What Did the Roman Army Eat? Surviving on a Legionnaire's Diet
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- Опубликовано: 13 май 2024
- The Roman army was spread across the entire globe, fighting huge campaigns that would require an enormous amount of supplies. One of the most important supplies would be the surplus of food, which would need to be made to last a long time to feed soldiers fighting for days on end.
Join Dan as he samples the staples of a fighting Roman centurion's diet.
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#historyhit #foodreview #foodhistory #romanfood
00:00 Introduction
00:36 History of the Roman Army
02:03 Hardtack Biscuits
03:13 Posca (Wine)
05:25 Venison & Wild Boar
06:14 Vegetables
07:14 Salt Pork
07:53 Cheese
09:22 Roman Army Food
If there’s hardtack involved, we should call Max Miller for a collab.
Was ok
*[clack clack]*
LOL!! Yeah, I would like that too!
Max is the hard tack king!
For the Posca too !
"What's the good news about this stuff?" "It'll last forever!" "Okay, so what's the bad news?" "It'll last forever ..."
BTW, back in World War II didn't the U.S. Army issue its troops blocks of nearly inedible Hershey's chocolate? A G.I. palmed his off on my mom, then a teenager, when his unit passed through her home town of Baliuag on the way to fight the Japs in Manila. She managed to get a lot of delicious chocolate shakes out of that block, and to her dying day never forgot that G.I.'s kindness ...
Vinegar is a good source of vitamin C, so if you’re uncertain of whether or not you’ll find a local supply of fruits and vegetables to forage or trade, at least you know you won’t get scurvy.
Bruh, Vinegar has NO Vitamin C. You peddle lies and misinformation.
vinegar is not good source of vitamin C unless it's freshly produced. in 17th century, they prescribed vinegar and pickles to cure scurvy. we both know it wasn't the vinegar that did the job here.
You're not supposed to eat the hardtack directly like a cookie. People crushed the hardtack into crumbs and then stirred it into a soup or stew to thicken it, similar to adding cornstarch or a roux.
Tyey just dipped it in water, wine, a soup, or whatever was available.
You'd think he would know that. Makes his opinions to be taken with a grain of hardtack ;)
He said that you have to dip it in something like a stew to eat it.
Sometimes. when you're walking on the road there's no stew. You eat it as you have it. No soldier are you?
Sailors on later centuries would turn their ships biscuits into a porridge and then eat it at night so they wouldn’t have to see the bugs in it.
There’s also accounts from the peninsula war of solders eating the salted pork before it was fully cooked.
That bit about salt really being the base of salary is really interesting
Didn't they tell you that in your school?
As I understand it, that’s a myth. The soldiers were paid in money a few times a year. All the Roman forts I’ve ever seen have strong-rooms built into them, which is where the soldiers would collect their pay from. The salt was a part of their monthly ration, and because salt was very valuable, soldiers often traded it or sold it instead of using it, which effectively gave them a more regular income than their less regular paydays.
sometimes soldiers were paid in salt. they traded it for other goods
@@christopherellis2663 No and very few colleges teach it either. Next question.
The value of my salary is still a handful of salt.
It seems to me that most historians misunderstand hardtack. What he gets right here is that hardtack was made to survive a long time without spoilage. That is why it is hard. All the moisture has been baked out of it, so that it cannot spoil. I don't know if anyone has ever figured out how long it could last.
What Dan and others get wrong, is that there was that soldiers and sailors really didn't try to eat it dry, and weren't searching around for something to dip it in, anymore than people today are trying to find something to dip their dry pasta into. They simply rehydrated the hardtack, so to speak, by soaking it in something wet, such as stew or yes, wine. Wine because it was common enough to be served wine (and beer in some other places) as a substitute for water, which could often cause dysentery unless boiled. They would expect to do this in the same way we expect to cook potatoes, or flour.
Once soaked in something for long enough, hardtack is not bad at all. It is bread, after all. It is only hard for storage, and never meant to be eaten hard like we eat biscuits today.
Correct
I think some museum in Sweden has a round of Hardtack under a glass case.
He literally in the video talks about how they would try to dip the tacks into the wine, then DIPS HIS OWN TACK INTO THE WINE! But I guess you sure showed your knowledge??? I guess?
@@bombkita They didn't dip; they soaked. That is my point. They way Dan describes this is as if they confronted this food in the way we eat biscuits today. That was not case, except in extreme situations.
It would be like some historian talking about people today, trying to find something they can dip their dried pasta in to make it palatable. It is absurd. None of us are eating pasta dry, we wouldn't try more than once. We just know that pasta gets boiled (or exposed to heat and liquid of some sort) before it is eaten.
This was the same for all the consumers of hardtack through the ages. Only rarely would you even try to eat it without soaking. And soaking in wine gets a lot of press, but you'd more often see it soaked into cooked stew or soup.
Lobscouse was a common dish for sailors, of meat, vegetables, and hardtack.
I'm saying that Dan misunderstands how hardtack was approached, and portrays it as people gnawing on the corner of a rock. Not accurate.
@@ThatGuyNamedRick Hmmm. Is that a Swedish thing?
Well...yet another of my fellow men thinking about the Roman Empire.
Posca tastes great if you make it right, I don't know how he didn't like it . Chuck the right herbs in it and get the mix right and it's good. The key is to use wine that's gone sour rather than just straight vinegar. Used to make with that left over bit of wine that sat in the fridge too long.
leftover wine? Never heard of it. 😅 🍷.
Don't know about making it taste good but considering how far from home the soldiers likely were it would help prevent issues from drinking the local water.
Liar.
@@thejman8734 Who's lying?
It is just watered down cheap wine with honey. It is literally the ingredients.
The "Vinegar" is the poor wine that turned into Vinegar aka. sour non-alcoholic (or very low alcoholic) wine. Not the cooking vinegar.
As the great Obelix would say " these Romans are crazy" 😊
But he might agree on the wild boar dish :)
@@lucagriglio8253 Absolutely 👍😁
Dan is the man.
So Dan, you’re saying the soldiers didn’t eat Little Caesar’s Pizza?
Dan: "What have the Romans every done for us?"
Someone: "The cheese?"
Dan: "oh, well yeah the cheese, that goes without saying!"
kevinmcqueenie "Blessed are the cheesemakers......"
"its safe to go out at night now"
well purveyors of dairy products in general @@chestermosburger3113
So many people thinking about the Roman Empire every day!
It's likely that the reason your posca was so bad (other than you aren't used to it) is that you don't have anything like what they would have recognized as "vinegar". Unless you used a good wine vinegar; and even then it would be too processed.
would of been old wine which had gone a little sharp rather than straight up acetic acid mixed with water
Love the bit about cheese!
Looking good in that armor sir. 😉
I made some hard tack a few years ago. Filled you up, but that's about all you can say for it, apart from the calories. You certainly wouldn't want to try to bite it without softening it up first. Question? Might they have crushed the biscuit up and fried it with the bacon, as Napoleonic sailors, and American Civil War soldiers sometimes did? Possible. It's also interesting that the basic military ration of "biscuit, salt meat, and alcohol" stayed more or less the same from the 1st cent BCE to the 19th cent CE. 2000 years of hardtack......shudder.
They wouldn't eat them straight up, they would crush the hardtack into crumbs and stir it into soups and stews to thicken them, a bit like adding roux.
@@Sorcerers_ApprenticeI wonder how often they were forced to not soften it up in stews, but just in their drink rations?
@@Sorcerers_Apprentice that's what Napoleonic navies did, though they did also eat ships bicuits as is after tapping them to dislodge the weevils!
It's not quite hardtack, but a lot of modern military field rations still have something like a fortified cracker in them. It's a tried and true formula for making carbohydrates that stay edible for a long time. I think it honestly wouldn't have been too difficult to introduce a variety of dried herbs, salts, spices, and the like to a hardtack recipe to improve their flavor without significantly compromising the shelf life.
''Blessed are the cheesemakers''
I’m so glad I’m not the first to that joke 😂
And add "Cheese" to the list of things the Romans did for us.
Oh hell yes, im about to devour a bowl of mac and cheese while I watch this. Love seeing Dan pop up in my feed.
Cool! It's a soggy black berry waffle with bacon for me! 😂
The richest Romans ate boar that ate pretty much only chestnuts, apparently they made the bacon taste amazing.
Most nuts have a pretty decent amount of good fats in them, prolly why it made 'em taste so good.
Similar to jamon iberico, which does indeed taste anazing 🤤
Pata Negra
There is a special type of ham that's made in Spain, it comes from a certain type of pig, and it lives on acorns. It's supposed to be very special, taste amazing, and it's ridiculously expensive.
@@edg09 It's called jamon Iberico and yes, it's expensive (no wonder why).
It should be “legionary’s” in the title. Great video!
Last time I savoured British military ration packs in the early 1990s they were still including hard tack biscuits !
Did your neck hurt after laying like that? It didn't look like the most comfy way to eat or drink either lol.
Finally a history show did the research and shows us a movie accurate typical Roman at ease taking his respite. Though the lack of gauntlets really disappointed me as an expert of the subject.
Pretty ingenious those Romans.
You don’t have a well run empire for five hundred years without some attention to detail.
Thanks for illuminating some of their methods.
(1200 years).
over 2000 years
Hey Dan. Love your work 👍
A wonderful introducing...thank you history Hit channel for sharing
sounds like you guys forgot to check the mic before filming. Sound is very low.
Very interesting episode, would be perfect collab video with @TastingHistory Channel :D
Jesus was given "οινον μετα χολης μεμιγμενον" (wine with gall mixed) but he refused to drink it.
This was not "sour wine" in any sense that is being proposed here.
It was a mixture of mandrake, which is a powerful drug (tropane) and vinegar/wine, which is needed to help the body absorb the drug.
Thank you. The lapses of the learned are not to be let past
I would have expected a channel with "History" in the name to have pictures that I couldn't have denied the authenticity of when I was still in middle school.
Great video. I'm surprised you didn't discuss or sample Garum
It makes sense since he took a historical reference from a soldier's diet. I would be surprised if they had widespread access to garum in the army due to the nature of its preparation.
One that surprised me wasn't on the list was legumes. It was the protein staple together with cheese when meat wasn't available and they are the most practical thing to carry around when dried.
Erm I get the feeling he wouldn't like it!
Interesting. Thank you kindly for sharing it!
Is the secret name of this series "Make Dan Snow Hurt"? I'm here for it, I just want to know.
Odd, I've been thinking a lot about Roman stuff lately.
I enjoyed your video and I gave it a Thumbs Up
Hardtack was usually used as an ingredient or rehydrated. Did you ever try cooking the Spam from your WWII food video after the suggestions?
Stop eating, centurion! Still many countries to conquer!!! Ave Roma!!!
Dan makes a very convincing Centurion Guard!
Great video
Dan Snow knows everything, including how to eat hard tack.
Dan's encounter with hardtack reminds me a little of Drachinifel's video in which he tries to recreate Royal Navy rations c. 18th-19th Century. His expression when he comes to grips with ship's biscuit is priceless.
Great channel 💯👍 Just liked and subscribed 👍
I love the fact that the description of wild boar and venison was interrupted by an advert for Ocado 🙂
Interesting stuff
This is great
The only thing worse than the hardtack was Dan Snows lorica Musculata.
The irony
Im watching this whilst eating some 5 year old hard-tack with corned-beef in a stock soup
Thanks ❣️🤣🤣🤣...
I wonder if the biscuit dipping was what we adopted from the Romans in the form of rich tea/digestives and dipping them into tea like some still do ?
Dan Snow, a man who will risk his stomach to give us a great video.
Nevermind the vinegar in the wine, just put some honey in there. The cheese sounds great and the meat sounds delicious
I had three basics for packing food for a road trip: a big chunk of pepperoni, a chunk of cheese, and a bag of pita. All easily eaten with one hand.
You missed out on garum! A fermented fish sauce.
6:52 I don’t need parsnips for that ❤
🤭
Dan in armor is awesome 😂
All seem like great lads.
Please tell us that after Mr Rahm’s move to LIV that the taco colab is going to happen? 🙏
6:59 The cook book ic called "De Re Culquinare", it means "About Cooking" (or something like it, ancient latin is a mess), the books autor is Appicius.
Nice hat Dan!!!
I'm betting the Romans ate whatever was local whether it was in Britain, Spain or Syria.
Hardtack was eaten on Royal Navy sailing ships. The ration included rehydrated beef, pork, peas, rum mixed with water, supplemented with fresh fruit and veg when they could get it.
I have heard about the soldiers being paid with salt many times. The problem I have with that statement is, what does the soldier do with a bag of salt? Does he carry it around with him, or does he leave it with his kit? When he needs to buy something, he needs to find a seller who wants salt. Who sets the value of salt? If he wants to send some of his salary back home, how is that done? Does salt have the same value all over the empire? I think there must be something wrong with this statement.
Mainly used in their cooking
Or traded
Like cigarettes in modern armies
Very good point
That ‘Salary’ fact has blown my mind
I still miss you my old friend. It still sad to hear that you were destroyed by the heirs of arminius but you will never be forgotten
Legionary, not Legionnaire when it comes to Roman soldiers. Plural being Legionaries.
Dan loves larping lol. Love it.
Huh. I never knew about hard tack, i thought soldiers got allowances of grain and each contubernium had basically millstones to grain it. I'll really have to look into this (for context - I'm a Latin teacher, i really should know these things)
That is correct however on forced marches or when grain was going to be scarce the twice baked bread was carried. It would have been a good ingredient in a stew as a thickener even when you had grain to make fresh bread.
Were they also equipped with a ration of Wolf Nipple Chips?
Tasting history with max miller made those hard tacks
Holy damn i like so much his leasons
I enjoyed the two tv shows Battlefield Britain and Twentieth Century Battlefields that were Hosted by Dan Snow and his father.
Dan really doesn't look comfortable on that sofa! Haha
Is that GO WEST by Pet Shop Boys that I keep hearing in the background?!!
I remember watching Dan and his father in the Battlefield series about a decade ago. Now he has salt in his hair, how time flies.
Hard tack was also known as ships bread too.
We have the Romans to thank for stuff like ham, and deli sausage. They discovered and were the first to use sodium nitrate for curing. And smoking, added flavour, that made meats shelf stable. ( meaning no requirement for refrigeration )
What year is this suppose to be set in?
The idea that the Roman army could achieve victory by simply being well-supplied is fascinating. Another example of the adage that amateurs speak of tactics while professionals speak of logistics
I remember suffering with hard tack in the Canadian Army years ago. How like the Romans we are
Veni! Vidi! Vici! Roma invicta!
Ave
Centurion. What’s this then? Romanes eunt domus? ‘People called Romanes they go the house’?
Brian. It -- it says ’Romans go home!’
Centurion. No it doesn’t. What’s Latin for ‘Roman’? Come on, come on!
now paint it a hundred times! if you dont have it done by sunrise, I'll cut yer balls off! Hail Caesar!
" 'Domus'? The locative, man - the locative!"
Max Miller should do a History Hit where he introduces Dan to Garum which is a very smelly kind of gross ( decaying fish anyone) fish sauce.
I miss heard 'shift' 😮
I never understood what their problem was with barley. I know one of the punishments for soldiers for various infractions was to have your normal rations taken away and replaced with barley for a period of time.
I tried posca before and didn't find it bad at all. That vinegar really makes your mouth salivate, so it's pretty refreshing if you're really thirsty, like sour candy.
If i recall correctly consumption of barley was culturally considered degrading to soldiers as it was a grain usually fed to livestock and slaves according to Pliny. So best guess is that it was an issue of class status rather then inferiority of the food itself. Although the protein content of barley was pretty low so probably the soldiery developed a distinct disdain for it given their need to maintain muscle mass for the fight.
hard tack were mixed with broth probably and yeah hot drinks.
Glad to see (and hear) Dan went to the dentist ;)
I would assume you would put the hardtack into water or soup to soften it up first. Let it boil for a bit.
2:10 - I blame Max Miller for the memetic "tap tap" this evoked.
And no, you're supposed to process that biscuit into your stew, or soak it first
Otters noses … badgers spleen … get em while they’re ‘ot!
And the aqueducts…
Not too bad, seeings how Europe didnt have tomatoes, potatoes, tobacco & Turkey! 😂
I drink a tbsp of apple cider vinegar with water everyday and after a few weeks of doing this you grow accustomed to it and it doesn’t taste bad anymore 🤷♂️
There are no essential carbohydrates. Jerky and pemmican are the preferred option. Vinegar is an ameliorant to the ravages of carbs
Roman Empire Map
Where can I see/visit/download a map/stone/paper/goatskin map or any kind of peutzeriana that says IMPERIUM ROMANUM (or something to that effect), not ITALIA, made DURING the Roman Empire? There were numerous contemporary cartographers but not a single map has ‘Roman Empire’. There is Tartaria but no Roman Empire. Thanks in advance.
He looks just like Lucius Vorenus ! 🤣
Posca is similar to switchel
Roman army ate spaghetti with meatballs and pizza?
They invaded anyone who would try to touch-a their spaghett'!
Ahh'way Calzone-ay!
I read somewhere (can't remember where) that there is only one cook book remaining from Roman times. Is this true?
I almost spelled it Brian food lol i almost kept it but I didn't know if the joke woukd go
Beaver is not bad by any means. The tail fat is actually delicious spread on a slice of rye bread.
While hardtack was issued right up until World War I, the most recent and descriptive accounts of the food come from the American Civil War. Soldiers often referred to the biscuits as “worm castles” because all too often they would become home to maggots and weevils.
Blessed are the cheese makers.