Accommodation in ancient Rome
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In the city of ancient Rome, only the wealthy could afford to live in a domus (in this case, house, like a mansion). For most of Rome apartments (or the back rooms of their ground floor shops) were the affordable alternative, making Rome the first urban, flat-based society. The Rome apartments were often in buildings called insulae(sg. insula [literally, 'island']). Some Rome apartments may have been in buildings 7-8 stories high. Lodging houses were diversoria, where residents (hospites or diversitores) lived in cellae 'rooms'.
The Latin that seems closest to Rome apartments, cenacula, is formed from the Latin word for a meal, cena, making cenaculum signify a dining area, but the cenacula were for more than dining. Hermansen says the balcony and/or windows of the Rome apartments were major centres of social life in Rome. Upper-story windows (on the buildings' outsides) were illegally used for dumping. The Rome apartments may have contained 3 types of rooms:
The Latin that seems closest to Rome apartments, cenacula, is formed from the Latin word for a meal, cena, making cenaculum signify a dining area, but the cenacula were for more than dining. Hermansen says the balcony and/or windows of the Rome apartments were major centres of social life in Rome. Upper-story windows (on the buildings' outsides) were illegally used for dumping. The Rome apartments may have contained 3 types of rooms:
- cubicula (bedrooms)
- exedra (sitting room)
- medianum corridors facing the street and like the atrium of a domus.