Researchers have analyzed the ancient DNA from 136 Roman era individuals from the Balkan Peninsula (present day Serbia and Croatia). They showed little contribution from the Italian peninsula.

Rather than wide scale migration from the Italian peninsula, the DNA studies show that half of the Roman inhabitants were of Balkan Iron Age ancestry, as well as a third were from Western Anatolia.

Several individuals from this period have North or Eastern African ancestry.
 

One individual of East African ancestry was buried with an oil lamp depicting Jupiter-related Eagle iconography. Isotopic analysis of his teeth suggest dietary habits from a distant region.

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To provide cultural and historical context for the genetic data, the team collaborated with local archeologists and historians. For each grave, they documented burial type, as well as any objects buried alongside the individuals, such as coins, jewelry, pottery, tools, and weapons. The researchers also used radiocarbon dating to verify the age of 38 of the ancient individuals, which generated isotopic data that provide a window into those individuals' diets.

The researchers were surprised to find no evidence of Italian Iron Age ancestry in the Balkan populations during the height of the Roman Empire. Instead, they showed that there was an influx of people from Western Anatolia, another part of the Roman Empire, during that period. They also found evidence of individual migrations into the Balkans from both within and outside the Roman Empire. Notably, a 16-year-old male who was excavated from a necropolis in a large Roman city was of 100% East African ancestry. The individual was buried with an oil lamp depicting Jupiter-related eagle iconography, but isotopic analysis of his teeth indicated that he had consumed marine protein sources during his childhood and therefore had likely grown up in a distant location.

 

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During the late Imperial period, between 250 and 550 CE, the researchers detected migrants with mixed ancestry from Northern Europe and the Pontic-Kazakh steppe. "We found that those two ancestries -- central/northern European and Sarmatian-Scythian -- tended to come together, which suggests that these are likely to have been multi-ethnic confederations of moving people," says senior author and population geneticist David Reich of Harvard University.

https://cosmosmagazine.com/history/civilisations/surprise-discovery-about-roman-empire-found-in-ancient-dna/

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/12/231207161343.htm

A fine-toothed ivory comb with a Canaanite inscription was found in Northern Israel. It is thought to be the earliest example of a Canaanite sentence. It is believed that Canaanite is the earliest language to use an alphabet.
 

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“Together, the barely discernible markings form seven separate words, "ytš ḥṭ ḏ lqml śʿ[r w]zqt", which roughly translates to "May this tusk root out the lice of the hai[r and the] beard".The hopeful message, thought to have been written around 1700 BCE, is the first reliable sentence archaeologists have found in a Canaanite dialect.”

One side of the comb contains the remnants of six large teeth, probably for brushing hair, while the other side shows remnants of 14 fine teeth, most likely for removing lice and their eggs.

 

I found two aspects of this find interesting. 

First, the ivory to make the comb would have been imported, possibly from elephants from Egypt. This would suggest that the comb was the possession of a wealthy person who could afford such luxury.

Second, the comb had remnants of an ancient head louse. This might suggest that head lice were ubiquitous in the ancient world, including among the wealthiest.

 Remains of the head lice between the teeth of the Lachish comb. (Vainstub et al., Jerusalem Journal of Archaeology, 2022)

https://www.sciencealert.com/this-ancient-inscription-is-the-oldest-sentence-in-the-worlds-first-alphabetm

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2022/11/11/comb-first-sentence-canaanite-alphabet/10668203002/

Hundreds of 5000-year-old sealed wine jars were found at the burial complex of Egyptian Queen Merit-Neith in Umm El Qa’ab necropolis near Abydos. Also at the complex we’re the tombs of 41 courtiers and servants.

Although the wine had evaporated and no longer was present, there was a lot of organic residue, grapes seeds and crystals.

Grape seeds found in the sealed jars.

https://www.sci.news/archaeology/meret-neith-wine-12342.html

The victims “relaxed position” suggests that the cause of death was asphyxiation.

The victims of Pompeii died a horrible death. Many times it was not, however, the high temperatures or crush injuries that killed them. It was suffocation (and lack of oxygen) that killed the victims.

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Piero Dellino, a professor of volcanology at the University of Bari, Italy, agrees with these conclusions. ‘People were not killed by the mechanics or other things. People were killed because they were breathing ash,’ he says. ‘It was not hot, just that the eruption lasted for a few minutes more than what can be breathable.’

https://www.chemistryworld.com/news/elemental-analysis-sheds-light-on-pompeii-victims-final-moments/4018044.article

The Romans enjoyed eating eggs. Maybe not surprising, they sometimes used honey in their egg dishes. 
 

Here is Apicus’ description of egg preparation with honey from his cookbook De re coquinaria. (Although the cookbook is attributed to Apicius of the first century AD, it was thought to be compiled in the fifth century AD.)

Here is the recipe for ova sphongia ex lacte (spongy eggs made with milk):

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302: Ova sphongia ex lacte

Four eggs in half a pint of milk and an ounce of oil well beaten, to make a fluffy mixture; in a pan put a little oil, and carefully add the egg preparation, without letting it boil however. Place it in the oven to let it rise and when one side is done, turn it out into a service platter fold it pour over honey, sprinkle with pepper and serve.

 

https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Apicius/7*.html

https://historicalitaliancooking.home.blog/english/recipes/ancient-roman-dessert-ova-spongia-ex-lacte-sweet-omelette/

Here is a video on the preparation of this sweet omelette:

De Agri Cultura by Cato the Elder 85:

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85 Recipe for Punic porridge: Soak a pound of groats in water until it is quite soft. Pour it into a clean bowl, add 3 pounds of fresh cheese, ½ pound of honey, and 1 egg, and mix the whole thoroughly; turn into a new pot.

Pultem Punicam sic coquito. Libram alicae in aquam indito, facito uti bene madeat. Id infundito in alveum purum, eo casei recentis P. III, mellis P. S, ovum unum, omnia una permisceto bene. Ita insipito in aulam novam.

 

https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Cato/De_Agricultura/E*.html

Here's a good article about the preparation of this Punic porridge:

https://cibiantiquorum.com/punic-porridge/

A body with a wooden box found at its feet has been discovered near present-day Jászberény, Hungary (almost 35 miles from Budapest). The wooden box, which is dated to the 1st century AD, contained high-quality copper-alloy and silver medical tools: needles, tweezers, forceps, and scalpels with replaceable blades. Researchers believe the man was a physician in the Roman Empire. There has been no explanation for this man’s distant travel.

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It's unclear why the man traveled to the region; in the first century A.D., it was ruled by Sarmatians of the Iazyges tribe and acted as a buffer state between the Roman territories and the Dacians farther north. 

The region became fully Romanized after the Marcomannic War from A.D. 166 to 188, which took place between Rome and several tribes, including the Germanic Marcomanni and the Sarmatian Iazyges: Rome won the war, and the region became a frontier of the empire until the fifth century, when it fell to the Huns.

 

https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/romans/1st-century-burial-holds-roman-doctor-buried-with-medical-tools-including-top-quality-scalpels

(Jászberény, Hungary)

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The site of Roquepertuse lies in Provence, just inland from France's southeastern Mediterranean coast. From the Late Bronze Age (c. 1400-750 BC) to the Late Iron Age (c. 450-25 BC), the local inhabitants cultivated barley, as well as millet and emmer—all grains used in ancient beer brewing, although of course barley is the most recognizable to us today.

When originally discovered in the 19th century, Roquepertuse was thought to be a Celtic religious center (or 'sanctuary'—when in doubt, archaeologists always invoke 'ritual' to explain just about everything), thanks to some impressive statuary found at the site, but more recent excavation and analysis points to a more prosaic village settlement (albeit one that was violently destroyed on more than one occasion over its time 'in operation').

 

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The Roman historian, Tacitus, writing of the Germans, says, "To drink, the Teutons have a horrible brew fermented from barley or wheat, a brew which has only a very far removed similarity to wine" and the Emperor Julian composed a poem claiming the scent of wine was of nectar while the smell of beer was that of a goat.

https://www.seriouseats.com/beer-prehistory-celtic-beer-from-france

https://www.worldhistory.org/article/223/beer-in-the-ancient-world/

We have had previous posts about the diet of the Legionaries and whether they were vegetarians (see post below). I think that most scholars now believe that the Legionaries’ diet was supplemented by local food sources, including meat and fish.

The excellent Max Miller recently did a video on possible diets of the Roman army using ancient sources including letters found at Vindolanda:

Recent archaeological studies suggest that the Romans were among the first to breed brachycephalic (or flat-faced) dogs. Studies of dog remains in Turkey help confirm the theory.

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The dog remains were found at a dig site in Aydın back in 2007, but were considered too delicate for study at the time—they were put in safe storage instead. In 2021, the team on this new effort retrieved the bones and began a slow study of the bones to learn more about the dog.

Though the specimen was not complete, the research team was still able to determine that it was a dog and that it had been treated well. Many dog remains have been found from Roman times, and because most were used as work animals, most were not well treated. The team identified the dog as a brachycephalic breed, a group that includes flat-faced dogs such as boxers, pugs and chow chows. The find was unique; only one other brachycephalic breed had ever been found before from a place in the Roman Empire, and that was in the ruins of Pompeii. It also marks the oldest known find of a brachycephalic anywhere, suggesting the Romans may have been the first to breed flat-faced dogs.

 

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This study examined a skull of a dog from the Roman period. The skull, obtained during the 2007 excavations, could only be examined in 2021. The skull was visually of a brachycephalic type. Its craniometric measurements were compared with data from modern brachycephalic breeds of Boxer, French Bulldog, and Pekingese. The comparison revealed that the Tralleis dog craniometric measurements fell between those of the French Bulldog and Pekingese dogs. As a result, the skull in question is currently the only example of such as Roman dog in Asia Minor in the west.

https://phys.org/news/2023-04-early-romans-flat-faced-dogs.html

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2352409X2300144X

Here is a previous thread about dogs in Ancient Rome:

The use of drugs (recreational or medicinal) has been a subject before. (See the post below.) Here’s a good video on the subject. The video requires the free YouTube platform, however:

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Priscus was an envoy of the Eastern Roman Empire sent to meet with Attila at his encampment. His visit coincided with that of representatives of the Western Roman Empire. We join Priscus' account as he and the other envoys are invited to dine with the leader of the Huns:

"When we had returned to our tent, Orestes' father came to say that Attila invited both parties of us to dine with him about 3 o'clock that afternoon. We waited for the time of the invitation, and then all of us, the envoys from the Western Romans as well, presented ourselves in the doorway facing Attila.

A lavish meal, served on silver trenchers, was prepared for us and the other barbarians, but Attila just had some meat on a wooden platter, for this was one aspect of his self-discipline. For instance, gold or silver cups were presented to the other diners, but his own goblet was made of wood. His clothes, too, were simple, and no trouble was taken except to have them clean. The sword that hung by his side, the clasps of his barbarian shoes and the bridle of his horse were all free from gold, precious stones or other valuable decorations affected by the other Scythians."

 

http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/attila.htm

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Smallpox was once one of humanity's most devastating diseases, but its origin is shrouded in mystery. For years, scientific estimates of when the smallpox virus first emerged have been at odds with historical records. Now, a new study reveals that the virus dates back 2,000 years further than scientists have previously shown, verifying historical sources and confirming for the first time that the disease has plagued human societies since ancient times.

Some historians believe that smallpox has been around since long before the Vikings. Suspicious scarring on ancient Egyptian mummies (including the Pharoah Ramses V who died in 1157 BC) leads some to believe that the history of smallpox stretches back at least 3,000 years. So far, the missing piece of scientific evidence to support this theory has remained hidden.

By comparing the genomes of modern and historic strains of variola virus, researchers at the Scientific Institute Eugenio Medea and University of Milan in Italy have traced the evolution of the virus back in time. They found that different strains of smallpox all descended from a single common ancestor and that a small fraction of the genetic components found in Viking-age genomes had persisted until the 18th century.

 

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/01/230109112755.htm

On his excellent YouTube channel "Tasting History," Max Miller does an excellent job summarizing the psychopathic Emperor Domitian’s Black Banquet as described by Cassius Dio. Max prepares an ancient Roman jellyfish for the macabre feast.

(Cassius Dio’s “Roman History,” Book LXVII , 9)
 

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He entertained the foremost men among the senators and knights in the following fashion. He prepared a room that was pitch black on every side, ceiling, walls and floor, and had made ready bare couches of the same colour resting on the uncovered floor; then he invited in his guests alone at night without their attendants. 

And first he set beside each of them a slab shaped like a gravestone, bearing the guest's name and also a small lamp, such as hang in tombs.

Next comely naked boys, likewise painted black, entered like phantoms, and after encircling the guests in an awe-inspiring dance took up their stations at their feet.  

After this all the things that are commonly offered at the sacrifices to departed spirits were likewise set before the guests, all of them black and in dishes of a similar colour. Consequently, every single one of the guests feared and trembled and was kept in constant expectation of having his throat cut the next moment, the more so as on the part of everybody but Domitian there was dead silence, as if they were already in the realms of the dead, and the emperor himself conversed only upon topics relating to death and slaughter.  

Finally, he dismissed them; but he had first removed their slaves, who had stood in the vestibule, and now gave his guests in charge of other slaves, whom they did not know, to be conveyed either in carriages or litters, and by this procedure he filled them with far greater fear. And scarcely had each guest reached his home and was beginning to get his breath again, as one might say, when word was brought him that a messenger from the Augustus had come.  

While they were accordingly expecting to perish this time in any case, one person brought in the slab, which was of silver, and then others in turn brought in various articles, including the dishes that had been set before them at the dinner, which were constructed of very costly material; and last of all came that particular boy who had been each guest's familiar spirit, now washed and adorned. Thus, after having passed the entire night in terror, they received the gifts.

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/e/roman/texts/cassius_dio/67*.html

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The edible dormouse  (Glis glis) was considered a delicacy in Ancient Rome, either as a savoury appetizer or as a dessert (dipped in honey and poppy seeds). The Romans used a special kind of enclosure, a glirarium to raise and fatten dormice for the table. It is still considered a delicacy in Slovenia and in several places in Croatia. Dormouse fat was believed by the Elizabethans to induce sleep since the animal put on fat before hibernating.

Glirarium, the Roman dormouse fattening jar

Nice article on the dormouse:

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/dormouse-jars-glirarium-rome

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dormouse
 

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The team members identified four locations on the chromosomes where changes may have been driven by exposure to bubonic plague, including an increase in the frequency of the ERAP2 variant. They found that immune cells in people who carry this variant were more effectively able to kill Y. pestis, the bacterium that causes bubonic plaque, thus increasing the odds of surviving the disease by as much as 40 percent. But the ERAP2 variant has also been associated with a slight increase in the risk of developing Crohn’s disease, which is caused by inflammation of the digestive system.

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More broadly, our results highlight the contribution of natural selection to present-day susceptibility towards chronic inflammatory and autoimmune disease. We show that ERAP2 is transcriptionally responsive to stimulation with a large array of pathogens, supporting its key role in the regulation of immune responses. Therefore, selection imposed by Y. pestis on ERAP2 probably affects the immune response to other pathogens or disease traits. Consistent with this hypothesis, the selectively advantageous ERAP2 variant is also a known risk factor for Crohn’s disease, and ERAP2 variation has also been associated with other infectious diseases. Thus, selection for pathogen defence in the presence of pathogens such as Y. pestis may be counterbalanced against the costs of immune disorders, resulting in a long-term signature of balancing selection. Likewise, another of our top candidate loci (rs11571319 near CTLA4) is associated with an increased risk of rheumatoid arthritis and systemic lupus erythematosus, such that retaining the putatively advantageous allele during the Black Death confers increased risk for autoimmune disease in present-day populations

https://www.archaeology.org/news

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05349-x

The mythical now-extinct ancient plant of silphium has been discussed before. Turkish researchers believe that they have found the ancient plant at last:
 

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The author of the paper claims to have found a modern species which shares the description of silphion. This species, which also grows yellow flowers like the ancient miracle plant could be a “good candidate for being the long-lost plant of the Greeks and Romans”, researcher Mahmut Miski was quoted as saying with regard to the plant Ferula drudeana.

It has been believed that silphion may have gone extinct due to overharvesting but one study published in the Frontiers in Conservation Science in 2022 offers a view that environmental factors due to human actions like deforestation and desertification could have been involved in the plant mysteriously vanishing. 

In the Heritage journal paper, it was argued that temperature increase leading to more evaporation may have been to blame as the plant may have required conditions to be moist and cold. 
 

The problem with getting a clear confirmation is that the silphion plant does not exist for scientists to have a DNA test. However, it has been claimed that the plant’s specimens might be found on the seabed in the region in one of the ancient shipwrecks. Researchers hope to confirm the claim one day.

 

https://greekreporter.com/2022/09/27/plant-ancient-greece-rediscovered/

https://www.dnaindia.com/science/report-miracle-cure-all-plant-from-ancient-times-that-mysteriously-vanished-2000-years-ago-rediscovered-silphion-2988492

There have been previous posts about the use of opium in antiquity, including the recent finding of opium in a Canaanite grave (see below).

Here is a scientific article dealing with the subject of the Canaanite find and conclusions of the research:

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After the conquest of Assyria and Babylonia by the Persians (539 bce), the cultivation of the opium poppy and preparation of opium subsequently appeared in Persia. Opium also made its way from Asia Minor to Greece and Rome. The word “opium” has been assumed to be of Greek origin, deriving from “opos” (juice) and “opion” (poppy juice). The ancient Greeks associated various divinities with opium such as Hypnos (sleep), Morpheus (dream), Nyx (night) and Thanatos (the twin brother of Hypnos) (death). Opium is frequently mentioned in Greek mythology, and Homer cites the drug as an intoxicating, pain-relieving and sleep-inducing substance in both The Iliad and The Odyssey. The Romans continued in the use of opium as a medicine and as a poison (510 bce to 476 ce). Subsequently, opium use spread throughout the rest of the world: China, India, Europe, etc..

According to historical literary sources and new chemical evidence, it is suggested that opium was first cultivated in Asia Minor (c. 3000 bce). It made its way to Greece and Cyprus as early as the 16th century bce, and became an important import from Cyprus to the Ancient Near East for its stimulating properties, giving it a high economic value. Opium was indeed extracted and collected into Cypriot Base-Ring ware for the purpose of trade in and around the Levant. The opium was most likely used in a number of ways: for medicinal, cultic and ritualistic purposes, as many Cypriot vessels were found in a variety of contexts, signifying its use either for burial rites and/or as an offering for the dead.

 

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/arcm.12806

After visiting the Getty Villa Museum garden, Max Miller has been inspired to create his own Roman Garden. (The Getty Villa, located in the Los Angeles area, was inspired by the Villa of the Papyri at Herculaneum.) Here’s another great video by Max: