This paper analyses the occupation sequence documented in the Roman house of La Fortuna (Cartagena, Spain). We use a contextual approach to study all the material culture documented in the domus. We start with a complete re-documentation of the stratigraphic record, in order to match the finds to their provenance. As a basis for this documentation, we discuss the abandonment typologies and the formation processes documented in the house. Using this framework we make a detailed examination of the artefact assemblages documented and we apply a quantitative study of the production, redistribution and consumption patterns during the different occupation phases. The ultimate objective of this paper is to provide a social and economic reading of the household activities carried out by the successive inhabitants in their own historical context.

The image of the narrow door in the Gospel of Luke is to be read in the context of a symposium in a Roman domus. The elaboration of the Q-material is related to patron-client-relationships and their architectural and cultural conditions (salutatio, cena). By announcing an eschatological turn of events the pericope warns householders in the community to open now their residences for wandering prophets, thus fulfilling the teaching of Jesus.