Lex Aemilia sumptuaria
From NovaRoma
(Difference between revisions)
m (Reverted edits by M. Lucretius Agricola (Talk); changed back to last version by Gnaeus Cornelius Lentulus) |
|
| (One intermediate revision by one user not shown) | |
Latest revision as of 17:20, 17 March 2011
The Lex Aemilia sumptuaria was enacted by M. Aemilius Scaurus, consul of AUC 639 (115 BCE). As with the Lex Licinius sumptuaria, rather than limit the number of guests at a dinner party, or the cost one could spend on a feast, it sought to prohibit which foods and food preparations could used. Thus the Lex Aemilia sumptuaria prohibited meals that served mice, rats, stuffed (or force-fed) dormice, mussels, and those birds that came from foreign lands. Similar prohibitions were decreed by censors of an earlier date and the prohibitions applied also to what foods were not acceptable to serve to the Gods.
Source: C. Plinius Secundus, Historia Naturalis 8.57 (223)
