This is a small book covering various everyday practices of ancient Romans. It has an interesting angle connecting practices from ancient Rome to those in modern Italy, but being 60 years old, almost everything that is supposed to delight the reader is outdated. The author has an unfortunate old-time tone (he was born in 1871 in Cambridge and went through a decade of Harvard education, so Ι don't exactly know what I was expecting), and there are more than a few paragraphs that illicit an "👀 What did he just say?" with regard to women and the poor. Overall it's a fine thing to waste the day with but I would not be surprised if the library I found this in weeded it within the decade. There are just more modern avenues for the same information (though probably none so small and cute). ( )