The Roman World.

I love the Roman world and have done so since my first Latin lesson as a school boy. The first Latin words I learned were "Roma est magna" (Rome is great) and these words inspired me to know as much as I could about this ancient civilisation that has given us so much and has had a profound influence on our modern world. It could be argued that, today, we are the inheritors of the rich Graeco-Roman-Judeo-Christian traditions, the spread of which was made possible by the expansion of the Roman republic and empire..

I have been fortunate enough to travel throughout the Roman world from Hadrian's Wall in the UK down the Rhine and Danube rivers to the Black sea and on to Ephesus in modern day Turkey. I have seen the wonders of Rome in such places as Arles, Lyon, Glanum in France and also in Spain and Italy. I have visited Rome and marvelled at the Romans' great feats of engineering, temple building, etc. And yet, despite her towering achievements, I have been repulsed by her barbaric cruelty inflicted on those she conquered. Rome was a superpower built on cruel, barbaric slavery where a slave was no more than property to be used and abused as his/her owner saw fit. A slave had no status as a human and was seen simply as a "talking tool".

This is no more apparent than at Pompeii - a place which fascinates me - and I have returned there several times over the years. It is a visible microcosm of the Roman world and how her people lived out their lives. Pompeii was multi-cultural - it had been a Greek city before it was Roman - and here we can glimpse how her residents, patricians, plebeians and slaves lived side by side.

Pictured here is the entrance to a domus (townhouse) in Pompeii. Wealthy Romans obviously lived privately as the only evidence of the existence of this domus is its front entrance. The empty spaces on side of the doorway would, most probably, have been shops, or takeaway food stalls - staffed by slaves - concealing the domus from the public. And yes, the Romans did have fast food outlets as can be seen adjacent to the perimeter of the Pompeiian Forum opposite the baths and public toilets.

The wealthy residents and their household slaves would have lived in relative seclusion free from prying eyes as there were no windows fronting on to the street.

Whenever I wander through the magnificent ruins of Pompeii, I have to confess my thoughts are usually centred on the slaves who lived, served and died there. They were the economic powerhouse that fuelled Rome's ambitions and expansion.

I have found my visits to Pompeii to be poignant! What comes across is how like us the people of Pompeii were. A walk through Pompeii reveals them as real people going about their daily lives much as we do today and  there are so many similarities that connect our two eras.

You can't help but be affected by what happened when Vesuvius erupted on either 24 August AD 79 or 24 October AD 79. There is some debate over which date is accurate. But what can't be denied is the scale of that calamitous event or the terrible loss of life of patricians, plebeians and slaves  - all shared the same horrible fate.

 I walked past a house in which the remains of a badly disabled child - unable to walk and thus to flee - was found lying on a bed covered by the body of an adult man trying to shield him in those final moments. My guide told me it was the boy's father who'd tried to protect him. But I wondered how many slaves also tried to protect their owners in those final minutes before their lives were snuffed out.

In death, both the freemen and slaves of Pompeii were equal!

Picture sourced from the internet: the text is mine.