Flour, Water, Amore: The History of Pasta in Italy

With the turn of each century, our appetites have evolved to equate gastronomy with garnished. Culinary complexity is admirable, no doubt; however, the true art and science of good eating boils down to the basics. Fresh ingredients, coupled with a lineage of love, can transform even the simplest staples into a chef d’oeuvre! 

Pasta consists of two ingredients: flour and water; and if you’re feeling fancy, egg. This formula has remained unchanged since the first dough was kneaded by Etruscan hands as early as the 4th century BCE. 

Before the Romans conquered their civilization, the Etruscans flourished from the Tiber River in the south, to parts of the Po Valley in the north. Their cities included: Cerveteri (Cisra), Chiusi (Clevsin), Populonia (Puplona), Tarquinia (Tarchuna), Veii (Vei), Vetulonia (Vetluna), and Vulci (Velch). In the 7th century BCE, cultural exchanges between maritime trading nations, such as the Carthaginians, Phoenicians, and the Greeks, transformed Etruscan way of life; from religion and the alphabet—to eating habits. 

Remnants of this major Mediterranean trading power are found few and far between, but ancient ruins reveal a fascinating glimpse into their lost history. The excavations of surviving tombs have unearthed wall paintings, bucchero pottery, clothing, and tools manufactured in precious metals and minerals. Across Etruscan sites, archeologists have discovered depictions of lavish banquets and scenes showing social elites attending drinking parties and feasting on exotic dishes. They shared beef, lamb, pork, deer, boar, hare, and game birds. There was seafood (especially tuna), sheep's cheese, olives, porridge, bread pancakes, vegetables, fruit, eggs, raisins, and nuts. The dishes were elevated by the addition of herbs and spices, such as mint, honey, vinegar, and pepper. 

The Etruscans were skilled farmers and cultivated crops including grain, pine nuts, olive oil, and wine. They exported their foodstuffs as far as North Africa; but their greatest contribution to both seafaring folk and society was a special starch-based recipe. Testaroli was made with water, flour, and salt. The ingredients were mixed into a batter and then cooked on a hot terra cotta or cast iron device called a ‘testo’. The result was a thin pancake, or crêpe. Then, it was sliced into triangles and laid out to cool or to be cooked further in boiling water. Today, Testaroli is enjoyed throughout southern Liguria and northern Tuscany, and is an especially popular dish in the city of Pontremoli. 

Today, testaroli remains a popular dish throughout southern Liguria and northern Tuscany

After the Etruscans were absorbed by the Romans, pasta-making was rebranded. Among Italy’s ancient artifacts was a collection of 4th century CE recipes written in Latin by Apicius and titled, De re culinaria or De re coquinaria, which translates to “On the Art of Cookery.” The contents include chapters on preserving fresh figs, extending the shelf life of meat, creating wine sauce for truffles, making honey refreshers for weary travelers, and being a “careful and experienced cook.” Within the pages are black and white sketches of serving dishes, a colander for straining wine, a wine press, a “dinner gong,” and an “elaborate thermospodium,” which was an apparatus fueled by charcoal to keep food and drinks hot. A particularly noteworthy image is that of Pompeii’s Casa Di Forno—House of the Oven. Dating back to 79 AD, this bakery and flour mill consisted of four grain grinders, hand-operated by enslaved peoples. The larger mills were churned by donkeys attached to beams.

The works of Apicius went on to inspire the first pastario—a catalog of pastas—authored by food scholar Oretta Zanini De Vita in 2009. Traveling to every corner of her native Italy, Zanini De Vita dug into dusty family cookbooks, recorded oral histories, and searched through obscure archives to compile a complete history of pasta—shapes, terminology, and all. The following excerpt conveys some of the endearing pasta names villagers used:

Farfalline (little butterflies), nastrini (little ribbons), margherite (daisies), or, with an eye to the barnyard, creste di gallo (coxcombs), galletti (small roosters), corna di bue (ox horns), and denti di cavallo (horse’s teeth). Then come occhi (eyes) di lupo (wolf ), di pernice (partridge), di passero (sparrow), and on down, smaller and smaller, until we get to occhi di pulce (flea) and punte d’ago (needle points). The weather contributed, too, with tempestine (little storms) and grandinine (little hail-stones), and the lame in the village became pastas called gobbini and stortini. From the forest came folletti (elves) and diavoletti (imps), and on humid summer evenings, lucciole (fireflies) and lumachelle (snails).

Saints, demons, sagas, and superstitions were common figments of the Italian pasta imaginary, too. Some epic names even commemorate Italy’s wars in Africa. Libya inspired tripolini (from Tripoli), which entered the market in 1911, and bengasini (from Benghazi). Some pasta names even reference the shape of African headdresses, or to the rings (anelli) the women of Benghazi wore in their ears. Conquest played a significant role in the various homemade pasta formats. This is evident in the presence of orecchiette, which can be traced to the domination of Puglia by the Angevin lords of Provence in the thirteenth century.

The early cooks who inhabited the coast were the most prominent characters in the Italian pasta story. Because fresh pastas are hygroscopic and sensitive to weather, pasta makers were rumored to be magicians. Zanini De Vita writes: 

They scrutinized the sky, questioned the stars, and examined the phases of the moon and the winds to establish how to set the pasta to dry because the pasta, they say, “has to dry with its own air”: humid air at the beginning and then dry air in the days that follow. There is a saying, “Make the maccheroni with the scirocco, dry them with the tramontana,” referring to the warm, moist wind from the south and the cold, dry wind from over the Alps. The old chief pastaio (pasta maker) knew that the winds usually changed at noon and midnight along the coast, and that his drying racks would need attention at those hours. Toward April and October, if the scirocco blew, it turned into a tramontana at around one or two in the morning, and it was necessary to hurry and move the pasta to the large drying areas. The back streets echoed with the voice of u chiammatore (the caller), who awakened the workers for their shift.

From sumptuous Etruscan spreads, to dinners under the Tuscan sun, these tales attest to pasta’s enduring spirit. Stay hungry for next week’s blog, where we’ll make the journey to the New World and into the homes and hearts of America’s Italians!

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