The Bakery of Popidius Priscus allows almost the entire process of bread production in ancient Pompeii to be reconstructed, from grinding the grain to baking the loaves.
Five large lava-stone mills remain visible in the building. Each mill consisted of a conical lower stone, the meta, and an hourglass-shaped upper stone, the catillus. The latter was turned by human or animal power, gradually grinding the grain into flour.
The bread was then baked in the building’s large oven. Unlike other Pompeian bakeries, no actual counter for direct sales has been identified here. Some of the production may therefore have been made to order, sold wholesale or distributed by street vendors.
The bakery provides particularly vivid evidence for the organisation of the city’s food production.
