Baking flourished in the Roman Empire from as early as 300BC but it wasn’t until 168BC that the first Bakers Guild was formed, within 150 years there were more than three hundred specialist pastry chefs in Rome.
The whole craft was incorporated in a guild of bakers - COLLEGIUM PISTORUM - and was of so high repute in the affairs of the state that one of its representatives had a seat in the Senate. The ruins of Pompeii and other buried cities have revealed the kind of bakeries that existed in those historic times.
The Romans enjoyed several kinds of bread, with interesting names. Lentaculum, made originally flat, round loaves made of emmer, (a cereal grain closely related to wheat flour) with a bit of salt were eaten. There was also oyster bread (to be eaten with oysters); 'artolaganus' or cakebread; 'speusticus' or 'hurry bread', tin bread, Parthian bread and the Roman Style Slipper Loaf
Breads were made richer by adding milk, eggs and butter, but only the wealthy and privileged could afford these. The Egyptian grammarian and philosopher Athenaeus, who lived in the 3rd century A.D., has handed down to us considerable knowledge about bread and baking in those days.