Rakes These tools are

used for a multitude of

jobs, from separating
dirt and rocks to
cleaning out animal’s
Pitchforks stalls. They were also
These were and are used to cultivate the
primarily used to ground and prepare it
move hay and for planting.
straw.

Shovel This was and

is used for moving
These roman farm tools are dirt and rocks to
good examples of what kind also cleaning out
of tools Roman farmers used animal’s stalls. But
they could also be
during the empire age but it
used for planting.
wasn’t just the Romans who
used these tools as many
other peoples used the
relatively same tools

In Ancient Rome, there was a variety of

foods that the Romans ate. In coastal towns, some
Romans ate seafood, mainly consisting of fish, which
they either bought from a fisherman or caught
themselves. Also, there were the farmers, who
either produced grapes, which they ate, but also
they made wine out of them, which is the primary
drink for them at the time, olives, for olive oil,
and some other farms made grain, wheat and
barley, which were either used in trade or to make
food, mainly bread-based foods.

Roman wine was There were also farm animals, such as

kept in these oxen and donkeys for the heavy-duty jobs, bees
shaped pottery jars that provided sugar, cows, for milk, and finally
sheep and goats. They were used to produce milk
and for their hides which were used to make
clothing and wine sacks, which they used to
transport wine, like a canteen. Farmers didn’t
really use horses, but the richer people raised
them to race or for the military.

Also, owning land was a sign of importance

in Roman society. It gave you a high status not only
if you had a larger farm (typically owned by the
wealthy nobles, also known as aristocrats) but also
if produced the highest quality and most profitable
product. There were 3 farm sizes: small: 18-108
jugera*, medium: 80-500 jugera, and large**: 500+
jugera.
*Roman unit of area, it’s about .65 acres.
**commonly referred to as Latifunda
There were four systems of farming that
the Romans used. (1) Where the farmer and his
family did all the work on the farm and they
employed no one. (2) Sharecropping, where the
farm owner had a tenant(s), with which he
shares the product. (3) Slavery, where, as you
know, the farm owner owned slaves that did all
the work and were monitored by a slave
overseer. (4) where the farm owner acted like a
land lord and leased the land to a tenant.
 Typically, a family of 6 without
Did you know?
animals would need to farm at least 12 jugera
to have enough food and another 8 if they had
Snails were raised by roman farmers
animals. They would also need at least 20
as luxury pets.
jugera if they were sharecropping farmers,
where roughly 1/3 of the overall product is
given to the “land lord” as payment.

Typical Roman
farm. A large percentage of farms in ancient
Rome were owned by the wealthy aristocrats
but that typically didn’t even live on their
farms. But how did they control their farms you
ask? What they did was they had a freedman as
an overseer for the slaves* that worked on
their farm. The overseer was responsible for
making sure the slaves were fed, clothed and
sheltered properly, which also happened to be
their payment, which was why they were such
popular workers and why they were the primary
There were three different
source of labor in ancient Rome. He also made
ways to get a slave.
sure that the work was evenly spread among the
(1)- Go to the market and buy
slaves and that if they fought he fixed the
one.
fights. And he made sure that any and all orders
(2)- Through the conquest of
given from the owner to be followed. And those
war.
are just a few of their tasks.
(3)- Be born into slavery.
*go over there.