Pompeii Graffiti Quotes

Some were popular sex symbols: graffiti from the first century AD have been found on walls in Pompeii—one Thracian gladiator was “the maiden’s prayer and delight” and “the doctor to cure girls.” Their images appeared on pots and dishes.

appears this way in graffiti from the city of Pompeii, which was preserved to an extraordinary degree when Mt. Vesuvius erupted in AD 79. “Corus licks cunt” (Corus cunnum lingit) and “Jucundus licks the cunt of Rustica” (Iucundus cunum lingit Rusticae), for example, appear on Pompeian apartment buildings.

Whoever loves, let him flourish. Let him perish who knows not love. Let him perish twice over whoever forbids love.

A loaf of bread cost a quarter of a sesterce. So did a glass of wine.2 We know from graffiti at Pompeii that a prostitute, perhaps not a very elegant one, charged half a sesterce for her services. Entrance to the public baths was just twice that. Roman soldiers earned 1,200 sesterces a year and although there were some perks, they had to buy their own equipment. A casual labourer earned perhaps 2-3 sesterces a day – when he got work. A charity scheme to support poor children, presumably at a fairly basic level, paid between 10 and 12 sesterces a month. A lecturer in rhetoric under Vespasian received 100,000 sesterces a year and this was considered remarkable. It was a similar amount to the purchase price of a first-rate, intelligent slave in the second century, when lessening warfare had reduced the market. One foot of road cost 22 sesterces to lay and a large and elaborate tomb anything from 100,000 to half a million sesterces.