![Horrea](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f1/Horrea.JPG)
A ''horreum'' (plural: ''horrea'') was a type of public warehouse used during the
ancient Roman period. Although the
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
term is often used to refer to
granaries
A granary is a storehouse or room in a barn for threshed grain or animal feed. Ancient or primitive granaries are most often made of pottery. Granaries are often built above the ground to keep the stored food away from mice and other animals ...
, Roman ''horrea'' were used to store many other types of consumables; the giant
Horrea Galbae
The Horrea Galbae were warehouses ('' horrea'') in the southern part of ancient Rome, located between the southern end of the Aventine Hill and the waste dump of Monte Testaccio. They ran for a substantial distance, possibly extending as far as the ...
in
Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus (legendary)
, image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg
, map_caption ...
were used not only to store
grain but also
olive oil,
wine
Wine is an alcoholic drink typically made from fermented grapes. Yeast consumes the sugar in the grapes and converts it to ethanol and carbon dioxide, releasing heat in the process. Different varieties of grapes and strains of yeasts are m ...
, foodstuffs, clothing and even
marble
Marble is a metamorphic rock composed of recrystallized carbonate minerals, most commonly calcite or dolomite. Marble is typically not foliated (layered), although there are exceptions. In geology, the term ''marble'' refers to metamorphose ...
.
[Lawrence Richardson, ''A New Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome'', p. 193. JHU Press, 1992. ] By the end of the imperial period, the city of Rome had nearly 300 ''horrea'' to supply its demands. The biggest were enormous, even by modern standards; the Horrea Galbae contained 140 rooms on the ground floor alone, covering an area of some 225,000 square feet (21,000 m²).
[David Stone Potter, D. J. Mattingly, ''Life, Death, and Entertainment in the Roman Empire'', p. 180. University of Michigan Press, 1999. ] The amount of storage space available in the public ''horrea'' can be judged by the fact that when the emperor
Septimius Severus
Lucius Septimius Severus (; 11 April 145 – 4 February 211) was Roman emperor from 193 to 211. He was born in Leptis Magna (present-day Al-Khums, Libya) in the Roman province of Africa. As a young man he advanced through the customary suc ...
died in 211 AD, he is said to have left the city's ''horrea'' stocked with enough food to supply Rome's million-strong population for seven years.
[Guy P.R. Métreaux, "Villa rustica alimentaria et annonaria", in ''The Roman Villa: Villa Urbana'', ed. Alfred Frazer, p[. 14-15. University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology, 1998. ] Smaller (though similar) ''horrea'' were a standard feature of Roman towns, cities and forts throughout the empire; well-preserved examples of military ''horrea'' have been excavated on Hadrian's Wall in England, notably at the forts of Housesteads, Corbridge and South Shields.
History
The first ''horrea'' were built in Rome towards the end of the 2nd century BC,
[Joseph Patrich, "Warehouses and Granaries in Caesarea Maritima", in ''Caesarea Maritima: A Retrospective After Two Millennia'', p. 149. BRILL, 1996. ] with the first known public ''horreum'' being constructed by the ill-fated
tribune
Tribune () was the title of various elected officials in ancient Rome. The two most important were the tribunes of the plebs and the military tribunes. For most of Roman history, a college of ten tribunes of the plebs acted as a check on th ...
Gaius Gracchus
Gaius Sempronius Gracchus ( – 121 BC) was a reformist Roman politician in the 2nd century BC. He is most famous for his tribunate for the years 123 and 122 BC, in which he proposed a wide set of laws, including laws to establish ...
in 123 BC.
The word came to be applied any place designated for the preservation of goods; thus it was often used refer to cellars (''horrea subterranea''), but it could also be applied to a place where artworks were stored, or even to a library. Some public horrea functioned somewhat like banks, where valuables could be stored, but the most important class of ''horrea'' were those where foodstuffs such as grain and olive oil were stored and distributed by the state. Rome's insatiable demands for foodstuffs meant that the amount of goods that passed through some of the city's horrea was immense, even by modern standards. The artificial hill of
Monte Testaccio
Monte Testaccio (; alternatively spelled Monte Testaceo; also known as Monte dei cocci) is an artificial mound in Rome composed almost entirely of ''testae'' ( it, cocci), fragments of broken ancient Roman pottery, nearly all discarded amphorae d ...
in Rome, which stands behind the site of the Horrea Galbae, is estimated to contain the remains of at least 53 million olive oil amphorae in which some 6 billion litres (1.58 billion gallons) of oil were imported.
[Bryan Ward-Perkins, ''The Fall of Rome: And the End of Civilization'', pp. 91-92. Oxford University Press, 2005. .]
Design and naming
![Ostia, horrea epagathiana 01](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e6/Ostia%2C_horrea_epagathiana_01.JPG)
The ''horrea'' of Rome and its port,
Ostia, stood two or more stories high. They were built with ramps, rather than staircases, to provide easy access to the upper floors. Grain horrea had their ground floor raised on pillars to reduce the likelihood of damp getting in and spoiling the goods. Many ''horrea'' appear to have served as great trading areas with rows of small shops (''
taberna
A ''taberna'' (plural ''tabernae'') was a type of shop or stall in Ancient Rome. Originally meaning a single-room shop for the sale of goods and services, ''tabernae'' were often incorporated into domestic dwellings on the ground level flanking ...
e'') off a central courtyard; some may have been fairly elaborate, perhaps serving as the equivalent of modern shopping arcades. Others, such as those in Ostia, dispensed with the courtyard and instead had rows of ''tabernae'' standing back-to-back. In the
Middle East
The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europ ...
, horrea took a very different design with a single row of very deep ''tabernae'', all opening onto the same side; this reflected an architectural style that was widely followed in the region's palaces and temple complexes, well before the arrival of the Romans.
[Claridge, Amanda (1998). ]
Rome: An Oxford Archaeological Guide
', First, Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 55.
Unsurprisingly, security and fire protection were major concerns. ''Horrea'' were frequently built with very thick walls (as much as thick) to reduce the danger of fire, and the windows were always narrow and placed high up on the wall to deter theft. Doors were protected with elaborate systems of locks and bolts. Even the largest ''horrea'' usually only had two or three external doors, which were often quite narrow and would not have permitted the entrance of carts. The arduous task of moving goods into, out of and around ''horrea'' was most probably carried out by manual labour alone; the biggest ''horrea'' would thus have had an enormous staff of labourers.
Roman ''horrea'' were individually named, some having names indicating the commodities they stored (and probably sold), such as
wax
Waxes are a diverse class of organic compounds that are lipophilic, malleable solids near ambient temperatures. They include higher alkanes and lipids, typically with melting points above about 40 °C (104 °F), melting to giv ...
(''candelaria''),
paper
Paper is a thin sheet material produced by mechanically or chemically processing cellulose fibres derived from wood, rags, grasses or other vegetable sources in water, draining the water through fine mesh leaving the fibre evenly distrib ...
(''chartaria'') and
pepper
Pepper or peppers may refer to:
Food and spice
* Piperaceae or the pepper family, a large family of flowering plant
** Black pepper
* ''Capsicum'' or pepper, a genus of flowering plants in the nightshade family Solanaceae
** Bell pepper
** Chili ...
(''piperataria''). Others were named after emperors or other individuals connected with the imperial family, such as the aforementioned Horrea Galbae, which were apparently named after the 1st century AD emperor
Galba.
A particularly well-preserved ''horreum'' in Ostia, the Horrea Epagathiana et Epaphroditiana, is known from an inscription to have been named after two
freedmen
A freedman or freedwoman is a formerly enslaved person who has been released from slavery, usually by legal means. Historically, enslaved people were freed by manumission (granted freedom by their captor-owners), emancipation (granted freedom a ...
(presumably its owners), Epagathus and Epaphroditus.
Regio I - Insula VIII - Horrea Epagathiana et Epaphroditiana
/ref>
References
Bibliography
* RICKMAN, G., (1971): Roman Granaries and store buildings. Cambridge.
* SALIDO DOMINGUEZ, J., (2011): Horrea Militaria. El aprovisionamiento de grano al ejército en el occidente del Imperio romano, Anejos de Gladius 14, Madrid.
* SALIDO DOMINGUEZ, J., (2009): “Los graneros militares romanos de Hispania”. En MORILLO, A., HANEL, N. & MARTÍN, E., (eds.): Limes XX. Estudios sobre la Frontera Romana. Anejos de Gladius 13. Volumen 2. Madrid, 679-692. I.S.B.N. 978-84-00-08856-9.
* SALIDO DOMINGUEZ, J., (2008): “La investigación sobre los horrea de época romana: balance historiográfico y perspectivas de futuro”. CUPAUAM 34, 105-124. I.S.B.N. 978-84-00-08856-9 http://www.uam.es/otros/cupauam/pdf/Cupauam34/3405.pdf
* SALIDO DOMINGUEZ, J., (2008b): “Los sistemas de almacenamiento y conservación de grano en las villae hispanorromanas”. En FERNÁNDEZ OCHOA, C., GARCÍA-ENTERO, V. & GIL SENDINO, F., (eds.): Las villae tardorromanas en el Occidente del Imperio. Arquitectura y función. IV Coloquio Internacional de Arqueología de Gijón. 26, 27 y 28 de Octubre de 2006, Gijón, 693-706. I.S.B.N.: 978-84-9704-363-2.
External links
- plans and images of an excavated horreum at Ostia Antica
* {{YouTube, 7nGZWh-8EoE, Computer reconstruction of the ''horreum'' at Longovicium}
Ancient Roman architecture