ricotta, slept on straw mattresses made of wild fennel72 inside small conical huts, much like those of their Neolithic ancestors around the Mediterranean. This type of accommodation survived in the agro romano until after World War II, when health regulations prohibited them.
Even in the 1800s, the incredible spectacle of hundreds of thousands of sheep leaving for the transhumance could be seen: They paraded in a great cloud of dust, and in their midst, riding a mule, the vergaro used his verga (staff) to set the pace of the flock, speeding them up or slowing them down as needed. Amid that sea of moving wool walked the shepherds, skin leathery from the sun despite their broad felt hats tied under the chin. After the flock came the so-called vignarole, a large cart where sick or lame sheep could ride, and, finally, the long string of laden mules, some with their loads balanced with cheese-making utensils.
Their march took place along tratturi, or “tracks,” which are the oldest roads in the world. For centuries, the flocks always traveled the same route, across Tuscany, Abruzzo, Puglia, Lucania (Basilicata), and Campania. A census of tratturi conducted at the beginning of the 1900s counted a total of 3,050 kilometers (1,895 miles).
The flocks traveled at night, to avoid the heat of the day, but in the darkness it was necessary to keep the eyes wide open, because the brigand, who could already taste the roast lamb, hid behind the hedges, grabbed the legs of the last sheep in the line, and gagged its mouth to keep it from crying out. During the day, the shepherds hunted terragni,73 or they gathered field greens. The shepherd had a trained eye and was able to fill his bag quickly with lattughella di maggese, chicories, radishes, and rampions, which ended up in a good soup in the evening. No clocks were needed to tell the time: when Venus—which they called gallinella—appeared in the sky, it was midnight.
Roads and Taverns
The great roads that radiated from the Urbs like the spokes of a wheel had once been one of the strengths of the Roman expansion. But over the centuries they deteriorated into small lanes, some wiped out by scrub, some reconstructed with a different route of greater local interest. Even the Via Francigena74 was shifted to different routes, of which the only certain one is the end of the Via Cassia, roughly from the Baccano valley75 to the entrance to Rome.
The ancient roads measured their distances from the gates in the Servian walls76 and were named either for the city toward which they led or the political authority who had had them built. Thus the Via Nomentana led to Nomentum, today Mentana; the Via Tiburtina to Tibur, present-day Tivoli; while the Via Flaminia was called by the name of the censor Gaius Flaminius and went to Ariminum (Rimini), start of the Via Aemilia, built in the consulate of Marcus Aemilius Lepidus.
The most beautiful and important road was the Via Appia, built, says Livy,77 in 312 B.C. It led to Capua78 and was the first Roman road to be paved in the manner of the Carthaginian roads, that is, with basalt stones. By that time Rome was a major power. The roads of the early republican period were simple tracks, difficult to transit for merchants and armies. That must have been why the central government felt the need to speed up the traffic of the armies. Its surface was perfectly smooth, and two vehicles coming from opposite directions could pass each other. Along its route were numerous stages: Right after the Porta Capena was Ad Novum; there followed Bovillae (Boville, near Frattocchie), Aricias (Ariccia), Ad Sponsas (perhaps Cisterna), Tres Tabernae (still not identified), and Forum Appii (whose tavern was known for having mosquitoes as large as elephants). Then came Ad Medias (Mesa), Feronia, Tarracina (Terracina), Fundi (Fondi), Formiae (Formia), Minturnae (Minturno), Ad Pontem campanum, Urbanas (Urbana), Casilinum (present-day Capua), and finally Capua.
But there were other roads toward different points south, such as the Ostiensis, the Laurentina, the Campana, and the Ardeatina. Toward the east ran the Latina, the Tusculana, the Asinaria, the Labicana, the Praenestina or Gabina, the Collatina, and the Tiberina or Valeria. The roads leading north were the Nomentana, the Salaria, the Flaminia, and the Cassia.
Besides the Appia, the richest and most ornate roads were the Flaminia, the Latina, and the Cassia. The first stretch, just outside the walls, was lined with tombs and mausoleums. In later centuries, shepherds and peasants of the agro used their ruins as shelter for the night.
Settlements gradually formed at the stopping places along the roads and grew into villages, towns, and cities. They were designated municipium, civitas, or vicus, but there were also small agglomerations, very important for the nomenclature of the roads, such as mansio, positio, and mutatio. A mansio was a simple cluster of houses that included one or more taverns for staying overnight. The positio was a mansio located on the seashore. And a mutatio was a place where horses could be changed.
With the centuries, the ancient Roman stations took the name of stazioni di posta79 and added other services, such as a church and a grocery shop, especially for rural workers. Many of these villages were also fortified with sturdy walls; one entered through one gate and left through the other. A number of these stations became known as an osteria della posta and remained in operation for many centuries. Some are remembered for the illustrious names that passed through them: the osteria of Grotta Rossa, outside the Porta del Popolo, already existed in Cicero’s day;80 the emperor Vespasian camped in the neighborhood when getting ready to give battle to Vitellius in 69, and it was still standing during the Battle of the Milvian Bridge, between Constantine and Maxentius, in October 312. Tradition has it that, in the twelfth century, the concordat between Pope Paschal II and Henry V on the question of the investiture81 was signed at an osteria near Sutri; much later, an osteria witnessed the retreat of Garibaldi in 1849. Montaigne and later Shelley and Byron stayed at Castelnuovo di Porto, since the sixteenth century a property of the Vatican, which gave it in concession for use as an inn for periods of nine years. From 1700 on, this station displayed the image of a peacock on its sign.
The population of these osterias along the great arteries grew over time. Other artisans joined the blacksmith, the tavern keeper, and the priest who said mass to provide needed services: shoemakers who made bags and purses, tinsmiths who made kitchen utensils. Little by little the villages grew into the large and small towns that today still line the major highways. One of the most important was certainly the Osteria della Storta on the Via Cassia, at a strategic point on the Via Francigena, 9 miles (14.5 kilometers) from Rome. There were actually five osterias here, given the importance of the interchange. Already in the Roman period there was an osteria for the postal service and to this end was built a stabulum for the post. According to tradition, Saint Ignatius of Loyola had a vision when he stopped here on his way to Rome. The Osteria dei Cacciatori (of the hunters), at the foot of Monte Sacro, was still standing, when, on August 15, 1805, Simón Bolívar swore he would liberate South America from Spanish domination; and the Osteria dei Francesi in Marino, near Frascati, in the Castelli Romani, took its name from Alberico da Barbiano, the great condottiero in the service of the papacy, in memory of his victory over the French in 1379.
One of the osterias on the Tiber Island belonged to a man named Grappasonne. In 1908, Queen Margherita’s car broke down in front of it. Later the owner hung on a hook the chair on which Her Majesty rested while the problem was being dealt with. From that day on, the sign on the osteria bore this inscription: “Osteria with choice wines from the forest of Marino. In this wretched osteria, on the 17th day of October 1908, the automobile of Her Majesty the Queen broke down, and she sat in this humble chair. The owner, Abele Grappasonne, moved by such an honor, placed this commemoration.”
Prices were already regulated in 1529, when in the absence of Pope Clement VII (1523–34), the legate Antonio del Monte published a “table of prices” for the osterias and the suburban taverns, from which we deduce that the price of bread in the osterias must have been one and a half bolognino per libbra, wine four bolognini the boccale, and the “evening,” which included lodging for the night and the meal for the traveler and his horse, should not exceed twenty-five bolognini. A ration of fodder, or, as they called it then, provenna, cost five bolognini. In the city things were changing, because the rates varied according to the level and reputation of the establishments.
As the centuries passed, many of the suburban osterias disappeared with the vicissitudes of the territory, but vestiges of a number of them remain, and a careful eye today can still spot