§286. The transition from the ancient porridge (§283) to bread baked in the modern fashion must have been through the medium of thin cakes baked in or over the fire. We do not know when bread baked in ovens came into use. Bakers (§283) as representatives of a trade do not go back beyond 171 B.C., but long before this time, of course, the family bread had been made by the _māter familiās_, or by a slave under her supervision. After public bakeries were once established it became less and less usual for bread to be made in private houses in the towns. Only the most pretentious of the city mansions had ovens attached, as shown by the ruins. In the country, on the other hand, the older custom was always retained (§148). Under Trajan (98-118) it became the custom to distribute bread to the people daily, instead of grain once a month, and the bakers were organized into a guild (_corpus_, _collegium_), and as a corporation enjoyed certain privileges and immunities. In Fig. 111 are shown the ruins of a Pompeian bakery with several mills in connection with it. [Illustration: FIGURE 112. OVEN FOR BREAD] §287. Breadmaking.--After the flour collected about the edge of the _mēta_ (§284) had been sifted, water and salt were added and the dough was kneaded in a trough by hand or by a simple machine shown in the cut in Schreiber LXVII. Yeast was added as nowadays and the bread was baked in an oven much like those still found in parts of Europe. One preserved in the ruins of Pompeii is shown in the cut (Fig. 112): at _a_ is the oven proper, in which a fire was built, the draft being furnished by the openings at _d_. The surrounding chamber, _b_, is intended to retain the heat after the fire (usually of charcoal) had been raked out into the ashpit, _e_, and the vents closed. The letter _f_ marks a receptacle for water, which seems to have been used for moistening the bread while baking. After the oven had been heated to the proper temperature and the fire raked out, the loaves were put in, the vents closed, and the bread left to bake. [Illustration: FIGURE 113. SALESROOM OF BAKERY] §288. There were several qualities of bread, varying with the sort of grain, the setting of the millstones (§284) and the fineness of the sieves (§287). The very best, made of pure wheat-flour, was called _pānis silīgneus_; that made of coarse flour, of flour and bran, or of bran alone was called _pānis plebēius_, _castrēnsis_, _sordidus_, _rūsticus_, etc. The loaves were circular and rather flat--some have been found in the ruins of Pompeii--and had their surface marked off by lines drawn from the center into four or more parts. The wall painting (Fig. 113) of a salesroom of a bakery, also found in Pompeii, gives a good idea of the appearance of the bread. Various kinds of cakes and confections were also sold at these shops.