Talk:Agriculture in ancient Rome

Note:Farming in Ancient Rome was merged into this article; see Talk:Farming in Ancient Rome for old talk page.

Comments
Like Steven said, this is a really broad topic, I like the sections you broke it down into. I also noticed some typos (a bunch under the Roman Farm section) that will be easy to change, things like misspelled words, etc. There are also a couple things that you just barely mention in your article, you might want to add another statement or two about how important they were. I thought you did a pretty good job of conveying how important agriculture was to the Romans with examples from Cato and the Twelve Tables, maybe try to tie them to some kind of development of it through the ages? Otherwise, good job being concise, yet informative! - Leslie Halpern

You did a good job handling such an incredibly broad topic. I agree with Ryan that some mention of Egypt might be useful, as it provided some 40% of their agriculture needs. Were it to be included, the "Roman Farm" section could be split with an additional "History" section added, going over the course of the Roman Farm's history, and not necessarily the specifics that would be necessary in the "Roman Farm" section, just to get some element of time. As far as copy editing things go, I fixed a few typos(I know we're both journalists, and I didn't know if I should just say it here or fix it) References was misspelled in the title head, which was the biggest one, and a few in the Law section, but nothing Medill F worthy. You can check them in the history section to see. To answer your e-mail, I think economics should go. If the person who added this thought it was important enough initially, they should have sourced it, and if they miss it, they'll come back and source it in the future. Being under your article, which is well-researched and factual, the economics section hurts the credibility of the entire article. Good job. -Steven Berger

I like how the article brings agriculture (farming) and laws together to show how central agriculture was to the Roman Society. I also like how you used Cato the Censor's piece "On Farming," which was a reading in Lewis and Reinhold. The article states, "roman agriculture reached its height in productivity and efficiency during the late republic and early empire." Is it possible to elaborate on this and explain why? Were there specific methods or tools used during this time that contributed to such success? It is nice to see how the four systems of farm management are broken down. It would be interesting for you to include how such systems can hold even during war campaigns (i.e. show how soldiers could fight, come back to harvest during the proper season, then go back off to battle). Finally, I remember that Alexandria (Egypt) was a great place for Roman agriculture. Your article could explain why this area was so desired. As a last note, (and as you stated in the e-mail) the section on economics does not contain any sources. While the information seems credible and specific, it is hard to accept without sources. If you cannot find this information in any sources, I personally do not think it should be there. -Ryan Nelson

If you think of Italian food today, you might think of tomatoes and spaghetti. In ancient Rome, however, you wouldn't have heard of these things. To find out more about what you would have eaten, keep reading.

What would I have eaten for breakfast, lunch, and dinner?

For breakfast, the average Roman would have eaten bread with honey or fruit. Your lunch would have consisted of bread, olives, and cheese. Dinner would have been bread, fruits, and vegetables. Poor people often only ate bread for their meals, while rich people ate a lot of meat. The meat was usually chicken, pork, or rabbit. On special occasions they had unusual dishes such as flamingo and giraffe.

Were there farmers in ancient Rome?

Of course there were farmers in ancient Rome ... just look at all the bread they ate! All farmers grew wheat in their fields. Farmers who lived in areas with warm climates grew grapes and olives while those in cooler climates grew turnips and apples.

roman agriculture
I think that you should further discuss the measure of units, such as the "modii". What is that equal to? I have to give a report and my teacher will ask what that is and i will not know. Please edit that.

Thank you for your time

Modius: about a peck. Thanks for pointing this out, as modii (plural) should've had a link. Cynwolfe (talk) 05:17, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Merge discussion
I stumbled across this article as I was creating Wikilinks for the orphaned article Farming in Ancient Rome. There seems to be some overlap, but this article only covers the ancient period. Would a merge be in order or do you think that renaming or splitting Roman agriculture would do? Darkfrog24 (talk) 22:56, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree with you (better late than never). The other article should be merged into this one ('Roman agriculture' is a better name). After the merge the article will have to be seriously improved. Flamarande (talk) 14:53, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
 * I support the merge of these two articles. Dialectric (talk) 15:14, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I went ahead and merged Farming in Ancient Rome into this article, as the subject was the same. Dialectric (talk) 20:41, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Good job, thanks. Flamarande (talk) 21:17, 17 May 2010 (UTC)

Proposed name change for this article
I propose to change the title of this article from Roman agriculture to Agriculture in ancient Rome. The proposed change would give this article a title consistent with Agriculture in ancient Greece, Agriculture in ancient Egypt, and Agriculture in ancient Africa. In addition, the present title is somewhat misleading. The title Roman Agriculture could refer to agriculture in or near the city throughout history, when in reality this article is only about agriculture in ancient Rome. Smallchief (talk)