswhere tiny houses were stacked, the narrow
alleys, where it was difficult totravel at certain hours and without being n
s two, and the public bathroomswhere all defecate together for a Roman anyone.

(02:28):
Among the sixty million anonymous inhabitants ofthe Empire, life was very short.
Limited freedoms and very high economic uncertainty. Paying rent, getting daily food,
not getting sick, and looking forwork must have been the Romans'
greatest concern. It was not thesame living in the countryside as in the

(02:49):
cities. If you were urbanieta,you could shake a host of shops,
taverns, brothels, bathrooms, itwas easy to socialize and enjoy an ample
leisure offer adapted to almost every pocketand you had at your disposal a wide
system of public services, such asbathrooms, fountains and running water. But
the streets of ancient Rome were sonarrow and dangerous that a Roman writer named

(03:14):
Juvenal recommended that his fellow citizens notgo out on the street without you making
a will. The life of aminor was also very complicated. Coming into
the world in a Roman home didnot bode well for a long and prosperous
life. About one third of themdied before the year and half before the

(03:38):
year five. A man' slife expectancy was forty years old and that
of a woman was barely over thirty. Essentially and due to complications in childbirths.
Only seven per cent of the populationexceeded the sixties and reached the octogenarian,
although not impossible, it was certainlya bit of a disappointment. The

(04:09):
great infant mortality was a major problemfor the empire that needed adults willing to
enlist in the army to conquer territoriesand a lot of labor for the great
imperial public works. In this way, in august times, the mothers of
many families began to be rewarded.Roman citizens with more than three children emancipated

(04:31):
from the legal guardianship of their fatheror husband. If they were free or
italic non- Roman, this privilegecost them four children and if they lived
in five provinces. Roman society wasstrongly hierarchical The blocks of houses of Rome

(04:59):
reflected the rough perfection of this socialpyramid. Only on the other hand we
found humble multi- storey brick buildingscalled in sulae, where it was common
to find tents and taverns on theground floor, over which houses were spread
over six or seven floors of height. The richest lived on the ground floor

(05:20):
on spacious and well- decorated floors. As he climbed up the stairs,
overcrowding increased and comforts diminished. Urbanslaves slowly lacked their own and used to
sleep in the corridors directly on theground. Rents were renewed every six months
and during those days it was commonto see evicted families sleeping on the street.

(05:49):
The precariousness was enormous in the countryside. A single bad harvest threatened the
survival of the peasants instead, inthe cities, unemployment and temporary jobs were
on the agenda. For the Romanelite working was in bad taste. However,

(06:10):
artisans, midwives, carpenters, soldiers, bakers were proud of their trades
to the point that they used tobrag about them on their funeral tombstones.
The salary of a pawn or aday laborer was not enough to feed a
family of four, so women andchildren worked to round up income. Most

(06:32):
men did so in the construction ofthe great public works of the Empire.
For example, caracalla thermal baths employedabout ten zero workers for four to five
years. The degree of personal autonomyof the average Roman was very limited.

(06:56):
Not even in the free were theyat all. Formally, a male reached
the age of majority in adolescence whenhe wore the beryl robe, but remained
subject to the parental authority until thelatter died. In the meantime, he
could not manage his own estate ordecide who to marry. Even if she

(07:17):
was already a forty- year-old, a woman always depended on a
legal guardian, who could be herhusband, her father- in- law,
her father or his death, anyother relative. Man could only aspire
to emancipate himself if he was amother of a large family, and this

(07:38):
affected even the upper classes over theworld or n. The rental business in
Rome was very lucrative. The populationgrew so much that it would be put

(08:00):
to live for rent in one ofthe thousands of blocks of flats that were
built throughout the city. The streetsof the cities were full of publicity,
walls and walls. We could findelection slogans, gladiator combat posters and rental
housing advertisements. Without a doubt,those who wrote these practical messages expected a

(08:22):
good number of people to understand them, but the vast majority of the Roman
population were literate. The owners ofthese blocks of flats were aristocrats and it
is estimated that at the time ofAugust, Rome became home to a million

(08:43):
inhabitants. Providing accommodation for a constantlyincreasing population was made possible by a highly
developed rental housing market. Among themillion people living in Rome were seven hundred
and fifty- zero mild plebeians fromone hundred thousand to two hundred thousand slaves
and about twenty- nine more,among soldiers, knights and the families of

(09:07):
about three hundred senators. Social inequalitiescreated a Rome with a minority of renters
and a large mass of tenants.Therefore, the rental market in Rome was
very profitable and renewed every year.The contracts entered into force on 1 July
and were paid by year. Afterthat date, what remained unrented fell in

(09:31):
price. As the tenant was toallow access to the administrator. It is
likely that, except in contracts signedfor several years, every June new potential
tenants visit the house, a skillfulstrategy to pressure the resident and try to

(09:54):
raise the rent already juvenal face.He says that in neighboring cities you buy
a comfortable house for the price forwhich in Rome you rent a dump for
a year at the end of June. The transfer of those who moved and
who left without paying the rent hadto be incessant in the streets. In

(10:26):
ancient Rome was lived in the streets, The rooms of the floor blocks were
only used for sleeping and public serviceswere distributed throughout the city. If you
wanted to eat water, wash upthe toilet, you had to leave the
house and go to the public latrines. According to one paper, in the

(10:48):
centre of Rome there were one hundredand forty- four public toilets. They
were all very similar. A largeroom with a bench running with holes in
which the butts fit, as theneeds were made in common. The Romans
were very fond of public toilets andnot only went to wash. According to

(11:11):
some writings, they were noisy andnoisy places filled with people who practiced exercises,
ate, shaved each other, massaged, casual sex, and it was
easy to get gonorrhea. Baths wereplaces they did not understand from social strata.

(11:35):
We could find any character in them. Even Emperor Trajan once went to
this type of public toilet and wassurprised to see people rubbing their backs against
the wall for not having slaves tohelp them in that task. And now

(11:56):
let' s talk about shows andparties. Although the rural Roma were working
from sun to sun, in theurban centres the working day did not exceed
six hours. Most shops closed shortlyafter noon. At the time of Claudius

(12:18):
there were one hundred and fifty-nine public holidays. The Roman urbanites had
a wide range of entertainment to takeadvantage of that free time and some entertainments
were free, such as theatre,games and car racing. The games of
shows were the great fun of theRomans and were held in the circus halls

(12:43):
with oval shape with a central separationthat divided in two lanes the sand,
thus forming the race track. Thesebuildings were the largest. The maximum circus
in Rome could accommodate up to threehundred and zero spectators. There the races
of cars were practiced with different modalities, with two horses were called vegas,

(13:07):
with three trigas and with four quadrigas, which were undoubtedly the most spectacular.
These entertainments were extremely dangerous, bothfor the origa and for the horse.
The accidents of the participants, whosuffered serious injuries and even death, were

(13:28):
very common. Theatre shows in Romewere of great importance because of Hellenistic influence.
Initially the enclosures used for theatrical performanceswere temporary or improvised. But in
the fifty- fifth year, beforeChrist, the Pompey Theatre was built,

(13:52):
the first stone theatre that could houseup to twenty- zero spectators. The
orchestra of s was semicircular, whilein Greek theatres it was circular. Some
of these theaters, built all overthe Empire, had incredible acoustics. But
in addition, the Romans, mastersof engineering, built the theaters using arches,

(14:16):
vaults and semicircular galleries that communicated wellall the spaces of the enclosure.
But without a doubt, the showsthey liked most were gladiators' fights.
We can say that the Colosseum ofRome was the palace of the people,

(14:41):
a colossal work so that the walkingRomans could enjoy the most incredible battles,
where the power of the empire couldexpose and show fantastic shows with strange and
exotic creatures brought from all over,comparing it with a football match. Every
show at the Colosseum of Rome wouldbe the World Cup. The most important

(15:07):
characters in this show were undoubtedly thefamous gladiators. They dressed strangely with incredible
helmets and heavy armor to fight.Most of them were foreigners, coming from
the most remote provinces of the empire, Hispanic Asian Egyptians wearing what we might

(15:30):
consider to be costumes designed to symbolizethe outside world of the provinces and the
exoticism and diversity of the empire representeda violent fantasy of the Roman outside world.
At first, these fights were ashow, a farce of wrestling,
and it was very rare for fightersto die, as they were highly priced,

(15:52):
like a top- notch football playertoday. Then yes, there were
victims and now we will be interestedin Roman fashion. In Rome, the

(16:15):
dress, in addition to being asocial symbol, showed us the status and
position of a character. Seeing aRoman only by his garment, one could
know in a matter of second whetherhe was rich, poor foreigner, whether
he was a common citizen or helda public office and even among the rich,
we could know whether he belonged tothe elite or simply what we would

(16:38):
call a new rich. Wool wasthe most used and common type of material
to make the garments, given theirabundance, low cost and easy handling,
but depending on the purchasing power ofpeople, the garments could also be of

(16:59):
something or gift linen or silk.Tasteful patrician women used almost exclusively silk for
their chitons or robes. Leather wasalso used, especially in footwear and to
reinforce different types of garments with slatsof such material. The decorations on the

(17:25):
garments were an important point in definingthe taste of the Romans. There was
no shortage of pearl ornaments, whichwere widely used to decorate from the brooches
in the robes to sandals or shoes. Gold and silver in the form of
threads were another of the avalaries usedin numerous garments. The most wealthy people

(17:48):
usually wore garments with delicate patterns,sewn, with fine, gold or silver
threads. Different types of paints wereused to color clothes. The very expensive
purple obtained from molluscs and considered ofexquisite taste, was intended exclusively to decorate

(18:08):
garments that only a few could afford. The selection and variety of clothing was
wide and versatile, ranging from robesand robes to layers and hoods, such
as the paenula. It was alsocommon to find Romans with hats and ornaments

(18:32):
of all kinds in the HORSE theunderwear. It was also common as the
Latin subligaculum tying below, which wasa kind of short short formed by a
strip of leather or linen worn byboth men and women. Under the robe
he wrapped himself between his thighs andtied himself to his waist. Today,

(19:04):
when we think of ancient Rome,what we see is a city with ruins,
amphitheaters, colossal, marble temples,a world of emperors, armies,
gladiators fighting beasts. Rome was thefirst global city and, like any macrocity,
possessed endless contradictions. It was adiverse city, but not tolerant.

(19:26):
Enemy foreigners were enslaved and forced tofight in the sand of the Colosseum,
but other foreigners were destined to begreat emperors regardless of where you came from.
In Rome you could reinvent yourself.There was such social diversity that while

(19:49):
some went through hardships of poverty anddid not know how to pay the rent.
Others gained benefits and successes. Adisconcerting mix of ideas and religions was
observed in any of this city's rhinos. It was what we would
say today in a cosmopolitan city fullof stories. It is surprising the Romans

(20:18):
' eagerness to tell us their stories, to tell us what they were like,
what they were dedicated to, whattheir concerns were and all this is
found in their funeral tombstones. Thanksto them we can know their lives,
see their faces looking at us,greet us and tell us what they were

(20:40):
called, with whom they lived,to whom they loved their tastes and what
they dedicated themselves to. But whatthey really tell us is that everyday life
in Ancient Rome was as wonderfully chaoticand emotional as ours today. Thanks for

(21:11):
listening to you, thanks for sharingour content on your social networks until the next podcast