Garum facts for kids
Garum was a special fish sauce that people used a long time ago. It was popular in ancient Greece, Rome, and the Byzantium. This sauce was made by letting small fish parts, like their intestines, ferment. This means tiny bacteria helped break them down over time.
Even though garum was super popular with the Romans, it actually started with the ancient Greeks. Its name comes from Greek words like garos or garon. These words referred to the type of fish whose insides were first used to make this unique sauce.
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Making Garum: A Stinky Business
While the finished garum sauce tasted mild and subtle, making it was a very smelly process! The smell was so strong and unpleasant that garum factories had to be built far away from cities. This way, people living nearby wouldn't be bothered by the odor.
Famous Garum Factories
Today, you can still see the old ruins of a garum factory at a place called Baelo Claudia in Spain. The garum made here was very famous and was even sent all the way to Rome. This made Baelo Claudia quite an important town back then.
Garum from Lusitania (which is now Portugal) was also highly valued in Rome. It was shipped directly from the port of Lacobriga, known today as Lagos.
What About Liquamen?
Liquamen was another type of fish sauce, very similar to garum. Sometimes, people even used the names garum and liquamen to mean the same thing.
Images for kids
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An ancient Roman garum factory in Portugal.
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A mosaic showing a "Flower of Garum" jug. The writing says it's "from the workshop of the garum importer Aulus Umbricius Scaurus".
See also
In Spanish: Garo (salsa) para niños
