Daily life in Sagalassos during the 2nd century CE
A grounded look at a Pisidian mountain city, where pottery, fountains, farms, baths, local elites, and steep streets shaped daily life.
Sagalassos was a prosperous Roman city in the mountains of Pisidia. In the 2nd century CE, it was known for local elites, fountains, baths, public buildings, and regional pottery production. Its mountain setting made water, terraces, transport, and farming central to daily routines.
Housing and Living Spaces
Homes used stone, brick, timber, plaster, tile, courtyards, and terraces adapted to slopes. Domestic spaces supported cooking, storage, textile work, sleeping, and family ritual. Steep streets shaped movement and carrying labor.
Food and Daily Meals
Meals included bread, wine, olives, legumes, fruit, vegetables, dairy, goat or sheep meat, and foods from nearby farms. Water from springs and fountains was central to urban comfort.
Work and Labor
Work included pottery production, farming, herding, building, market selling, bath maintenance, stonework, textile production, transport, and domestic service. Pottery workshops connected local clay and fuel to regional exchange.
Social Structure
Sagalassos included civic elites, potters, farmers, herders, artisans, merchants, freedpeople, enslaved workers, and visitors. Status depended on wealth, patronage, craft, land, legal condition, and civic role.
Tools and Technology
Tools included kilns, pottery wheels or forming tools, molds, lamps, water pipes, fountains, carts, baskets, looms, coins, and masonry tools. Water management and pottery production were signature technologies.
Clothing and Materials
Clothing used wool, linen, leather, sandals, cloaks, tunics, belts, pins, jewelry, and work garments. Mountain weather made cloaks and durable footwear important.
Daily life in Sagalassos adds a mountain city and pottery-production angle to classical Asia Minor.