An Essential Item With Many Uses
The ancient Romans developed a unique culinary tradition, much of which has survived into modern times. Olive oil was a fundamental aspect of the Roman diet that had to be transported to every corner of the Roman Empire.
Beyond its role as a consumable, olive oil was culturally significant and an economic essential. Bathing, religious rituals, and even medical treatment required a steady supply of olive oil.
Pliny the Elder probably best summarized olive oil's importance to Roman life when he said, "There are two liquids that are especially agreeable to the human body, wine inside and oil outside, both of them the most excellent of all the products of the tree class, but oil an absolute necessity."
Appearance of Olives and Olive Oil in Rome
Olive trees have been cultivated by humans for over 6,000 years. Native to Iran, Syria, and Palestine, they spread to Crete by 3,000 BC. They then made it to Northern Africa and Southern Europe.
The Greeks eventually embraced olives and began their export throughout the Mediterranean region. In ancient Rome, they were an indispensable commodity that helped fuel the Roman economy.
Cultivation and Manufacture
The ancient Romans perfected the manufacture of olive oil. While today the process has been automated and modernized, it remains essentially the same.
Olives are a fruit that grows on trees, and the local climate and amount of water received impact the taste and smoothness of the olives. Farmers who tend olive orchards have to either pick unripe olives, shake the tree to release just ripe olives, or pick fully ripe olives off the ground that have fallen naturally. The Romans often used sticks to hit the tree trunk and release the olives. This method is still in use today in some olive farms whose trees are too old to tolerate machine picking.
Olive trees are resilient plants that can live for hundreds of years. They require minimal care and survive through drought, making them an ideal crop. However, olive trees only produce every two years. Roman olive harvests took place between October and December.
Once collected, the olives were taken to a mill and turned into oil. Extractors would place the olives in a trapetum, which was a large basin carved into stone. Above the basin was a horizontal rod featuring two vertical millstones that spun. They would be lowered into the basin on a pulley system. The olives would then be ground between the millstones and the base, turning the olives into a watery paste. Depending on the extent of the operation, the millstone would be powered by humans or mules.
Precision was important when grinding the olives. If the stones were too low, they could grind the pits as well as the meat of the olive. This would result in the loss of that batch of paste, or only being able to sell it as the lowest quality olive oil, because the pits created a bitter taste.
Manufacturers then spread the paste on fiscula, which were vegetal fiber discs. The fiscula were then stacked and compressed using a torcular, a large press. The resulting mixture of oil and water was then drained into vessels and filtered to remove bits of paste.
The purified mix of oil and water was then transferred to another container where the oil would rise to the top as the water sank over time. Olive oil producers could use the refuse from the paste and oil extraction to feed livestock or fertilize the soil.
Classes of Olive Oil
The government of ancient Rome recognized the importance of olive oil for the Empire. The emperor Hadrian passed laws to promote the cultivation of olives, by exempting individuals who grew the trees from rent payments on their land for ten years.
The massive demand for olive oil meant the industry was highly profitable and highly regulated in ancient Rome. Strict standards were established and enforced. Olive oil was available for everyone but, as with any economic good, the price rose with quality. Access to the best was only possible for wealthy Romans of the highest social class.
The type and quality of the oil dictated who had access to it and what it was used for. The Romans typically sorted olive oil into five categories:
- Oleum ex albis ulivis, the highest quality and most expensive oil, was manufactured from unripe olives that had to be picked from the tree.
- Oleum viride was considered high quality because it came from partially green and almost ripe olives
- Oleum maturum was extracted from fully ripe olives and widely available to the masses
- Oleum caducum was considered lower quality oil because it was made from fully ripe olives that were collected straight from the ground.
- Oleum cibarium was the lowest quality oil because it was made from overripe and wormy olives collected from the ground. It was primarily used by slaves and the very poor.
Olive Oil and Trade
The city of Rome itself was unable to produce enough olive oil to satisfy its own requirements, let alone the demand throughout the rest of the Empire. At its peak through the 2nd century AD, the largest exporter of olive oil to Rome was Baetica, on the present-day Iberian Peninsula.
The oil from Baetica and later the Roman province of North Africa traveled the region by sea. It was shipped in sealed clay containers, their distinctive rounded shape now referred to in the present day as Dressell 20 amphorae. A single amphora contained about 18 gallons of oil and weighed almost 70 pounds. These amphorae were single-use containers that were discarded once they were unsealed, and the olive oil was dispersed into smaller vessels for sale to consumers. Interestingly, archaeologists have found these types of amphorae as far from Rome as modern-day Britain, Germany, and Holland.
Related Page: Roman Amphorae Pottery
Imagine a scene at a busy Roman port: barrels of olive oil, a prized commodity, are being loaded and unloaded. Amidst this activity, scribes are fervently recording the details of these transactions using Roman numerals and hastily written notes to try and keep track of the movements, and pay the right amount of tax!
Roman Uses for Olive Oil
Cooking
The De Re Coquinaria, or The Art of Cooking, is the oldest surviving collection of recipes. Compiled by Marcus Gavius Apicius in the first century AD, the book is a straightforward collection of 500 recipes categorized by meal type. Unsurprisingly, olive oil is an ingredient in almost every dish.
While the Romans naturally enjoyed relatively protein-rich diets, olive oil was also an excellent nutritional source. Historians speculate that a typical Roman citizen consumed about one-quarter of a cup of olive oil per day as a result of its use as a preparation, garnish, and cleanser. That equates to 500 calories, which researchers say accounted for 25% of a Roman adult's daily caloric intake.
Bathing
Hygiene transcended class in ancient Rome; the societal norm was that everyone should be clean. This made baths a vital part of each community. They also doubled as a meeting space and leisure center because they were so popular.
Roman baths often included a gymnasium where men could exercise, run, and wrestle. Olive oil was a key component of the post-workout regimen. Men would first coat themselves in oil, as the Romans believed the oil had exfoliating properties, and that it drew impurities out of the pores and collected sweat and dirt that accumulated on the skin. After the oil had cleansed their skin, the men would remove it using a strigil, which was a long-edged metal tool.
Beyond its role as a cleanser, olive oil was used in post-exercise massages to soothe muscles. The ancient Romans also infused olive oil with other aromatics to make perfume and other cosmetics.
Lamp Fuel
Before artificial lighting, societal activity had to be conducted between dawn and dusk. The advent of lamps allowed the Romans to further their leisure activity and supercharged the economy, as businesses could operate for longer hours. Olive oil was the primary fuel for clay and metal lamps used both indoors and outdoors.
Historians speculate that the overwhelming abundance of olive oil throughout the Empire may have later spurred innovative uses to help stabilize prices and prevent the collapse of the market.
Religious Rituals
Every religious denomination that existed throughout the Roman Empire used oil in its rites and ceremonies. Romans would often anoint idols and place offerings of fine olive oil at the temples of their favored gods. Jews living in Rome relied on olive oil as fuel for menorahs and other ceremonial lamps. The Christians used oil to bless themselves and as part of baptismal rituals.
Deceased Romans were also cleansed with olive oil and blessed before their burial. Afterwards, the family would often leave olive oil as a gift to the deceased soul at their grave.
Medicine
While the Greek Hippocrates was the first recorded champion of olive oil as a medical treatment, the Romans built on his knowledge and developed a wide array of cures and preventative treatments using olive oil as a key ingredient. Roman doctors used it as a base for antiseptic plasters and ointments, as a topical analgesic, and to promote healing in cuts, burns, and other wounds.
Claudius Galen, a Greek-born Roman doctor, developed a cold cream with olive oil as its base for preventing illness. Ancient physicians also developed treatments for ear infections and gynecological problems using olive oil. The Romans used it to moisturize the skin and soothe sunburns as well.
Lubricant
Roman machines featured many hinges and axles. Low-quality olive oil was often used to keep them lubricated and ease the wear-and-tear on the device. Maintaining adequate lubrication also made work easier for the people or livestock who operated the levers and machinery needed to generate the equipment's force and movement.
