The Origins of Restaurants

Abstract

The history of the hotel and catering industry spans more than 2000 years and embraces a wide range of different kinds of places that offer food and lodgings to travellers. The need for places where pilgrims could stay overnight had existed since shrines were first established and even before the beginning of the Christian age we know that in the days of the Druids there were the equivalent of today’s motorway service areas, where travellers could find refreshment and rest. In ancient Rome there were drinking-places, eating-rooms, lodging-houses and inns, and the inhabitants of Pompeii used to frequent the equivalent of our snack bars.