KITCHENS AND DINING ROOMS AT POMPEII ... - Get a Free Blog

located at the back of the stove. 119 Charcoal or small pieces of wood were burned between the
supports of the burners, which held pots, grills or spits for cooking the food. 120 These burners
are similar to, but smaller than, hearths of sub-type (2).
The 'hood' is a brick vault that overhangs the stove surface. In the two cases from the
sample, the hood repeats the arch that supports the stove top. In kitchen I.10.7 (11), the arch is
the result of the stove's installation beneath a masonry staircase; it serves to relieve the weight of
the stair (Fig. 5.167). The hood over the stove in caupona IX.2.25 (a) directs the smoke away from
the stove top and into the street via a flue in the wall just underneath the top of the vault (Fig.
2.28). 121
Stoves are the most common permanent cooking installation at Pompeii; it is unclear how
common the type was throughout the rest of the Roman world. At many sites, kitchens are either
not well-enough preserved, or little attention has been paid to their publication. Outside of
Campania, several examples appear in Ostia (in apartments, inns and taverns), Rome, Sperlonga
(the villa of Tiberius), and in Roman houses at Dion in Macedonia and Ephesus in Asia Minor, in
contexts from the first to the fifth centuries A.D. 122 To understand how factors such as climate,
resources and local traditions affect the construction of kitchen installations, a broader study than
this will be needed, one that takes into account variation across the Empire.
Type LO, "Large Oven"
A large oven is a domed structure whose primary function is to bake bread. The oven
was circular, two to three meters in diameter, and constructed of brick-faced masonry, usually
with large blocks of stone framing the opening to the baking chamber. 123 Mayeske identifies two
basic sub-types of large ovens:
Sub-type (1) This is a simple structure of beehive shape, with a single opening at the
front into which the fuel was placed to warm up the baking chamber, and a chimney in front of
or behind the peak of the dome to release the smoke (Fig. 2.29). When the fire had burned out,
119 The best preserved burners are those in kitchen (11) of I.10.7 at Pompeii, where pots, grills and spits were
found in situ. Other examples include: I.7.5 (c), built of imbrices; VII.14.9 (6), and perhaps IX.1.4 (b) (see Fig.
2.25).
120 See Salza Prina Ricotti 1978/80, 242-243. Fulvio 1879, 276-277 is of the opinion that these burners burned
wood only, but there is no evidence to support this hypothesis.
121 Fulvio 1879, 276 lists two other buildings in which 'hoods' for stoves appear that are not in this sample
(VI.7.19; I.3.31).
122 For kitchens in Herculaneum, see Maiuri 1958; for Campanian villas, Ostia and Rome, see Salza Prina
Ricotti 1978/80, and also Salza Prina Ricotti 1987, 117-123. For recent excavations at Dion, see Pandermalis
1989, and for the terrace houses at Ephesus, see Erdemgil et al., n.d., 47-53.
123 Fulvio 1879, 285.
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