Pater Familias

Theories, observations, and articles, by Philip Schaefer · All posts · Categories

ROMAN FOOD AND ROMAN NAMES.

February 23, 2009 at 11:35 AM · History

ROMAN FOOD AND ROMAN NAMES. I had known that Cicero’s family name came from the Latin word for chickpea. While looking at KITCHEN MYSTERIES, a book on the science of cooking by Herve This, I learned that other distinguished Roman families derived their names from foods: Fabius comes from faba, the broad bean; Lentulus comes from the word for lentil and Piso comes from the word for pea. Wikipedia tells me that Murena comes from the word for lamprey.