A Cabinet of Roman CuriositiesA Cabinet of Roman Curiosities

"Greater than the Iliad."---Sextus Propertius (on Vergil's Aeneid)

"A Fair Exchange for a Kangaroo"---King Ferdinand of the Two Sicilies (on the Herculaneum papyri)

"Such a Sublime Masterpiece will not Perish Till the Final Day Gives the Whole World Over to Destruction."---Publius Ovidius Naso (on Lucretius's On the Nature of Things)

"A Must for all Libraries."---The Emperor Tacitus (on the works of the historian Tacitus)

"Without this Fundamental Study, the Romans Theemselves Would Wander Like Strangers Through the Streets of Rome."---Marcus Tullius Cicero (on Varro's Roman, Antiquities)

"A Monument More Lasting than Bronze, Loftier than the Regal Pyramids; Neither Gnawing Rain Nor the Raging North Wind Nor the Countless Series of Years Nor the Flight of Time Could Bringit to Ruin."

We Know far More about the Romans than about any other ancient Western society. But what we know is sometimes bizarre, and hardly fits the conventional view of the Romans as a pragmatic people with a ruthlessly efficient army, an exemplary legal system, and a precise and logical language.

A Cabinet of Roman Curiosities is a serendipitous collection of odd facts and outlandish opinions, carefully gleaned from the wide body of evidence left to us by the Romans themselves. Each fact or opinion highlights a unique and curious feature of life in ancient Rome. Readers will find a cornucopia of fascinating particulars about Rome, from the fantastical (a description of werewolves) to the quotidian (styles of chamber pots), and from the refined (dining etiquette of Pompeians) to the vulgar (brothel graffiti). Classicist J. C. McKeown has organized the entries around major themes---e.g., The Army, Women, Education, Foreigners, Spectacles, etc.---making the book easily accessible for quick browsing or for more deliberate consumption. Throughout, the purpose of the enterprise is to amuse and to stimulate an interest in the ancient world's most remarkable and abundantly documented civilization.
Here is a whimsical and captivating collection of odd facts, strange beliefs, outlandish opinions, and other highly amusing trivia of the ancient Romans. We tend to think of the Romans as a pragmatic people with a ruthlessly efficient army, an exemplary legal system, and a precise and elegant language. A Cabinet of Roman Curiosities shows that the Romans were equally capable of bizarre superstitions, logic-defying customs, and often hilariously derisive views of their fellow Romans and non-Romans.
Classicist J. C. McKeown has organized the entries in this entertaining volume around major themes--The Army, Women, Religion and Superstition, Family Life, Medicine, Slaves, Spectacles--allowing for quick browsing or more deliberate consumption. Among the book's many gems are:


? Romans on urban living:
The satirist Juvenal lists "fires, falling buildings, and poets reciting in August as hazards to life in Rome."

? On enhanced interrogation:
"If we are obliged to take evidence from an arena-fighter or some other such person, his testimony is not to be believed unless given under torture." (Justinian)

? On dreams:
Dreaming of eating books "foretells advantage to teachers, lecturers, and anyone who earns his livelihood from books, but for everyone else it means sudden death"

? On food:
"When people unwittingly eat human flesh, served by unscrupulous restaurant owners and other such people, the similarity to pork is often noted." (Galen)

? On marriage:
In ancient Rome a marriage could be arranged even when the parties were absent, so long as they knew of the arrangement, "or agreed to it subsequently."

? On health care:
Pliny caustically described medical bills as a "down payment on death," and Martial quipped that "Diaulus used to be a doctor, now he's a mortician. He does as a mortician what he did as a doctor."

For anyone seeking an inglorious glimpse at the underside of the greatest empire in history, A Cabinet of Roman Curiosities offers endless delights.