Mediterranean’s soy sauce: the enduring legacy of garum

Few ancient foods tell a story as evocative as garum, the fermented fish sauce that once perfumed the kitchens and marketplaces of the Mediterranean. Over two millennia old, its origins reach back to the coastal civilisations of ancient Greece and Carthage, before the Romans embraced it as a beloved staple.

Emerging around the 5th century BCE, it began as a practical solution to utilise the abundant fish catch, particularly small