ABSTRACT
This chapter takes a step towards a better understanding of the contrasting soundscapes of ancient Rome. It includes subjective, qualitative descriptions of the personal experiences of the author, where the primary approach taken is to identify sounds from a selection of Latin literature and to give a flavour of the extent to which they can contribute to the texture of the cultural soundscape of Rome. In so doing, the chapter aims to draw attention to the richness of sound data that can be obtained from Latin literature and to use it to create a series of vignettes of real and imagined soundscapes in the city of Rome and its environs. Sound is deliberately privileged in this study to draw out an area of investigation that, when focused on the perceiver rather than the emitter of sound, is associated with subjective rather than objective data. The loudest noises in Latin literature tend to be associated with disorder.
