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Mary Beard, Professor of Classics and Fellow of Newnham College, whose acclaimed programme Pompeii: Life and Death in a Roman Town was broadcast in 2010, spent six weeks filming in Italy last summer.

By decoding epitaphs and piecing together the evidence from objects and archaeology, Professor Beard explores the stories of barmen, prostitutes, children, sailors, slaves and even gladiators.

In the first programme she rides the Via Appia, climbs to the top seats of the Colosseum, takes a boat to Rome’s famous Ostia port and takes us into the bowels of Monte Testaccio (‘broken pot mountain’).

She also meets Eurysaces, ex-slave and eccentric baker, who made a fortune out of the grain trade – building his tomb in the shape of a giant bread-oven; Baricha, Zabda and Achiba, three prisoners of war who went on to become Roman citizens; and Pupius Amicus, the purple-dye seller making imperial dye from murex shellfish imported from Tunisia.

In the second programme Professor Beard descends into the city streets to discover the dirt, crime, sex and slum conditions in the world’s first highrise city where most Romans lived in apartment blocks with little space, light or sanitation.

In the third programme she delves even deeper into ordinary Roman life by going behind the closed doors of the home, meeting an extraordinary cast of characters – drunken housewives, teenage brides, bullied children and runaway slaves – and paints a more dynamic, lusty picture of Roman life.

“ ̽��ֱ��idea behind the programme was to show that we really still can meet loads of very ordinary Romans face to face," said Professor Beard. "We may think of Rome as a marble city, full of posh blokes in togas. Sure there were some of those. But the funny, sardonic, touching voices of the men and women in the street�� still come across loud and clear. “Wine, women and bath” wrote one on his tombstone, “ruin our bodies – but they are what make life worth living!”

Episode One of Meet ̽��ֱ��Romans is on Tuesday 17 April on BBC2 at 9pm.