In taberna quando sumus? Osservazioni sul gioco d’azzardo (alea) a Pompei

Abstract

The past few years have seen a renewed interest about Roman law on gambling. Combining literary and legal sources, we are now able to reconstruct the interventions of the legislator from the Republican age to the Justianian reign. But what do we know about the real force of the laws? By analyzing the distribution of gambling in Pompeii (namely dice and knucklebones) we can appreciate the real impact of the law in the context of a Roman city during the early Imperial age.

Keywords

• dice
• gambling
• knucklebones
• Pompeii
• Roman law