In the historical period between the last decades of the thirteenth century and the first half of the fourteenth century, famine was one of the basic forms of inequality; in the economic systems of those times, which were largely characterized by the presence of the market and the circulation of money, its appearance, in its true sense of an increase in the prices of human food, and in particular those of cereals, prevented access to the market for all those who did not have sufficient income or any other right to food. At the same time, the increase in the price of agricultural products was also a sign of an economic crisis. All of this gave rise to great inequalities and very serious social conflicts, which the political authorities sought to control by means of special offices responsible for monitoring the continuity of food supplies to urban markets. The essay examines how all these economic and political changes took place in the city of Rome and in the territory from which the necessary agricultural products were imported.