How Romans Had Fun (And It Got Wild)

Two men in a Pompeii bar have been arguing over a game of dice for two thousand years. Spend a night out in ancient Rome: the bars emperors tried to shut down, the dice games they couldn't quit, the loudest bathhouse in the city, chariot races watched by 150,000 screaming fans, a gladiator riot painted on a wall, the dinner party where the guests were smothered in flowers, a pet eel with golden earrings, love letters scratched into walls, and the one week a year when the whole city turned upside down. 0:00 The Dice Game on the Wall 1:03 The Bar Emperors Tried to Shut Down 2:43 The Game Emperors Couldn't Quit 4:55 The Loudest Building in Rome 7:48 150,000 Screaming Fans 10:35 The Riot Painted on a Wall 12:26 The Show Cato Walked Out Of 13:46 The Dinner Party 16:13 The Dog With Its Own Portrait 19:20 The Eel With Golden Earrings 20:56 The Poem That Got a Poet Exiled 22:41 The Week Rome Went Mad Sources: Suetonius (Augustus, Caligula, Claudius, Nero, Vitellius); Seneca, Letters 18 and 56, On Anger 3.40, To Helvia 10; Pliny the Elder, Natural History 7, 9; Pliny the Younger, Letters 2.17 and 9.6; Tacitus, Annals 4.14 and 14.17; Martial; Ovid, Art of Love 1 and Tristia 2; Petronius, Satyricon; Plutarch, Lucullus; Valerius Maximus 2.10.8; Lucian, Saturnalia; Historia Augusta (Hadrian, Elagabalus); Pompeii inscriptions (CIL IV) and the Bath curse tablets.