Food and dining in the Roman Empire and a pesto-like preparation, somewhat similar to pizza or focaccia. Maintaining a bread oven is labor-intensive and requires space, so apartment dwellers probably prepared their dough at home, then had it baked in a communal oven. Mills and commercial ovens, usually combined in a bakery complex, were considered so vital to the wellbeing of Rome that several religious festivals honored the deities who furthered these processes—and even the donkeys who toiled in the mills. Vesta, the goddess of the hearth, was seen as complementary to Ceres, the goddess of grain, and donkeys were garlanded and given a rest on the
Royal household under the Merovingians and Carolingians Volume II: The Rise of the Saracens and the Foundation of the Western Empire", Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1913 Bury, J. B. (Editor), "The Cambridge Medieval History, Volume III: Germany and the Western Empire," Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1924 Previte-Orton, C. W. (Editor), "The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History, Volume I: The Later Roman Empire to the Twelfth Century", Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1952 Nelson, Janet L., "Charles the Bald", Longman Press, 1992 Nelson, Janet L. (Translator), "The Annals of St-Bertin", Manchester University Press, Manchester, 1991 Royal household under the Merovingians and Carolingians The royal household of the early kings of