What were the worst jobs for poor Romans in Ancient Rome? | Hacker News Reader

What were the worst jobs for poor Romans in Ancient Rome?

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87 pointsBerislavLopac82 comments

One thing, it's ambiguous if they are speaking of only jobs inside the city, or any job in the republic/empire. It's also ambiguous if this is limited to jobs only performed by free individuals. Some things that didn't make the list.

* Free individuals sometimes became Gladiators

* While very clean for ancient standards, their sewage system required a lot of manual maintenance.

* We know sailors we subject to scurvy, which suggests they spent most of their time on ship and had very poor diets.

* Prostitution was legal.

* Without an understanding of germ theory, anyone dealing with very sick or dead individuals could be subject to poor health outcomes.

* Lots of work would have been extremely physically taxing by today's standards. Lifting heavy things. Farming with hand tools. Blacksmithing.

Farming is the big one - if your job sucked too hard you’d just go back to being a subsistence farmer like most everyone else.

Was arable land easy to come by for a poor Roman or would you be more likely to have a landlord requiring some cut?

In general no, it wasn't easy for poor folks to get their own farm land, and it became harder as time went on.

A plot of land was a common millitary pension; soldiers would retire there and work the land after putting in enough service time. This worked well while there was plenty of decent land in Italy, but became a worse deal over time. Once the prime land was taken up soldiers had to settle for plots of varying quality far from their homeland, which was much less pleasant as you'd expect.

The poorest would likely “sign on” to an existing farm as a farmhand - the story of the Prodigal Son implies that concept was known in antiquity.

The problem was the big farms relied virtually exclusively on slave labor for labor. There were numerous attempted reforms to require landowners to hire free citizens, but I don't recall about any systemic change being achieved before the fall.

> soldiers had to settle for plots of varying quality far from their homeland

So .. Mesopotamian soldiers might have to settle for land in Italy after serving at Arbeia [1], the Roman fort in England rather than return to their homeland?

Or are you perhaps thinking that the Roman Army was mostly made up of soldiers from provinces of what is now modern day Italy?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arbeia

Things changed after the transition from Republic to an Empire. One of the factors in that transition was the shortage of land to provide to soldiers, who at that time were mostly Roman citizens.

Not at all. It was so hard to get land that “land reform” was a constant political point.

You've omitted the mines, which were a pretty notorious place to work, and I'd personally rank it the worst job of the lot. My understanding is that the miners were almost all slaves because of the poor working conditions.

People convicted of certain egregious crimes would commonly be sentenced to hard labor in the mines.

This was the punishment that astrologers received for violating certain regulations around astrology. (Their clients were executed.)

People are still working in mines like that today and for a long time, I'm guessing.

Mining was among the worst types of work with very little chance of doing it for longer. Which is why it was allmost only slaves doing it, like most of the other hard work, which is why there allways needed to be new wars to get new slaves to keep the system running.

I think mines switching to free labor to some degree in the imperial period since slaves became more scarce and expensive

I do think this is the actual answer. Brutally backbreaking work (literally breaking rocks with simple tools for 12+ hours per day every day), in poor conditions, and constantly inhaling dust that destroys your lungs to the point that you're constantly coughing up black mucus.

Being a rower on a ship was a terrible job too, but at least you had fresh air to breathe.

Didn't Rome still use the "eat, shit, and sleep on your seat" system used by the Greeks before them? I don't think rowers had anything that could reasonably be described as "fresh" air.

Honestly don't know. I suspect it entirely hinges on whether we're talking about slaves or not.

I think compared to deep mining shafts, before proper ventilation and smokefree lighting was invented - it definitely can be described as fresh air in comparison, however disgusting the rows were - on the sea is always wind blowing most of it away. But of course it mattered, whether you were on the top row or the lower rows - and where you would sit was also used as further punishment/reward.

Legionnaire :)

The correct term for a member of a Roman legion is legionary. A "legionnaire" is a member of the French Foreign Legion.

Working with the sewage system is what first came to my mind.

As far as germs that is so modern. Ignaz Semmelweis was considered a moron for suggesting that doctors wash their hands between handling dead bodies and delivering babies.

He died in 1865 with the establishment believing he was basically spreading misinformation.

Also, are we talking about jobs, or work?

Subsistence farmers worked, but didn't have 'jobs'. A blacksmith worked, but might have had a 'job', or, depending on how many people were working under him might have been more of business operator.

Being in any army sucks, so soldiering wasn't exactly a great 'job', either - although it often provided opportunities to rob and enslave other people.

One particularly unpleasant job (I believe often performed by slaves) was making charcoal. More man-hours went into making charcoal than went into the actual blacksmithing, as it was so coal-intensive. Entire regions were denuded of trees. And then of course you had lumberjacks.

Honestly, following around some rich person in Rome sounds easier than the hardest manual labor jobs.

> * Prostitution was legal.

As it is in Aotearoa New Zealand, where lately we also have constant news about shortages of workers in hospitality, tourism, agriculture, etc.

https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/06-08-2018/its-as-legal-as-...

Regarding gladiators, one of the most crazy statistics I ever read was that about 500K people died in the Colosseum while it was in use. That was probably in the span of a couple of centuries, but that's still a steady stream of dead folks.

At this juncture I must heartily recommend the very silly and good natured anime/manga Thermae Romae [1][2]. It's about a Roman bath architect who secretly discovers a way to time travel to modern Japanese baths to steal ideas (though he is slow to understand them). The original run is a little more pure than the Netflix reboot, where the humor / seriousness balance is off (it's never too long of a slog).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermae_Romae#Episode_list_(DL...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermae_Romae#Episode_list_(Ne...

It's one of the few animes where you HAVE to watch both the Dub and the Sub - there are different jokes in both.

Also highly recommend Bessatsu Olympia Kyklos by the same creator for the Tokyo Olympics

How about the movie? Is it any good?

"Mining" is rarely the wrong answer for worst job in any premodern era. Incredibly taxing physically, dangerous, claustrophobic, and with the constant risk of fire and being buried alive. The only silver lining for ancient miners was that they had little chance of living long enough to experience the long-term toxic effects of their vocation.

It’s definitely mining for Rome, mining was done more or less exclusively by slaves and life expectancy was short.

My understanding from historians answering similar questions about ancient Romans is that we really don't know much about the average Roman because almost nothing was written down about them and even less survives to this day.

It's a little nuanced. We know about some aspects of the average Roman citizen's life: the details of their class and labor statuses, their political enfranchisement, the effects of the Roman economy on their livelihood, urbanization trends through the Republic and Empire, etc. We also know a decent amount about what they ate, what they wore, etc.

We know many of these things either because they're discussed in comparison to an actual subject, or via inference with described subjects (i.e. descriptions of the lives of political candidates, bureaucrats, soldiers, slaves, and lesser sides of noble families).

While literary sources were always produced by aristocrats, they still give a window into their times even if it's biased, so we know some things about some jobs. But also since the mid 20th century there's been a movement in history to learn about the daily lives of everyday people of the past in every period including Rome. Combined with archaeology, we can learn some things, so while we don't have a perfect picture of life for the many free Roman citizens packed into their insulae doing their jobs, there's been work and progress on filling that in, esp. using archaeological sources like Pompeii.

Mining and military service are definitely worse than groveling, especially since Rome did have the bread line.

The military definitely had a pay advantage (and it got better over time in the imperial era, so much so that it began to bankrupt the state), but Rome was always killing people, either Romans or barbarians. The warfare was absolutely horrifying by modern standards, and I imagine that even the best warriors of Rome would have had severe PTSD. Add in practices like decimation and the life of a warrior could be shorter than any other.

As for mining, most miners were slaves. Worse, many slaves were captured and conquered people. Rome had slaves that were treated well too (accountants, physicians, potters, bakers, barbers, and so on), especially after various reform movements (legal claims could be made against slave owners who mistreated slaves, but it is not certain just how successful these claims were), but the majority performed brutal work in bad conditions (beyond mining, many prostitutes were also slaves, and some of the worst parts of construction in Rome were done by slaves).

> The warfare was absolutely horrifying by modern standards, and I imagine that even the best warriors of Rome would have had severe PTSD.

I'm not actually sure this was the case. We don't actually really hear of things like PTSD for anything before the Great War - and we do have veterans of prior wars saying something was different about WW1.

It seems that the constant, unending chance of combat or death really might be different than what came before.

I read the same thing somewhere on here many years ago.

The concept of war and killing was "more normal" during those times than it is now and the alternative to war still wasn't sunshine and rainbows for most.

I think what I also read was from the side of the wives. Deaths due to war were much more normalised and were a higher occurrence, therefore there were better support networks of wives whose husbands had been killed in battle.

Nah Herodotus wrote about it, as did Assyrian scholars. In the case of Assyrians this psychological problem was attributed to the spirits of slain enemies tormenting the sufferer. Given the extremely spiritual viewpoint of almost all ancient peoples, I have feeling that this is why it’s not heard of more frequently.

There is definitely something going on. Its hard to imagine there is no record of PTSD during countless wars over the course of history leading up to WWI.

https://www.civilwarmed.org/ptsd/ discusses PTSD in the context of the American Civil War.

"Abundant evidence suggests that Civil War soldiers, like their twentieth-century counterparts, exhibited symptoms that today we would associate with war trauma, notably post-traumatic stress disorder..."

Many references in the article.

> "Great heavens, what poor specimens of humanity the men were! Their entire bodies formed a pattern of livid bruises. Their backs, which bore the marks of the whip, were not so much covered as shaded by torn shirts of patchwork cloth... They had letters branded on their foreheads, half-shaved heads, and chains round their ankles. Their faces were a ghastly yellow, and their eyes had contracted in the smoke-filled gloom of that steaming, dank atmosphere, making them half-blind. They resembled boxers who coat themselves with dust when they fight, for their bodies were a dirty white from the oven-baked flour."

> Apuleius, The Golden Ass

Being sent to become a mill slave was considered one of the worst punishments available for Roman slaves. Essentially a slow death sentence where you turn a millstone in an unlit chamber until your lungs give out from breathing flour and stone dust.

Mining held a similar status.

The Ancient Romans used a sponge on a stick for washing themselves after defecating. I always wondered who was responsible for cleaning and replacing those sponges in public latrines.

amazingly there's a game (nearly) based on that value proposition: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/20082/pecunia-non-olet-g...

They used the three shells to clean the sponges.

In Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantium) the name of the profession with the responsibility of applying the sponge was σφουγκοκωλάριος, sfougokolariis where sfougo is the sponge, kolos is what you imagine it to be in context. The term is still used metaphorically in modern Greek.

People always act as if ancient people were somehow different. Obviously you'd have the cleaner who cleans the toilets and swaps the sponges. They'd get more from the storecupboard and someone would be in charge of ordering the sponges from the spongemaker.

Just imagine life today but without the electronics

How did rich people keep their wealth? Interesting, they had banking: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banking_in_ancient_Rome

Sometimes those bankers were disrupted by Judeans coming in an smashing up the nice open plan lending atriums. Really need the firm hand of government to prevent repeat offending

You just know at least one person got nailed for it.

Supposedly

Actually the vandalism was from the Galileans. The Judeans totally adored their market makers.

Oh I thought that Jesus was a galilean and also a Judean (that Galilea was a rural part of the larger Judea).

Well, there was Roman province called Provincia Iudaea. It was much larger than the Palestinian region Judea, but at no point (it's borders were adjusted multiple times) did it cover the Galilee.

Not to disrupt some good humor with boring factual accuracy, but worth noting the "temple money changers" were not Romans or bankers. Historic academics is of course rarely conclusive, especially biblical exegesis, but it's generally accepted by scholars that the "money changers" were Jews, likely volunteers, who provided a service required by Jewish law: exchanging Roman coins for Tyrian shekels to purchase animals for sacrifice. It was not realistic for every pilgrim to the Temple to bring their own animal so out of towners would buy one there, but it wasn't permitted to buy one with Roman money.

For some sources, here's two good threads[0][1] on /r/AcademicBiblical, which is strictly moderated with secular scholar rigor, and a video[2] linked in one of those threads by Dr Ian Mills at Duke University. If you're interested in an analysis of the intended meaning of the passage, there's more in those links.

[0]https://old.reddit.com/r/AcademicBiblical/comments/136pdmc/w...

[1]https://www.reddit.com/r/AcademicBiblical/comments/5xwjgd/wh...

[2]https://youtu.be/dLp-kgf0Ky4

What's interesting is Matthew 22:19, where Jesus has asked someone to show Him a Roman coin, and his questioners manage to produce it, no problem. Well, the Jews were forbidden to possess those denarii, because it made the person ritually impure (Matthew the Apostle, aka Levi, would know). So whoever produced the coin on request was probably rather embarrassed about it.

AIUI, the Book of Matthew was not written by that Matthew, or indeed by anyone whose identity we know, right?

This is correct - I don’t have as much knowledge about Jewish law and its usual interpretation circa 0AD, but Matthew was one of the first gospels to have its traditional authorship questioned because it is written in masterfully crafted classical Greek - not anything accessible to a rural Aramaic speaker. Since the birth of Biblical exegesis scholarship in the 19th century it has been widely accepted that none of the gospels were authored by the traditionally associated apostles, or any apostles, or even any first-hand witnesses to Jesus. The book I immediately recall about this is Forged by Bart Ehrman, but gospel authorship is one of the most well tread and thoroughly analyzed areas of biblical scholarship and the fact that the apostles didn’t write them is one of the points closest to consensus in the field.

I am intrigued to learn more about how Roman currency was managed in Judea at that time. As far as I know Jewish law did forbid carrying coinage with images of the emperor, but obviously many Jewish pilgrims to the temple had to exchange some kind of currency for shekels.

I'd understood at least the first three books - and I tend to follow the consensus around Markan Priority - were penned in Koine rather than classical? I suspect the distinction is of marginal relevance, in the current context.

Yes, I think your understanding of this field exceeds mine - not even sure where I pulled out “classical” Greek from, since in hindsight, the author of Matthew far post dated classical Greece!

Jews by the time of Jesus were very diverse just as they are today. Even in Judea itself you would find very different opinions on how "the law" (Halacha) should be interpreted. Most would probably find it silly and impractical to not use Roman coins. The point of Matthew 22:15-22 may be that. The Pharisee hands him a coin with the image of the emperor on it and Jesus reminds him that "Hey, you shouldn't be touching this at all. You hypocrite!"

Please dont post quora links. Whilst the questions and answers might be interesting, the whole site its just a minefield of ads, SEO spam, forced logins, etc…

The complete downfall of quora is surprising tbh.

Trying to cash out before they reached critical point? At one point about a decade ago through my spotty memory they are pretty on par with reddit in terms of adoption and reputation.

Quora has fulfilled its purpose of generating training data for large language models, by answering the majority of questions people have ever thought to search for on the premise of "I wonder if anyone's asked this question before." Now that ChatGPT has read all the answers, Quora can fade into the sunset while ChatGPT regurgitates its answers with precision as part of an ad-free conversation.

which is a bit sad since the majority of answers on Quora are worse than useless…

Seems like only a matter of time before LLM-powered search is also injecting ads. "Ancient Romans had a difficult life with a variety of unpleasant jobs. But after work, they liked to kick back and enjoy all-new garum-flavored Doritos!"

Are you sure Quora's purpose is to create large language models?

Yes

To me it became unbearable after it became flooded with people trying to add content without bringing any actual insight. They'd largely reuse existing materials or top google/wikipedia results and used certain style that became annoying to me (I wonder if others also started noticing the 'quora-style' answers)

I feel like all the good people disbanded as that happened. I noticed answers became increasingly anecdotes that looked like a blog post in the style: “10 years ago I was working with my father, when I noticed…”. It’s been years I simply ignore Quora when it shows up in a search cause I k ow it will be the same generic garbage as those SEO websites.

I remember asking for the scientific basis for the EPA's recommendations on UV exposure. I had this idea an actual scientist or someone who's done relevant research might answer. All I got were spun versions of the citeless blurb on the EPA's website. That was when I knew Quora was dead.

(kind of an aside after this point)

Meanwhile, ChatGPT (via Phind) just keeps giving me answers on the efficacy of sunscreen at blocking UV light. Nothing on what research went into deciding how much UV is too much. I want to know what actually makes UV 11 or UV 5, or why UV 2 is considered safe. It's the first time it's been 100% useless. I can't seem to get it to stick to the actual question no matter how I phrase it.

Maybe it's one of those ass-pull recommendations where no one really knows. I know people who sunscreen religiously and still got skin cancer, and people who don't get much sun who got it.

Thats a great question because recently I searched similar things when trying to learn about the risk of UV with kids. All sources basically concludes any direct exposure to the sun is bad for you (not just kids) because UV is inherently harmful and vitamin D can be gotten other ways.

Either this is overstated or everyone is behaving very recklessly. Maybe a mix of both. But more details on these levels would be good. I also wonder if they assume direct sunlight or if actual cloudiness is baked into the daily index values.

> At one point about a decade ago through my spotty memory they are pretty on par with reddit in terms of adoption and reputation

Considering Google Trends for "quora" vs "reddit", it was never even close, generally. https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=2008-04-18%202...

If the content is interesting, I think it's worth posting. If people think the ads and dark patterns make it not worthwhile, they should not upvote the post, and just let it sink down off the front page.

It's terribly sad that whoever wrote these posts stopped a decade ago, but at least the links are still active - always relevant when someone complains about quora:

https://jesuschristsiliconvalley-blog.tumblr.com/post/489620...

I'm finding that in the past couple of years, more of my google searches are pointing me to quora (but also to reddit, so some swings and roundabouts there). I don't know if they're getting qualitatively better, or just more adept at SEO.

Even with good adblockers in place, the bait-and-switch just after landing is hugely frustrating (if you want to read more, you must sign up, etc).

Not a terrible job, but uncertain was parasite. Basically you were paid to accompany someone and say how good they were. One of the few things I remember from high school was translating some plays in which a parasite was part of the cast.

(Another thing I remember was the supposed punishment for parricide: to be sewn into a sack with a rooster, a cat, and some stones, and then be tossed into the Tiber.)

Ancient punishments were insane. Death was usually just a side effect of whatever the actual punishment was. Bothered me for weeks after reading about that stuff.

For the teen-aged students of my boys-only school that kind of stuff was always worth reading, and the Greek and Latin teachers knew it so made sure we got a good supply of such stuff. Much more interesting and worth translating than Caesar marching around.

One of the most thumbed books in the library was "Pompeiian Graffiti". I learned some sexual terms that don't exist in English.

One thing they don't mention is that the pay for being a legionnaire was (as far as I know) quite a bit better than average.

The mines of Ancient Spain (modern Andalusia mostly) most definitely "employed" the sorriest souls

Being Vedius Pollio's servant?

If you’ve ever wondered what would’ve happened if Nazi Germany had won the war and had become a Thousand Year Reich, Rome is basically your answer. Militarism, War, Genocide, Slavery—it’s all right there.

Not sure what the point of your post is.

Rome (and Greeks before them) did certainly see the difference between Romans and Barbarians, but they also integrated the newly conquered tribes into the army, and eventually society. At some point there were even “barbarian” senators, and Roman citizenship was granted to everyone residing in the empire. They clearly didn’t have the same idea of race that the Nazis, or most of the western world until not long ago, had.

No. Romans assimilated any race into their empire. They were practical.

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