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Bakery of Sotericus, Pompeii

Location: Regio I
Insula 12
Area: Bakery - 520 square meters. The house is 157 sq. meters
Rooms: Bakery- 14, House- 6

The Bakery of Sotericus, also known as the Pistrinum of Sotericus or Casa del Forno, is a well-preserved example of an ancient Roman bakery unearthed in the ruins of Pompeii. Situated in Regio I, Insula 12 (specifically entrances at I.12.1 and I.12.2, sometimes referenced as 12.3), it lies along the bustling Via dell'Abbondanza, one of Pompeii's main thoroughfares, directly opposite the House of Trebius Valens. This location placed it in a central commercial area, contributing to the daily food supply of the city's estimated 10,000–20,000 inhabitants before the catastrophic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE buried Pompeii under layers of ash and pumice.

The bakery's layout spans two older, pre-existing buildings that were repurposed and merged into a single large workshop, covering an expansive area optimized for industrial-scale bread production. Entering from Via dell'Abbondanza, visitors would encounter a fountain just outside the entrances, a common feature in Pompeii for public water access. The interior is divided into several interconnected rooms, each serving a specific function in the bread-making process:

Room 1 (Entrance Area): This front room features benches along the walls, possibly for waiting workers or brief storage. It leads eastward into the main bakery space (Room 3) and southward into Room 4.
Room 2: Adjacent to the entrance, this space has a doorway in its east wall connecting to Room 4 and a window in the south wall overlooking Room 7, allowing for light and ventilation.
Room 3 (Mill Room): The heart of the operation, this room houses the grain mills—four conical structures of varying sizes made from porous volcanic lava sourced from nearby Vesuvius. These mills consisted of a fixed base (meta) and a rotating upper hopper (catillus), turned by donkeys or enslaved workers harnessed to wooden beams. The friction ground wheat into flour, a labor-intensive process that highlights the grueling conditions in Roman bakeries, where workers (often slaves) toiled in confined, dusty environments. Views of this room from the south, southeast, and east reveal the mills' arrangement for efficient workflow.
Room 4: Accessed from Room 1, this transitional space connects to Room 5 via a doorway in its east wall, serving as a pathway for moving materials between milling and preparation areas.
Room 5: Located in the southeast corner, this room features restored walls (original lower sections topped with rebuilt terracotta tiles) and likely functioned as part of the dough preparation zone, with shelves and worktops for mixing and shaping.
Room 11 (Oven Room): Deeper in the complex, this area contains the large masonry oven, a dome-shaped structure fueled by wood, where dough was baked into loaves. Similar to modern wood-fired pizza ovens, it could reach high temperatures for efficient baking. Traces of carbonized loaves found in other Pompeian bakeries (like the 81 loaves in the Bakery of Modestus) suggest the types produced here: round, segmented panis quadratus, often stamped with the bakery's mark and made from coarse flour, sometimes spiced or enriched with milk, eggs, honey, or oil. Bread here might have cost around 2 asses (Roman coins) per loaf and was a dietary staple, often soaked in wine or soup due to its hardness.

Additional facilities included a grain warehouse for storage, a mechanical dough-kneading machine (a hand-operated device with paddles for mixing flour and water), and a workers' bedroom, indicating round-the-clock operations. An adjoining stable housed the donkeys that powered the mills, with indentations in the floor to guide their circular movements—echoing the exploitative conditions revealed in other sites, like a recently excavated "prison bakery" where enslaved people and animals were confined.
Graffiti in the bakery is limited but includes electoral notices and inscriptions linking to Sotericus, though detailed translations from the site are sparse; broader Pompeian graffiti often references daily life, politics, or personal messages. No major artifacts like carbonized bread were specifically noted here, but the site's preservation offers insights into Pompeii's economy, where bakeries like this one produced not just bread but also pastries and early flatbreads resembling pizza (artolaganum or tracta).
The Bakery of Sotericus exemplifies the sophistication of Roman food production, blending manual labor with rudimentary machinery in a volcanic landscape that provided both fertile soil for wheat and lava for millstones. Its significance lies in illustrating the social hierarchy of ancient Pompeii: owners like Sotericus profited from the toil of workers and animals, while supplying essential goods to a vibrant urban society. Today, it remains a highlight for visitors exploring Pompeii's commercial heritage.

The house itself was different from the bakery with rich frescoes and various motifs. So on one of the walls you will see an image of a dog. These are warnings for the enemies of the host. In general, the topic of dogs is widely developed in Pompeii. They were depicted on mosaics, walls, etc.