Advertising in the Roman Empire

ADVERTISING IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE

THE TERM "ADVERTISING" has been defined through a commonly agreed-upon moderm explanation ("a paid form of promotion with an identifiable sponsor, intended to produce an action in the audience"). Throughout this article, advertising and other terms will be used to describe ancient Roman activities. I will also use the terms "public relations" (somewhat glibly defined as "doing good and telling others about it) and "marketing" ("that part of business concerned with price, product, promotion, and distribution").

Most research for this article centers on archaeological findings in the Italian cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. The writings of Pliny the Younger indicate that Mt. Vesuvius erupted on August 24, 79 A.D., and buried these two cities.

The director of excavations at Pompeii in 1860, Giuseppe Fiorelli, is credited with the true preservation of Pompeii. Because of the careful excavations, instead of being left to the elements and treasure hunters, Pompeii and Herculaneum are a unique source of information, especially in terms of the written word.

Though the destruction of the two cities occurred more than 1900 years ago, this was far from a primitive society. It included a large population of middle-class workers, including fullers, tanners, bankers, dry cleaners, innkeepers, shipbuilders, merchant seamen, jewelers, mule drivers, potters, teachers, fruit sellers, goldsmiths, fishermen, actors, athletes, miners, glassblowers, civil servants, carpenters, blacksmiths, police, firefighters, candlemakers, oil merchants, barbers, butchers, tailors, and weavers.

Many of these people were clients in the advertising business -- people seeking assistance in promoting their goods and services. Just as today, the area with the greatest diversity of clients was consumer goods -- products for mass consumption such as food, clothing, and health and beauty aids. A considerable amount of activity went into the manufacturing, importing, and selling of such consumer goods. As part of that activity, a complex advertising business flourished. While we cannot say for sure, it is likely that the Roman Empire was the cradle of advertising and marketing, where many of the practices of advertising as we know them now were developed.

The traditional date of the founding of Rome by Romulus is the year 753 B.C. Around 117 B.C., during the reign of the Emperior Trajan, the Roman Empire stretched from what is now Portugal in the west to the border of Scotland in the north, to Egypt in the south and to Saudi Arabia in the east.

The literacy and expansion of the empire, along with the development of the Roman political system, triggered a move from small, self-supporting farm communities to cities, which meant competition and diversification in commerce.

From at least as far back as the third century B.C., leisure travel by ship and horseback was possible for Romans. That people could afford leisure travel and do it without great rsk helped create tourism both as an industry and as a booming import/export business. Money was another factor contributing to this commercial development. The coining of money occurred at least as early as the first half of the third century B.C. The reliance on currency instead of barter, and the establishment of stable wages and prices, had a tremendous impact on commerce.

OVer time, the Roman labor pool developed to include both skilled and unskilled workers in a wide variety of trades, including art. Just as today, artists of all types played a large part in ancient advertising -- including writers, painters, sculptors, mosaicitsts, actors, and poets.

PRODUCTS

While beer was available in the Roman Empire, wine was a more popular drink and was mrketed with techniques similar to those used to sell beer today. At least 200 different brands of wine have been found throughout the empire; more than 50 in the cities of Vesuvius alone.

Most vintages were branded -- given a name -- ranging from a simple description (Vinum rubrum meant red wine), origin (Creticum excellens meant excellent wine of Crete) age (Rubrum annorum quatuor Ampliato meant four-year-old red for Ampliatus), winery name (M. Fabi Eupori Cnidum meant wine of Marcus Fabius Euporus), or a characterization (such as frenzy wine).

Another popular product of the day was a fish sauce called garum. It was made by mixing the entrails of sprats or sardines with finely chopped portions of fish and roe -- pounedM crushed, and stirred. The mixture was literally beaten to a pulp and left in either a warm room or the sun to ferment. After about six weeks of evaporationM this liquamen was put into a basket. What filtered through the cracks and into the decanters was garum.

Garum was apparently in favor throughout the Roman Empire and was sold under a wide variety of brand names:

* Best liquamen, for Aulus Virnius Modestus, from Agathopus

* Quality strained sauce

* Scaurus' tunny jelly, blossom brand, put up by Eutyches, slave of Scaurus

* 100 Percent Pure Garum of Scombrius Fortunatus (Foreshadowing Ivory Soap's 99-44/100%)

* Best hallex of Vibia

* Garum, essence of the best mackerel, from the shop of Agathopus

Even today, in many noncapitalist societies, most products are not advertised. They are packaged in containers labeled cheese of milk or butter. But Romans understood advertising and used it to try to make their brands seem unique.

POSITIONING AND MARKETING

Positioning means establishing a niche in the marketplace for a product -- finding a unique position for your product in a crowded field, so the product's purpose will fit comparatively few people's needs instead of trying to be all things to everyone. That is why Federal Express, for example, is not positioned as a deliveru service directly competitive with UPS or Purolator, but only as the most dependable "when it absolutely, positively has to get there overnight."

Ancient wine merchants were smart marketers. Just as American beer importers do today, ancient merchants understood the value of a product labeled "import." An ad for a tavern in Pompeii reads in part, "If you will have given the sum of two asses, you will drink better wines; if you will have paid four, you will drink Falernian wines."

SERVICES

Just as with products, competition for the consumer denarii was fierce. People had a choice of where to go for baths, drinking, dining, lodging, and banking. In Pompeii alone, at least 1,300 shops have been discovered, along with 30 inns.

A walk down a typical Pompeiian commercial street would show signs for such businesses as "the quick surveyor," "Publius Cornelius Faventinus, barber," "Phoebus the perfume dealer," "Cresces the architect," and "Marcus Vecilius Verecundus, the tailor/clothes dealer."

The baths are a particularly well-documented aspect of ancient Roman leisure-time activities. Most were fairly large operations like modern health clubs, with either fresh or salt water baths and rooms for changing, relaxing, and being oiled. At least one water area would be heated. The typical Roman went to teh baths almost daily, and spent the time alternating between the frigidarium and the laconicum.

Promotion for the baths included a complete listing of facilities, and occasionally a boastful advertising statement about quality. The Villa of Julia Felix in Pompeii, for instance, described itself as "good enough for VEnus," quite a statement in a population which worshipped the gods.

Advertising for bars, restaurants, and hotels was generally limited to shop signs, although at least one example exists of a sign located on the way to the amphitheatre, suggesting that patrons stop by after the show. While some signs were rather straightforward, many used beautiful illustrations and persuasive words. One innkeeper's sign read Hospitium: hic locatur tricinium cum tribus lectis et commodis omnibus, or "Inn: here is located a dining room with three couches and all conveniences." At the cloth factory and salesroom of M. Vecilius Verecundus was a lovely sign showing the entire clothmaking process. A carved relief at a butcher shop in Ostia shows the scales used to weigh meat. At a gambling house in Pompeii, a stone relief was painted with four phalli in red (it was a brothel, too) and a grey dice beaker against the dark background.

There were also point-of-purchase signs for specific products. One example of wine promotion at the point of sale is a large and attractive sign outside a tavern. It bears the inscription Ad cucumus, or "Cone to the sign of the bowls," and contains an illustrated wine list with the range of prices.

The two most popular forms of entertainment during the Roman Empire were public games and plays. Particularly good examples exist of ads for the games. There is even evidence of programs (libellus), as well as paintings of toga-clad men reading the advertisements for upcoming shows -- the Roman equivalent of a newspaper's entertainment listings. In additon to the number and kinds of combats, promoters advertised special inducements, as in vela erunt . . .("awnings will be provided").

POLITICAL ADVERTISING

We have numerous examples of Roman political advertising because the eruption of mount Vesuvius took place while many election "posters" were still up. More than 1,600 election advertisements supporting more than 100 different candidates have been found in Pompeii.

Some election advertisements had no sponsor: P FVR II V VB O VF Was the abbreviation for "Publium Furium duumvirum, virum bonum, oro vos, facite," translated as: "Make Publius Furius duumvir, I beg of you; he's good man." Others were sponsored by a business, group, or private citizen. M. Holconium Priscum II vir, i.d. pomari universi cum Helvio Vestale rog. translates as "All the fruit sellers, together with Helvius Vestalis, urge the election of M. Holconium Priscus as duumvir with judicial authority."

TRADEMARKS AND LOGOS

The ancient Romans were sophisticated in the packaging of goods, especially in the use of trademarks. One is the logo used by the wine merchant Marcus Sestius, whose wine ship was excavated off the coast of Marseilles, France in the 1950s. his final journey was thought to have been around 230 B.C. More than 7,000 wine jars were recovered, each with the same stamp. It had a trident next to it, the mark of Neptune or Poseidon, god of the sea: a fitting mark for a wine dealer who travelled throughout the Mediterranean.

A good trademark must connect the symbol with the business at a glance and communicate some fundamental information about the business. In Marcus Sestius' case, it ws clear his business was the sea. His mark was also found on land in similar form. On the Aegean island of Delos, thought to be his home port, was found a mosaic on a house floor with the SES pattern, this time with the trident forming the E.

A win e jug found in Pompeii carries the trdemrk Vr in usis Coelia Proculae, in which Vr stands for "Vinum rubrum." The mark translates as "Red wine for the enjoyment of Coelia Procula." Many trademarks did not use "proper" Latin. The use of abbreviations and the combining of letters was an accepted practice, rather than a slang, much as we in English would be comfortable with such terms as "Inc.," "OK," or "etc." in an ad.

The combining of letters, in this case V and R, is an attractive design element. It has a much different look than the letters simply placed next to each other . And it's a practice that continues today. A recent introduction of a new Kodak film designated VR carries much the same design.

Scriptores (literally, signpainters) were primarily responsible for the work (election signs, shop signs, announcements of games) that has been found throughout Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Ostia. Working sometimes alone, sometimes with assistants, they created some very handsome advertising.

Several signed their work. One announcement ends with Scr(ipsit) Aemilius Celer sing(ulus) ad luna(m), or "Aemilius CEler wrote this, all alone by the light of the moon." Scriptores were thought to be a class of scribe, who, under Diocletian's edict, were paid 20 or 25 denarii per 100 lines written. For the sake of compparison, a hircut was two denarii, and carpenters were paid 50 denarii per day. Whatever their class and income, the scriptores had no shortage of work, especially during a campaign season. They closely resembled the art director in the modern advertising community.

Scriptores (sometimes called signatores) solicited and serviced clients, created advertising arranged for its placement, and carried out the production process. They usually worked at night, assisted by a dealbator, or white-washer, and a lanternarius, or lantern-holder. Their primary medium was the wall, which by whitewashing could be used over and over again.

Scholars place all Latin inscriptions in one of three categories. The first is formal inscriptions, usually done on stone, often commemorating public works projects or private acts of charity. The second category is graffiti (literally, "scratches") -- less formal engraving, particularly numerous in Pompeii. The third category is dipinti, or wall paintings. This category usually included the election notices and announcements for games.

As you can see from the accompanying illustrations, many of the dipinti used typographical features normally considered generic to modern advertising. In its most basic form, a printed advertisement consists of a headline, body copy, illustration, and signature. These four elements and their classic arrangement as a large headline, followed by an illustration, smaller body copy, and then a still smaller signature, are not part of instinct or genetic coding. Developing this format ws a learned process, and it may have begun here on the walls of the Roman Empire.

In De Oratore, Cicero relates an incident involving rival firms competing for a construction contract. When both were summoned to speak before elected officials (who could give out the contract), the firm that hired an orator to speak for it, won.

Orators were people who spoke for a living, usually on the behalf of others, like public relations people today. Like orators, many ancient Roman writers occasionally mixed advertising with their philosophy. The poets Martial and Horace mention specific brands of wine in their work, and even Virgil is accused of this act.

The poet Horace: Nec purpurarum sidere clarior delenit usus nec Falerna vitis, which translates as: "Purple brighter than the stars nor Falernian (wine) soothes a grieving man." Another Horace slogan was: Festo quid potius die Neptuni faciam? Prome reconditum Lyde, strenue Caecubum, which translates as: "What would I rather do on the festival of Neptune? Come on, Lydia, hurry and bring forth the stored Caecubian (wine)."

The games at the amphitheatre used promotions such as programs, special inducements like awnings, and premium items like lamps with the images of gladiators upon them. Athletes and celebrities were often used to endorse products or for their merchandising value. In Ostia and in Rome, for example, archaelogists found handles of pocket knives inscribed with the head and name of a horse, Nereos, and his jockey, Euprepes.

POSITIONING. Feature/benefit copy strategies. Outdoor advertising. Trademarks. Not the types of things one would ordinarily expect an archaeologist to dust off carefully at an excavation site. But that's precisely what has happened.

While there were other civilizations that existed -- indeed, flourished -- before the Roman era, none had the marketing climate ofd this empire. Others had coined money, developed language, technical skills, government; but nowhere else do we find the abundance and acceptance of advertising and related businesses.

It may have had as much to do with the Romans themselves as with the social/political/commercial environment in which they lived. They were, by and large, a highly literate people. They were artistic. They enjoyed living the good life. In a way that was perhaps not possible in other old cultures, people could achieve some measure of respect, relative wealth, and improvement of their status through commerce. By capitalizing on new trends and out-thinking competitors, by building better mousetraps and using a new communications phenomenon we now call advertising, the Romans achieved all of these, and greatness too.

If it were possible for a Roman merchant or scriptore to walk into a modern advertising agency, their portfolio of work would look dated only in terms of radiocarbon dating. Their style, freshness, persuasion, and originality would win a few awards.

COPYRIGHT 1987 Point Foundation
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group