A Companion to Food in the Ancient World, First Edition. Edited by John Wilkins and Robin Nadeau. © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Published 2015 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

ChaPtER 9

Food is a material fact of human existence, as borne out in the sheer quantity of archae-ological evidence related to its production, distribution, consumption, and disposal. In this sense, archaeology offers an unrivalled perspective on ancient foodways, lacking both the geographical and social biases of the classical authors. Nevertheless, in spite of the plethora of extant food‐related material evidence pertaining, it is not without its own prejudices and problems. Not least among these is the challenge of reconstructing the dynamics and meanings of food consumption from an essentially fragmented, incom-plete, and static material archive. As the topic is so vast, the aim of this chapter is to showcase the potential of archaeological approaches. Of principal concern is the often complex relationship between consumption practice and the archaeological record, with emphasis on the role of food as a marker of social change in the Roman period. Eating and drinking in the ancient world had greater significance than mere biological suste-nance, and were central to the articulation of social relations and identities in life and death. Whilst such practices or foodways were often highly culturally sensitive and specific, consumption in a wider anthropological sense has been long understood as a mechanism for marking social differentiation (Veblen, 1899; Bourdieu, 1986; Miller, 1987; Douglas & Isherwood, 1996). In this sense, the archaeology of food consump-tion, as opposed to production or exchange, offers significant potential for fresh under-standings of ancient society, particularly in terms of characterizing of social and cultural change.

Rather than defining food consumption in terms of a series of specific events, it is arguably more profitable to see it as a much bigger process, from selection to disposal (Campbell, 1995, 102). In this sense, consumption acquires greater meaning as a sphere  of social practice in its own right, rather than the simple destination for the commodities of production. Therefore, the process of food consumption is considered here in terms of three constituent elements: acquisition (production to distribution), transformation (preparation to ingestion), and disposal. This framework echoes the

The Archaeology of Food Consumption

Martin Pitts

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approach of the social anthropologist Jack Goody (1982), who similarly found it useful to analyze cooking in the context of the total process of production, preparation, and consumption. Indeed, although an archaeological approach to the consumption of food and drink in its social setting (transformation) offers insights into identity and social differentiation in the ancient world, it is also one of the most problematic elements to infer directly. Thus, by studying the wider picture of ancient foodways, the risks of using fragmentary evidence may be addressed and minimized.

Acquisition (Production and Distribution)

A basic prerequisite for any study of food consumption is to have some understanding of the prior stages of food production and supply. A basic assumption follows that the majority of food and drink consumed in the ancient world was produced locally, with most people having some involvement in the agricultural economy (Garnsey, 1999, 23). The main exceptions to this general rule were large urban centers that had outgrown their productive hinterlands, notably Rome (Mattingly & Aldrete, 2000), and frontier armies stationed away from the Mediterranean (Stallibrass & Thomas, 2008). Both had to be sustained through largely state‐sponsored supply networks, most likely composed of private traders. While such regular state investment in long‐distance trade may have encouraged localized developments involving large‐scale production and exportation of certain basic foodstuffs such as grain and olive oil (Mattingly, 1988a, 1988b; Mattingly et al., 2001), by modern standards markets in the Roman empire were not well integrated into a single “global” system of supply and demand. Occasionally the production of certain foodstuffs reached levels of surplus going beyond the needs of the empire’s urban consumers. One such case is that of Italian wine in the second and first centuries bc, with written (Diod. Sic. 5.28) and archaeological evidence (Tchernia, 1983; Fitzpatrick, 1985) pointing towards the emergence of free market trade as the excess wine was soaked up by voracious “barbarian” consumers in Gaul. Nevertheless, in the broader sweep of ancient economic history, such developments were usually the product of historically specific circumstances, in this case the development of slave‐run latifundia (Hopkins, 1978), and were not sustainable. One important corollary pertaining to consumption is that “consumer choice” in foodstuffs in antiquity would have been for the most part regionally limited, particularly outside major urban agglomerations, with trade over longer distances being dictated by overarching and often largely politically determined supply networks. Nevertheless, the level of inter‐regional trade should not be underesti-mated. Even largely self‐sufficient territories would have had to be provisioned from afar during times of fluctuations in climate and harvest (Garnsey, 1999, 30), whilst studies of pottery provenance showing medium‐distance exchange can often be regarded as a proxy for the movement of foodstuffs, and associated culinary products such as salt (Gerrard, 2008).

Transformation (Preparation and Ingestion)

Through consumption in a communal context, food is transformed from agricultural surplus into social capital. Goods and wealth are not simply destroyed, but reincorpo-rated into the social system (Gell, 1986, 112). As agricultural produce formed the

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primary form of surplus in the ancient world, such transformation was necessary, as food could not be accumulated without end and its value could only be realized in a compar-atively short period of time (Murray, 1990b, 4). Countless ethnographic studies have shown that social relations are expressed and produced in the form of highly structured occasions of commensality (Gell, 1986). In this sense, communal consumption (prob-lematically termed “feasting” in prehistoric archaeology, see below) can be regarded as social technology that helps to create and maintain social relationships by transforming surpluses in order to improve chances of survival and reproduction (Hayden, 2001, 26). Indeed, communal consumption in the form of the symposion was at the heart of political life in the Hellenic world, whereas the Roman convivium represented a means through which a greater proportion of society participated in the articulation of social relations and patronage through eating and drinking together. Furthermore, convivial behavior represented a medium through which “barbarians” were distinguished from Greeks and Romans, whilst simultaneously providing an arena in which provincial peoples could “learn to be civilized.”

At the heart of the fashioning of new identities is the empowering nature of consumption. Here the division of labor is critical, with the potential for identities to be differentiated on the basis of an individual’s role in the constituent elements of the process (i.e. production, distribution, cooking, serving, and consumption), differential access to certain commodities, the quantity of material consumed, and varying styles of consumption or accompanying social practice such as “table manners” (Elias, 2000; Mennell, 1985; see Nadeau (Table Manners) in this volume). Social differentiation can be facilitated by consumption as leisure, understood as the capacity to absent oneself from work (Veblen, 1899; Miller, 1987, 147) and consumption as luxury, understood as consumption that is non‐essential for survival (Friedman, 1994b, 2), or more specifi-cally for social or rhetorical purposes (Appadurai, 1986, 38). To be truly empowering, consumption in many complex societies must follow the guidelines of the legitima-tory principle of “taste” (Bourdieu, 1986). In the Roman Empire, such attitudes are evidently present in the letters of the younger Pliny, and moreover in the satirical work of authors such as Juvenal and Petronius. However, a focus on written sources alone risks a narrow view of ancient society. The rest of this section considers archaeological evi-dence in more detail in order to illustrate the range of insights possible beyond the realms of elites and textual evidence.

As acts of consumption are often characterized by material constraints, such a topic might be regarded as ideal for archaeological study. Archaeological evidence pertaining directly to the transformative elements of consumption can be divided into three broad categories – the food itself, the spatial setting of consumption (ranging from temporary outdoor structures to purpose built dining‐rooms), and the technology of consumption (incorporating the technologies of storage, preparation, serving, and eating). A further category of ancient media (e.g. art and visual culture) provides key insights into com-munal consumption (Dunbabin, 2003; Clarke, 2003; see Lissarrague in this volume), albeit indirectly and subject to similar biases as contemporary written sources, and should be studied separately. Similarly, human skeletal remains can be analyzed to provide gen-eral indicators about a given individual’s diet and nutrition through life, but are unable to give direct insights into individual meals and consumption practices. Nevertheless, in spite of this broad array of evidence relating to the dynamics of ancient food consump-tion, the value of such categories is dependent on a number of factors: how much of the material survives a given instance of consumption; the extent to which consumption

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technology was discarded or re‐used for subsequent meals; the chemical aptitude of the material to resist or succumb to natural transformation processes (e.g. organic decay) (Schiffer, 1987); and the properties of the material to resist or succumb to cultural trans-forms (such as the recycling of re‐usable materials), which will affect its visibility in the archaeological record (Schiffer, 1987). The potential effects of these factors are summa-rized in Table 9.1, and are discussed in turn below.

With the remains of food itself, the archaeological evidence can be broadly divided between floral and faunal evidence. The most obvious drawback to this material is that much food is digested through consumption, thus making it virtually impossible to directly reconstruct meal contents archaeologically, other than in cases of exceptional preservation where stomach and intestinal contents can be analyzed (Stead, Bourke, & Brothwell, 1986). The problem of a biased sample is compounded by the high suscepti-bility of food remains to post‐depositional biodegradation, in addition to any previous recycling of waste from consumption into secondary products (especially with animal bone). Nevertheless, the analysis of archaeological food remains has much to offer the study of ancient consumption practices. With zooarchaeological approaches, there are a plethora of useful methods for understanding the consumption of meat in its wider social context. These include the identification of butchery marks on animal bones to distin-guish culturally specific preparation practices (Maltby, 1989, 1994, 2007); statistical studies of the proportions of different species present at given settlements over time (Luff, 1982; King, 1984, 1999a, 1999b, 2001; MacKinnon, 2004); and approaches to animal husbandry through the analysis of the age and size of animal species at the point of slaughter, which can facilitate further understandings of relationships between producer and consumer sites (Albarella, Johnstone, & Vickers, 2008). Similarly, archaeo-botany offers further evidence of food consumption, particularly through the identification of individual species of durable cereals, fruit stones, or weeds associated with certain crops, whilst a broader range of vegetable matter can also be preserved in waterlogged or highly arid conditions (Perring, 2002, 44–5; van der Veen, 1992, 1998; van der Veen & O’Connor, 1998; Cappers, 2006). In addition to the evidence of food remains themselves, it is possible to analyze food residues such as animal fats on cooking and storage vessels, although this relatively costly and time‐intensive procedure can only be realistically applied to a small proportion of ceramic material (Heron & Pollard, 1987; Charters et al., 1993; Colombini et al., 2005).

A further way to look at the impact of food consumed is through scientific analysis of skeletal remains, which are often readily persevered in the archaeological record. Poor nutrition can be identified through developmental defects in the skeleton and teeth (e.g. enamel hypoplasias) (Mays, 1998). It is also possible to glean more detailed insights into diet through the chemical analysis of bone. Analysis of stable isotopes in particular has already found useful application in the Roman period (Prowse et al., 2004), with work focusing on the study of carbon and nitrogen isotopes to gain insights into the relative consumption of meat, plant, and marine resources throughout the last few decades of an individual’s life. For example, analysis using this method at the late Romano‐British inhumation cemetery of Poundbury differentiated the majority of individuals from those buried in mausolea and lead coffins on the basis of the latter having consumed signifi-cantly higher levels of fish or fish products (Richards & Hedges, 1998). Unfortunately, this method is not currently deemed suitable for analysis of diet from cremated bone, with heating thought to cause shifts in the carbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratios (Mays, 1998, 215).

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Tab

le 9

.1

Cat

egor

ies

of a

rcha

eolo

gica

l evi

denc

e an

d fa

ctor

s in

fluen

cing

the

ir u

sefu

lnes

s in

the

cha

ract

eriz

atio

n of

con

sum

ptio

n pr

actic

es.

Eff

ect

of

cons

umpt

ion

Eff

ect

of c

ultu

ral t

rans

form

sE

ffec

t of

nat

ural

tra

nsfo

rms

Arc

haeo

logi

cal r

ecor

d

Food

rem

ains

: ar

chae

obot

any

dige

stio

n; u

neat

en

was

tere

cycl

ing

(man

ure,

ani

mal

fo

dder

, bur

ning

) al

ters

sam

ple

bio‐

degr

adat

ion,

sc

aven

ging

alte

rs s

ampl

ebi

as t

owar

ds d

urab

le a

nd c

harr

ed

rem

ains

; rep

rese

ntat

ion

grea

ter

in

very

ari

d/w

ater

logg

ed c

onte

xts

Food

rem

ains

: zo

oarc

haeo

logy

butc

hery

mar

ks;

who

le o

r in

com

plet

e ca

rcas

ses

high

rec

yclin

g va

lue

(e.g

. too

ls,

anim

al fo

dder

, mar

row

bone

pr

oces

sing

) al

ters

sam

ple

biod

egra

datio

n (d

epen

dent

on

soi

l con

ditio

ns)

alte

rs

sam

ple

vari

able

rep

rese

ntat

ion

invo

lvin

g bi

as, d

epen

dent

on

cont

ext

Hum

an s

kele

tal r

emai

nsfo

od e

nabl

es g

row

th

and

mai

ntai

ns b

one

stru

ctur

e

high

ly s

usce

ptib

le t

o va

riat

ions

in

mor

tuar

y pr

actic

e; c

rem

atio

n ha

sten

s de

grad

atio

n an

d re

mov

es u

sefu

l inf

orm

atio

n

biod

egra

datio

n de

pend

ent

on c

hem

ical

pro

pert

ies

of

buri

al c

onte

xt

vari

able

rep

rese

ntat

ion;

food

in

sigh

ts li

mite

d to

gen

eral

nu

triti

on o

r di

et o

ver

seve

ral y

ears

Stru

ctur

es: d

inin

g ro

oms

and

eatin

g ar

eas

usua

lly n

eglig

ible

re‐u

se o

f bui

ldin

gs a

nd m

ater

ials

(e

.g. r

obbi

ng)

conf

uses

id

entif

icat

ion

of c

onsu

mpt

ion

loci

biod

egra

datio

n of

tim

ber

iden

tific

atio

n pr

oble

ms

com

prom

ise

usef

ulne

ss o

f ca

tego

ry; c

onsu

mpt

ion

ofte

n no

t co

nstr

aine

d sp

atia

lly

Tec

hnol

ogy:

met

alm

inim

alre

cycl

ing

and

re‐u

se; r

obbi

ngco

rros

ion

(dep

ende

nt o

n so

il pH

)va

riab

le r

epre

sent

atio

n in

volv

ing

bias

Tec

hnol

ogy:

gla

ssw

ear,

brea

kage

recy

clin

g an

d re

‐use

(m

eltin

g)lim

ited

vari

able

rep

rese

ntat

ion

invo

lvin

g bi

as

Tec

hnol

ogy:

cer

amic

wea

r, br

eaka

gelo

w r

ecyc

ling

valu

e (e

.g.

build

ing

mat

eria

l); h

ighl

y re

dund

ant

once

bro

ken

quan

tity

rem

ains

fair

ly

cons

tant

; spa

tial m

ovem

ent

likel

y

arch

aeol

ogic

ally

ubi

quito

us,

repr

esen

tativ

e es

peci

ally

in

undi

stur

bed

cont

exts

Art

and

vis

ual c

ultu

reno

t di

rect

ly in

volv

edal

l mat

eria

ls e

spec

ially

sub

ject

to

recy

clin

g an

d ro

bbin

g; m

oder

n an

tiqui

ties

trad

e

mos

tly li

mite

dge

ogra

phic

al c

over

age

limite

d to

‘c

ore’

are

as. i

ndir

ect

and/

or

idea

lized

rep

rese

ntat

ion

of

cons

umpt

ion

with

soc

io‐p

oliti

cal

bias

es

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100 Martin Pitts

The second category of evidence after the remains of food itself comprises the struc-tures forming the spatial location and setting of consumption. In a domestic context, this may necessitate the archaeological identification of individual households (Allison, 1999, 2004), although more unusual locations may be associated with consumption in reli-gious contexts (e.g. temples, shrines, and sanctuaries) and funerary contexts (e.g. ceme-teries and ustrina). However, caution must be exercised in the identification of such locations through archaeological refuse deposition alone. The place of rubbish disposal does not necessarily equate to the actual locus of consumption (see next section). Unless purpose‐built dining rooms or areas are straightforward to identify archaeologically, the value of structural remains to the study of ancient foodways can be rather secondary. Although the role of dining architecture has been productively studied in the Roman period (Dickmann, 1997; Dunbabin, 1995, 1996; Foss, 1997; Ling, 1995; Slofstra, 1995), the quality of evidence is often variable, particularly in outlying provincial areas and for lower‐status households lacking purpose built facilities and/or clear differentiation between room usage. Nevertheless, from a more temporal perspective, it may be produc-tive to investigate the relationship between changes in architecture and settlement mor-phology and any changes in consumption patterns in other classes of evidence.

The third and final category of evidence related to the transformation of food prior to ingestion, the “technology of consumption,” comprises containers and vessels for the storage, preparation, serving, and consuming of food and drink, including various forms of ceramic, glass, and metal vessels and accoutrements. Items in this category can be indicative of quite specific consumption activities, with vessel forms identified as cups and beakers being associated with drinking, platters and dishes with eating at a table, and so on. It is also possible to examine culturally unique items (such as the crater) that were vital components of social practices such as the symposion (Dunbabin, 1993). The identification of suites or services of vessels associated with specific social practices is best approached through a rigorous analysis of archaeological pottery assemblages in both domestic and funerary contexts (Pitts, 2010). Unlike virtually all other categories of archaeological material directly involved in consumption, ceramic material often undergoes relatively little transformation in quantity between its original use and excava-tion. During use, pottery can be worn down and broken, yet pottery sherds have a high resistance to adverse soil pH and other physical transforms. Furthermore, unlike animal bone and vessels made of other materials (especially glass and metal), pottery has few secondary uses once broken (e.g. as building material), having a relatively high level of redundancy and low recyclable value (although see Peña (2007) on pottery reuse). Although different categories of data should be considered complementary, pottery has an almost ubiquitous presence on many Roman archaeological sites, and as a class of evi-dence is likely to be collectively more representative of consumption practice than any other class of archaeological find. Pottery in the Roman period occurred in a hugely variable range of forms and fabrics, often relating to specific elements of food storage, preparation, and consumption. Moreover, certain types of Roman pottery, particularly amphorae, often provide the sole evidence for culturally important commodities such as wine, olive oil, and garum (Peacock & Williams, 1986; Plouviez, 2003).

Despite the obvious potential of ceramics and other food‐related material culture to bring new and more holistic insights into consumption practices in the ancient world, research on this subject to date has been geographically uneven within the ancient world. Roman Britain provides an excellent case‐study for the benefits of such an approach, owing to the high intensity of archaeological fieldwork in the UK, a wide range of

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The Archaeology of Food Consumption 101

specialist approaches to the evidence, and a recent tendency for researchers to address the social significance of their material in addition to traditional matters of chronology and distribution. In particular, Cool’s (2006) landmark study, Eating and Drinking in Roman Britain, highlights the significant potential of future research in this area in the rest of the Classical world, through the integrated analysis of archaeological assemblages encompassing a broad range of classes of evidence relating to consumption.

Disposal (Discard and Deposit Formation)

The final stage of the consumption process consists of the disposal and subsequent trans-formation of meal remains. This is not necessarily a mere dumping of leftovers, and is often a significant act in itself, especially with more ritualized communal events such as funerary ceremonies. The manner of disposal represents a potential means to add value to the remains of a given meal, and can be equally bound up with notions of cultural identity. Therefore, this section assesses the potential of archaeological evidence formed after the transformation of food and drink in a meal. This evidence relates primarily to spatial patterning of material formerly involved in eating and drinking, and the charac-teristics of any deposits formed that include this material. Of further note here is the extent to which it is possible to identify and characterize specific consumption events or “feasts” (Dietler & Hayden, 2001) through assemblages of discarded meal remains.

Characterizing deposition

During and after the transformation of food in a meal, refuse can be discarded at the location of consumption (conventionally understood as “primary” deposition) or, more likely in a domestic or urban context, it can be moved away and accumulated elsewhere (“secondary” deposition). Of course, instances of primary deposition would offer excel-lent indicators of the contexts within which consumption has taken place. However, cases of primary deposition of food refuse are likely to be rare, especially in domestic contexts. An ethnographic study of 79 cultural groups revealed that primary deposition is the ultimate fate of few material residues of household consumption (Murray, 1980), reinforced by LaMotta & Schiffer (1999), who argued that very little cultural deposition occurs within house structures during phases of habitation. Although attitudes to refuse disposal will undoubtedly vary between different cultural groups, it is probable that most refuse will be discarded away from the location of consumption; therefore, instances of primary deposition should be treated as special. From an archaeological point of view this observation is problematic, not least because it means that a high proportion of meal remains in the archaeological record have already been moved from their original con-texts of consumption. Moreover, in the process of such secondary deposition, food remains and other associated materials will often be variably subjected to a range of cultural transforms such as recycling and sorting (see Table 9.1), rendering it erroneous to assume that the complete remains of a given meal would be disposed of in a single deposit. Interpreting such material is further complicated by the prevailing value systems of past societies relating to the disposal of food remains, which may seem less utilitarian when compared to modern western societies. Although a contemporary mindset might dictate that one does not throw away what is still useful, there are countless examples in

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102 Martin Pitts

both contemporary society and the archaeological record to the contrary (e.g. wishing‐wells). Indeed, notions of social status are often bound up with the capacity to throw things away or waste conspicuously (Thompson, 1979, 1–2).

In previous attempts to understand “irrational” practices of refuse deposition, archae-ologists have used the concept of “structured deposition.” This term was originally coined by Richards & Thomas (1984) to explain a range of Neolithic deposits otherwise described as non‐domestic, unusual, symbolic, or purposeful (i.e. ritual). Although potentially of use in identifying the participation of archaeological food remains in past social practices (e.g. feasting), this concept is unhelpful due to its dependence on the contentious recognition of ritual in the archaeological record. Without a firm definition for ritual, the notion of structured deposition lacks any robust analytical utility. This phenomenon may be regarded as less problematic in historical periods with written descriptions of instances of “structured deposition,” such as the placing of a colony’s first fruits in the ceremonial pit or mundus in Roman urban foundation ritual (Brown, 1980, 17; Woodward & Woodward, 2004), although the identification of such specific features archaeologically has often proved controversial (Bispham, 2006, 95). Recognizing that a universally applicable definition of ritual does not exist, Hill (1995, 97–8) argued that ritual should be identified in archaeological terms as practices distinct from everyday practices, which typify the ordinary and the routine according to the values of the society under scrutiny. Therefore, what is ritual deposition and “non‐rational” can only be ascertained by first defining the mundane and “rational.” The same criteria can be applied to archaeological assemblages containing food and food‐related material culture, in order to distinguish important feasting events from everyday forms of consumption.

Identifying feasting in the archaeological record

Research into the archaeology of feasting, notably the influential work of Dietler & Hayden (2001), has drawn attention to the possibility of reconstructing instances of communal consumption through an archaeological investigation of meal remains. Whilst typically focusing on New World archaeology and prehistoric Europe, such an approach offers considerable potential for offering complementary perspectives into food con-sumption in the Greco‐Roman period. This concern with feasting fits within more tradi-tional anthropological literature concerning the use of surplus for social benefit such as gift‐giving (Mauss, 1976), with the characteristics of feasting coming under the heading of the “potlatch,” particularly in terms of the reciprocal inviting of guests and competi-tion for hospitable honors (Douglas & Isherwood, 1996, 46). In this vein, Dietler (2001) offers a cross‐cultural classificatory schema of feasts, in terms of their role in structuring power relations in society. Whilst the “empowering feast” involves the basic manipulation of food for the purpose of social positioning, the “patron‐role feast” is more formalized, with the purpose of reinforcing entrenched social inequalities. In con-trast, in the “diacritical feast” participants are accorded status on the basis of factors such as taste, manners, and styles of eating as opposed to reciprocity or the sheer quantity of food being consumed.

To distinguish feasting from more mundane everyday forms of consumption, Dietler (2001) argued that feasting is distinctive because it is a form of public ritual. In this sense, feasting (as ritual) can only be identified once there is some consensus on what constitutes the mundane, as with the similar notion of structured deposition discussed

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The Archaeology of Food Consumption 103

above. Thus, applying Dietler’s anthropological definition and taxonomy of feasting in an archaeological rather than ethnographic context is somewhat problematic. First, it relies upon the assumption that feasting as ritual is easily identifiable in the archaeolog-ical record, encouraging undue emphasis to be placed on unusual consumption events as opposed to the everyday. Second, although the three modes of feasting are not intended to be mutually exclusive, distinctions between them are not clear‐cut, and it is difficult to envisage how they can precisely be elucidated from archaeological evidence. Hayden (2001) provides a more tangible list of archaeological criteria for the identification of feasting, including the presence of large quantities of food and/or consumption technology, rare or luxury foodstuffs and/or specialized feasting paraphernalia, associ-ated prestige items, and location in close proximity to special places and/or facilities (i.e. temples, funerary contexts, etc.). Nevertheless, the mere presence of these charac-teristics does not necessarily distinguish a feast from everyday forms of communal consumption, nor do they provide explicit guidance in determining the nature of power relations at a given instance of feasting. The difficulties in applying such concepts are clearly demonstrated in Ralph’s (2007) study of feasting in pre‐Roman East Anglia (UK). Here feasts are identified on problematic grounds (e.g. being equated with large pottery assemblages), and uncomfortable distinctions are made between different types of feast (e.g. work party, alliance‐building and diacritical) on the basis of limited support-ing evidence.

Although it is undeniable that individual consumption events can be plausibly identified in the archaeological record, distinguishing “feasting” from more everyday consumption is often fraught with problems. The issues of redundancy versus significance, and feasting versus everyday consumption, are often a matter of how deposits are structured, what they contain, and where they are placed. In view of this, a more produc-tive methodological approach is to examine “feasting” in the context of broader food consumption patterns, by placing primary emphasis on the characterization of everyday or mundane patterns of the disposal of food and associated technologies in a given locality. This kind of research is necessary not only for the meaningful identification of feasting, but also to engender a more holistic understanding of food consumption that is not biased towards patterns of perversity. Instead of forcing assemblages into the uncomfortable opposition of feasting versus mundane consumption, an approach that treats all such evidence as providing valuable information on consumption as social prac-tice is perhaps more commendable.

Conclusion: Towards a Holistic Archaeology of Consumption Practice

Although the quantity and diversity of archaeological evidence pertaining to food con-sumption undoubtedly offers significant potential for future research into ancient food-ways, the sheer breadth of such data and methodological approaches arguably provides an obstacle to future synthesis. Integrated studies comparing several different classes of evidence in an analytical fashion have been few to date (Meadows, 1997, 1999; Cool, 2006), due in part to the tendency of archaeologists to specialize in studying one particular class of material evidence. Thus, it may be argued that the principal classes of evidence are best studied individually, but with greater emphasis on the findings being synthesized at a later stage. As a relatively young discipline, archaeology has rapidly

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104 Martin Pitts

fragmented in recent decades, with a growing number of researchers sharing closer academic affinities to those in other disciplines (from analytical chemistry to social anthropology and cultural geography) than their contemporaries in archaeology, not to mention the continuing divide between prehistoric, Classical, and historical archaeology. In view of this, food consumption is perhaps one of the few themes in archaeology with the potential to re‐unite its increasingly disparate strands, whilst simultaneously engaging the interests of related disciplines. Such integration is not only intellectually desirable, but also necessary to make archaeology more accessible and foster increased public engagement with the subject.

FURTHER READING

Food in antiquity is a popular subject, but as yet there are few introductions that deal with the archaeological evidence in a comprehensive fashion. A good introduction to the archaeology of food in general is provided by Brothwell & Brothwell (1998), spanning a wide range of periods and approaches. For more Classical content, Garnsey (1999) has much relevant archaeological content. For specific classes of evidence Dunbabin (2003) on architectural remains and MacKinnon (2004) on animal bones are good starting points. For an integrated approach to different kinds of archaeological evidence for eating and drinking in a particular region, Cool (2006) is unique, par-ticularly in its accessible synthesis of complex assemblage data from decades of excavation reports. The problems and potential of studying feasting from archaeological data are explored in depth by Dietler & Hayden (2001). The present chapter has been heavily influenced by anthropological approaches to consumption; see Greene (2008) and Wallace‐Hadrill (2008) for broader discussion of such concepts in the context of the Roman empire.

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