Archaeologists Gather Online to Celebrate the History of The Mediterranean Diet

According to Roman mythol­ogy, there were three foods that the gods gave to humankind.

Minerva, the god­dess of wis­dom, gave an olive tree. Demeter, the god­dess of the har­vest, gifted wheat. Dionysus gave Romans the vine.

From these three gifts came foods that con­tinue to con­sti­tute three pil­lars of the Mediterranean diet: olive oil, bread and wine.

Archaeologists recently gath­ered online to dis­cuss the his­tory of the diet and cel­e­brate the eleventh anniver­sary of its inclu­sion on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage list.

Among the guests at the sem­i­nar was the direc­tor of the Naples Archeological Museum, Paolo Giulierini, who led the audi­ence on a jour­ney through ancient sources.

“In the coun­tries of the so-called ​‘Mezzaluna fer­tile’ – mainly the Mesopotamia region, then neigh­bor­ing coun­tries such as Egypt and the Greek colonies – these three crops have always rep­re­sented a source of wealth and sus­te­nance,” Giulierini said. ​“Somehow, they were the ​‘first nucleus’ of what we now call the Mediterranean diet.”

“Through the cen­turies, this nucleus has then been enriched thanks to the con­tri­bu­tions from var­i­ous pop­u­la­tions in the Mediterranean area and beyond,” he added. ​“For exam­ple, we have known foods such as rice, toma­toes and some cit­rus fruits since the Middle Ages, not before.”

While fur­ther clues to unravel the past of the Mediterranean diet can come from the obser­va­tion of ancient objects and paint­ings, Giulierini warned against some com­mon mis­in­ter­pre­ta­tions.

“The every­day life dimen­sion was rarely rep­re­sented in the artis­tic works that have come down to the present day, which often had a cel­e­bra­tory or metaphor­i­cal mean­ing,” he said.

“Frescoes with ban­quets laden with exotic fruits, sweets or game were the expres­sion of wealthy elites,” Giulierini added. ​“They did not rep­re­sent the lifestyle of largest sec­tions of the pop­u­la­tion, whose diet was deter­mined more by the phases of agri­cul­ture than by free choice.”

“Objects for the trans­for­ma­tion or con­ser­va­tion of food found in some Pompei vil­las can tell us a lot about the liv­ing stan­dards of the wealth­i­est fam­i­lies; noth­ing about those of the masses,” he con­tin­ued.

“That said, we know that in the Roman world agri­cul­ture was the basis for nutri­tion and food sup­ply, and that fish breed­ing was begin­ning to spread,” Giulierini con­cluded. ​“Cattle was essen­tial for agri­cul­ture, and ani­mals were needed alive: the con­sump­tion of meat was, then, lim­ited to a few excep­tional occa­sions.”

Giulierini’s full report is avail­able in the online gallery of edu­ca­tional and sci­en­tific con­tri­bu­tions of the Mediterranean Diet Virtual Museum, the first dig­i­tal museum in the world entirely ded­i­cated to the Mediterranean diet.

The museum was cre­ated by MedEatResearch of the University Suor Orsola Benincasa, an Italian aca­d­e­mic research cen­ter in Naples specif­i­cally ded­i­cated to the Mediterranean diet.

“Our goal is to enlighten the cul­tural, eco­nomic, anthro­po­log­i­cal, gas­tro­nomic, med­ical, edu­ca­tional and eco­log­i­cal aspects of the Mediterranean diet,” said Marino Niola, an anthro­pol­o­gist and one of the museum’s direc­tors.

“To achieve this, the museum will present our ethno­graphic research work and our stud­ies on longevity through pub­lic activ­i­ties such as sem­i­nars and con­fer­ences, and also by mak­ing avail­able videos and ​‘liv­ing tes­ti­monies’ of local pro­duc­ers, artists, sci­en­tists and cit­i­zens who recall the peas­ant soci­ety of the past,” he added.

Co-direc­tor Elisabetta Moro added: ​“While the Mediterranean diet is a com­bi­na­tion of fac­tors such as his­tory and neces­sity, we also have to con­sider the great pas­sion for food that the civ­i­liza­tions of the past left us.”

“Over the cen­turies, this pas­sion has become a dis­tinc­tive fea­ture of our soci­ety,” she con­cluded. ​“Now the chal­lenge is to pre­serve it and to enhance it through a food edu­ca­tional path involv­ing soci­ety at large and, above all, young gen­er­a­tions.”