Juvenal originally used it to decry the "selfishness" of common people and their neglect of wider concerns.
[citation needed] This phrase originates from Rome in Satire X of the Roman satirical poet Juvenal (c. 100 AD), who saw "bread and circuses" (panem et circenses) as emblematic of the loss of republican political liberty:[5][6] [...] iam pridem, ex quo suffragia nulli / vendimus, effudit curas; nam qui dabat olim / imperium, fasces, legiones, omnia, nunc se / continet atque duas tantum res anxius optat, / panem et circenses.
Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.
In much modern literature, this represents the Annona as a "briberous and corrupting attempt of the Roman emperors to cover up the fact that they were selfish and incompetent tyrants".
[8] Yet Augustus disapproved even the idea of a grain dole on moral grounds, even though he and every emperor after him took the responsibility and credit for ensuring the supply to citizens who qualified for it.