Chapter 2. Rome
Part 2
Part 1 of Chapter 2, “Rome,” can be found here…
2.6 Social Aspects of Wine in Rome
“For the rich — a golden cup, for the poor — a clay mug. But the wine is the same.”
— Roman proverb
★ Wine for the Army
For a legionary, wine was a mandatory part of the daily ration. It was diluted with water, sometimes sweetened with honey. Wine quenched thirst, disinfected food and water, and warmed the soldier on cold nights. It helped him endure the hardships of the march — and was considered almost as essential as bread and salt.
The daily wine ration of a legionary was about 1 sextarius (≈ 0.54 liters). But this wine was almost always diluted with water at a ratio of 1:1 or 1:2 (one part wine to two parts water). It was simple, sour, “soldier’s wine”. Sometimes, instead of wine, they received posca— a vinegar-water drink made by diluting the remnants of wine (refreshing in the heat, thirst-quenching, and disinfecting water).
It was a closed circle: citizens paid a tax on wine, that money went to maintain the soldiers, and the soldiers themselves received wine as part of their pay.
🎬 …Legionary camp, Gaul, 50 BC (Caesar’s campaigns)
Night. The wind drives dust through the camp. Beyond the palisade — barking dogs and the distant rustle of barbarian forests. Around the fire sit legionaries, weary from the day’s march. Someone pulls out a jug of wine, dilutes it with water, and pours it into clay cups. The wine is sour, but it warms the throat and body.
The soldiers joke, recall their families, and argue about who is the better commander — Caesar or Pompey.
— Drink, Marcus, before you fall asleep! Tomorrow we march twenty miles again!
— And don’t spill it — all our pay is in this jug!
Laughter, sparks from the fire, the clink of cups. Wine united them — men from every corner of the empire. Here, by the fire, they became one legion.
★ Wine for the Nobility
For senators and wealthy Romans, wine became a matter of luxury and even collecting. Rare labels — Falernian, Setinian, Caecuban — were stored for years and brought out only on special occasions. Golden and silver cups underlined the host’s status. The difference was not whether they drank wine — but which wine they drank.
🎬 …A banquet at a patrician’s house, around 60 AD, in the age of Nero
Evening. The atrium of a grand villa glows with lamplight, soft music plays in the corner. Guests recline on couches; before them — dishes of figs, oysters, and roasted meat.
A slave brings forth an amphora sealed with the mark of the vineyard. It is Falernian, more than twenty years old. The master of the house commands it to be opened with the care one would show a jewel. Golden and silver goblets shine in the hands of senators.
— This wine was once served to Caesar himself,” — declares the host with pride. The guests raise their cups, discuss the delicate bouquet, and debate whether Falernian or Setinian is superior.
For them, wine was not mere thirst-quenching. It was a symbol of power, wealth, and refined taste. Every sip a display of status, every amphora a piece of a collection.
★ Wine for the Plebs
On the streets of Rome, the plebs — artisans, small traders, the poor — drank cheap wine: sour, often watered down, sometimes even dyed to look better and cost less. It was sold in taverns, at festivals, even in the markets. Wine was poured straight from amphorae. Vendors carried leather wineskins through the streets, filling cup after cup.
For the common folk, wine was the “bread of joy”: not as exquisite as the patricians’ vintages, but accessible to all. It was part of public life — over a cup, they discussed bread prices and Forum rumors, quarreled, schemed, or laughed together. Wine was “democratic”: available to everyone, unlike expensive delicacies.
🎬 …Rome, a tavern at the Forum, mid-1st century AD, in the time of Claudius and Nero
Noon. The sun scorches, the Forum buzzes with traders’ voices. In a narrow tavern under a canvas awning, the plebs crowd together.
Amphorae of sour, simple wine stand on the counter. The tavern keeper scoops it out with a ladle and pours it into rough clay mugs.
— Don’t complain later that your head aches — the wine is sour today! — he teases a customer.
— As long as it’s cheap! — the man laughs, draining his mug in one gulp.
A jug bought for three is shared right there on the street. A boy sells hot flatbread nearby — the perfect pairing with wine.
No silver goblets, no rare vintages. Yet the plebs rejoiced in their wine no less than the senators in their treasured amphorae. For them, it was a holiday in the middle of an ordinary day, a sip of forgetfulness after hard labor.
★ Barbarians and Beer
On the northern frontier of the empire, by a wooden palisade, a Roman merchant meets a Germanic chieftain. The chieftain offers him a clay cup filled with a dark, bitter brew.
— Drink, Roman — this is our pride: beer!
The merchant sips cautiously, grimaces, and replies:
— In Rome, this is given only to slaves. A true citizen drinks wine.
The German laughs and claps him on the shoulder. Yet in the merchant’s eyes one can read the conviction: beer was the drink of barbarians; wine, the drink of civilization.
Thus wine became not just a product, but a cultural boundary: on one side, beer; on the other, wine. For a Roman, the difference was as obvious as that between the marble Forum and a barbarian village.
★ Wine as Equality and Division
One drink, yet many meanings. Wine united all Romans, yet also divided them by class. By a legionary’s fire, in a plebeian tavern, and in a senator’s atrium, it played different roles — but none of those worlds existed without it.
★ Wine in Medicine and Rituals
For Romans, wine was not only joy and trade but also a cure. The physician Galen recommended it, diluted, for strengthening health, easing pain, and disinfecting wounds. Wine was prescribed for colds, stomach troubles, as a sedative, and even as a surgical antiseptic.
Pliny the Elder, in his Natural History, described dozens of recipes: wine with herbs for the heart, wine mixed with honey for coughs.
Yet its ritual role was even greater. Wine was essential in sacrifices: the gods accepted it as they did bread and oil. It was poured upon the earth in reverence, placed in tombs so the dead could “drink” with the living.
At weddings and banquets it symbolized union and harmony; in oaths, it sealed truthfulness. Romans believed that wine itself must be a witness to a vow — whatever one swore while drinking had to be kept.
2.7 Amphorae as the Passports of Wine
In the Roman Empire, wine was stored and transported in amphorae, each stamped with crucial information: the year of harvest, the place of production, even the winemaker’s name. These were the world’s first “labels.” By them, the buyer could tell what he held in his hands — sweet Spanish, robust Gallic, or refined Italian wine.
Today, archaeologists read these inscriptions like accounting books: every amphora a document of trade.
2.8 The Scale of Trade
Rome supplied not only itself with wine. Legions in Britain, merchants in Egypt, officials in Syria — all drank Roman wine. Ships loaded with amphorae crisscrossed the Mediterranean. Wagons rolled along imperial roads. Wine became a universal currency: it paid debts, sealed alliances, and bought friendship.
Rome imported wine from Spain, Gaul, Greece, and the Aegean islands. Exports flowed the other way too: Italian wines filled amphorae that spread across the Mediterranean. The standard vessel of antiquity, the amphora, made transportation efficient by sea.
🎬 …The port of Ostia, 30 km from Rome, around 110 AD
Morning in Ostia. Waves crash against the breakwater; the harbor roars with noise. Ships arrive from all directions, sails still raised: some from Spain, heavy with Baetican wine amphorae; others from Gaul; still others from Africa.
On the docks, workers and slaves swarm. Under overseers’ shouts, they unload amphorae, each stamped with a seal — the winemaker’s name, the vintage year, the place of origin. Rows of jars stretch along the piers; warehouses overflow. In the air the smells of resin, sea, and sour wine spilled during unloading.
Carts stand ready in long lines to carry the jars to Rome. The city drinks more than it can produce itself: millions of citizens demand bread, oil, and wine. Ostia thus becomes the “wine heart” of the capital. Here it is decided what wine will fill senators’ goblets, what will slosh in the plebs’ mugs, and what will be poured into the legionary’s flask.
…Up the Tiber to the Heart of Rome
When the ships were unloaded in Ostia, the journey was not over. Amphorae were transferred onto broad, flat-bottomed barges suited for the Tiber. Slaves hauled them upstream with ropes. On the horizon rose the domes of temples and towers of Rome.
At the foot of the Aventine Hill, the unloading began. Amphorae were stacked on the riverbank; some carted straight into the city, while the broken shards were taken to a special dump. There, over time, rose the famous hill of Monte Testaccio — a silent monument to Rome’s wine trade.
Thus the wine’s path ended: from Spanish and Gallic hillsides, across the sea, through harbor and river, into the cups of Romans.
2.9 Taxes and Duties
“Nihil tam populare quam vinum” (“Nothing is closer to the people than wine.)
— Roman saying
Wine in Rome was drunk by everyone, in great quantity. Naturally, the state could not leave it untaxed: wine became a serious source of revenue. Already in Republican times, there were trade levies; under the Empire, special excise taxes appeared — the vectigal vinarium.
Every amphora crossing the empire’s borders or entering the city walls became an object of accounting and taxation. Historians estimate that customs duties on wine and olive oil alone brought millions of sesterces annually into Rome’s treasury. These revenues helped finance the army, roads, and aqueducts.
But taxes and tariffs served another purpose as well: senators and emperors sought to protect their own vineyards. Imported wines were often cheaper, sometimes even of higher quality, threatening Italian producers. Thus the government imposed protective duties, restricted the flow of foreign wine into the capital, and at times even forbade planting new vineyards in the provinces.
Taxes on wine also became a political instrument. Lower them, and you win popularity with the people. Raise them, and you refill the treasury in hard times. Wine turned into a lever of power: a single imperial decree could raise market prices and spark unrest among the plebs.
In this way, Rome’s wine taxation system was an early example of a financial mechanism where treasury, army, and people were bound together by a single drink.
2.10 Emperor Domitian and His Edict
One famous measure was Emperor Domitian’s decree (92 AD), ordering the uprooting of many provincial vineyards. Gaul and Spain saw this as an economic blow, but Rome had one aim: to keep money flowing into Italy itself.
Domitian sought to bring order to the wine trade. Italian vineyards enriched senators and the elite, but they faced serious competition: in Gaul, Spain, the Balkans, and Asia, vast new vineyards were already flourishing. Provincial wine was beginning to rival Italy’s. The argument was simple: “Rome must not lack bread while provincial lands are planted only with vines.” Yet behind those words lay another motive — protecting Italian producers and ensuring that wealth stayed in Italy.
Reaction of the Provinces
For Gauls and Spaniards, wine was not just a drink but a source of prosperity. Chroniclers recorded their protests:
— Rome wants to drink our wine but forbids us to make it. This law is a gift to Italian nobles and landlords.
The Law’s Legacy
Domitian’s ban lasted nearly two centuries, repealed only under Emperor Probus (3rd century), who encouraged viticulture and permitted vineyards once more in the provinces. Thanks to his policy, vines spread widely across Gaul, Pannonia, and even Britain.
Domitian’s decree shows that in Rome, wine was not only culture and commerce, but also a subject of strict state regulation. The empire intervened in viticulture for the sake of taxes, protectionism, and control over its provinces.
🎬 …Narbonese Gaul (today’s Languedoc and Provence), around 92 AD
On a Gallic hillside, a farmer gazes at his vineyard. In his hand, a broken vine cutting — uprooted by order of Rome.
— We tended it for years… the sun and soil here give wine no worse than Italy’s. And now they say: enough. Rome wants bread. Rome wants only its own nobles to grow rich. And what remains for us?
He tosses the cutting into the fire. Flames devour it as greedily as Rome devours his labor. Neighbors shake their heads. They understand: they may not sell their harvest, nor plant new vines. Yet Rome still drinks wine, and amphorae from their lands will find their way to markets — secretly, in defiance of the ban.
2.11 The People and the Taxes
But whenever the state tightened the tax noose too much, protests erupted. Chronicles recall how in Rome stone tablets with new tariff decrees were torn down and smashed right on the Forum, at the very steps of the Senate. The people could endure many things — but not the loss of their wine.
🎬 …The Roman Forum, late 1st century AD, in the age of Domitian
Noon. Between marble columns, amid stalls and merchants, a crowd gathers. Traders argue with tax collectors:
— Why must I pay more for Spanish wine? It’s cheaper, and the people love it! — shouts one, waving toward the warehouses.
— By order of the emperor! Italian producers must be protected!” — the collector retorts, clutching the inscribed decree.
— And what of us? Should we go bankrupt?!” — roars the crowd.
Stones and shards fly toward the collectors. Suddenly, the stone tablet with the new duties crashes to the pavement, shattered. Someone shoves a collector by the shoulder. The crowd surges with a roar: wine was not just a commodity — it was a right. And Romans would not tolerate having that right taken away.
2.12 Rome and the Revenues of the Wine Trade
Rome levied import duties (typically 2.5–5% of a product’s value) as well as market taxes in ports. Wine was no exception. In the later Empire, there was even a general sales tax, the centesima rerum venalium — 1% on all sales, wine included.
🎬 …The port of Ostia — Rome’s maritime hub, 2nd century AD, reign of Hadrian
A Roman tax official in a white toga inspects stamps on amphorae of Gallic wine.
— Stamp is clear. Gaul. Approved.
He is handed another amphora. No seal. The official frowns.
— Confiscate it. No wine enters without the emperor’s mark.
★ Revenues for the Treasury
Exact numbers are lost, but estimates can be made:
→ A typical Roman legion in the 1st century AD numbered 5–6,000 soldiers. Wine was part of their rations.
→ In Rome itself (about 1 million inhabitants in the 1st–2nd centuries), annual wine consumption may have reached 100–150 million liters (according to modern historians).
→ Even a modest tax of 2–3% on that volume would bring tens of millions of sesterces each year.
For comparison: a legionary’s annual salary under Augustus was 900 sesterces. With some 150,000 soldiers in the army, wine taxes alone could cover a significant portion of military expenses.
📌though we cannot state, for instance, “the treasury received X millions in year Y,” we can say with confidence that wine taxes were one of Rome’s major revenue streams, on par with those on salt and grain. And the sheer volume of archaeological finds — millions of amphorae — makes it clear: the flow of wine was vast.
2.13 Conclusion
For Rome, wine was never just a drink. It became a symbol, a tax resource, a weapon, and a song.
Along the Roman roads marched legions, and beside them rattled wagons of amphorae. Wine accompanied soldiers and plebeians, senators and slaves, gods and the dead. It flowed through ports like Ostia, rose upriver on barges along the Tiber, and left behind mountains of shards at Monte Testaccio. It filled the treasury, supplied the army, healed the sick, sealed marriages and oaths.
Rome taught Europe to live with wine. Vines carried in legionary saddlebags took root in Gaul, Spain, along the Rhine, and even in misty Britain. Many of today’s great wine regions are direct heirs to what was once «Rome’s wine policy».
The empire fell. Legions vanished, roads overgrew, aqueducts crumbled. But the vineyards remained. And when we raise a glass of Bordeaux, Rioja, or Tuscan wine, we continue the tradition begun when «the eagle of Rome» still clutched the world in its talons.
► Carthage
Carthage was burned, its walls torn down, its people enslaved — yet the sea still remembers Phoenician sails. Trade routes, amphorae, and inscriptions remain the shadow of a city that loved commerce and the sea, and even in ruins became legend.
► Rome
Rome fell, but its vines did not die. They struck roots in Gaul and Spain, outlived emperors and barbarians, and still reach for the sun — living memory of a world where wine was the language of civilization.
► Two Fates
Carthage became legend. Rome became legacy. One sank into the sea of history, the other dissolved into its wine.
To be continued…
Thus, in ancient Rome, wine proved a mirror of society: sour and watered for the plebs in the Forum; aged and rare for the nobles at their banquets. Yet whatever its taste, every journey began with an amphora — the silent witness of Roman trade, feasts, and daily life.
When the empire wavered and Rome collapsed, it seemed its wine culture would vanish as well. But amphorae were replaced by new vessels, the roads shifted, and the vines found new guardians.
In the Middle Ages, those guardians were the monks — men for whom wine ceased to be only a commodity or luxury, and became part of spiritual service and monastic discipline. The Middle Ages — when the vineyard passed from empire to monastery, and wine became both a prayer and a sacrament.
The third chapter of “Amphora” can be found here…
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