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The Roman heating system was called a hypocaust. How did Romans heat their homes?Rich Romans liked to be warm and cosy. They had central heating at home, in villas and in public baths. The heating system was kept going by slaves, who kept a fire blazing in a furnace to heat warm air. The warm air moved around the building through spaces under the floors and between the walls.
As well as those built in Italy, there were Roman houses built in Greece, Africa, Britain, and many other places. The main room in the house was the atrium, a windowless room with a space in the ceiling (the compluvium) through which rain fell into the impluvium, a hollow space in the floor.ore elaborate houses had concrete floors, often with a mosaic surfaces. In the upper stories floors were made of wood, sometimes with a layer of concrete on top. Roman roofs varied, with some flat and some sloped. The earliest roof was a thatch of straw, later replaced by shingles and finally tiles.