Sung, drawn and quartered: the roman ideogram of bread (part 2)

Abstract

The common, round, and quartered loaf of wheat-bread was produced and eaten by all echelons of Roman society. The fundamentality of this segmented loaf to the daily life, industry, and economy of Rome, imbued it with ideogrammic qualities of social balance and stability which have yet to be explored. Part 1 of this paper introduced the development of bread in Roman diets, before an in-depth analysis of its metaphoric characteristics in ancient writing genres. Part 2 investigates how these themes translate visually into the archaeological record, exploring the emblematic use of bread on tombs, altars, frescos, and mosaics throughout the Empire. This two-part paper aims to highlight the allegorical nature of bread beyond dietetics.