Puke Collector

The Romans like their food – lambs brains, stuffed mice, jellyfish omlettes. In fact, they like to eat so much that they make themselves vomit just so they could eat even more. The philosopher Seneca says that ‘they vomit so that they may eat and eat so that they may vomit’. Roman diners don’t even bother to leave the room when they want to make themselves sick. They either vomit into specially provided bowls, or simply spew on the floor. The job of the puke collector is to go crawling around mopping up the vomit during parties – unless the party guest was kind enough to vomit directly onto his face.