Archaeological excavations at Pompeii, the southern Italian city destroyed in AD 79. C. by the Vesuvius volcano, continue to reveal details about the past. In the latest discovery, a fresco that represents a still life, appears what could be an ancestor of the current pizza, according to the Archaeological Park of Pompeii.
The food seen in this 2,000-year-old Pompeian fresco is clearly not pizza. It cannot be, “since it is missing some of the most characteristic ingredients”, such as tomato and mozzarella. However, what was represented on the wall of a house of the time, “could be a distant ancestor of the modern plate”, elevated to World Heritage in 2017 as traditional art of the Neapolitan pizza maker.
As explained by archaeologists from the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, “it is supposed that next to a glass of wine, placed on a silver tray, a ‘focaccia’ is represented, a type of flat bread that serves as a support for various fruits, on the which can be identified as a pomegranate and perhaps a date, seasoned with spices or with a kind of pesto (moretum in Latin), indicated by yellowish and ocher dots”. In addition, on the same tray, there would be nuts and a garland of yellow strawberry trees.
They explain that “this type of image, known in antiquity under the name of ‘xenia’, was inspired by the gifts offered to guests, according to a Greek tradition, which dates back to Hellenistic times (3rd-1st centuries to .C.)”.
Of the cities under Vesuvius, they explain, “about three hundred of these representations are known, which often also allude to the sacred sphere, in addition to that of hospitality” but highlight the “remarkable quality of execution” of the new fresco found in the new excavations of Regio IX, as the Pompeian houses are called.
“In addition to the precise identification of the foods represented, we find in this fresco some themes from the Hellenistic tradition, elaborated later by authors from the Roman-imperial era such as Virgil, Martial and Philostratus. I think of the contrast between a frugal and simple meal, which refers to an area between the bucolic and the sacred, on the one hand, and the luxury of silver trays and the refinement of artistic and literary representations”, commented the director of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, Gabriel Zuchtriegel.
The fresco was found in the atrium of a house that had already been partially explored between 1888 and 1891 and whose investigations were resumed last January. The structures excavated in the 19th century and partially exposed already suggested the presence of a large atrium with the classic succession of rooms on the east side and, on the opposite side, the entrance to the kiln’s production sector.
