I also heard that Roman middle classes who couldn't afford silver used leaden plates to eat off of. As lead very quickly develops an airtight patina, this is mu

I also heard that Roman middle classes who couldn't afford silver used leaden plates to eat off of. As lead very quickly develops an airtight patina, this is much worse than plumbing (which after installation of basically never touched) because knives, forks and just general friction of handling the plates causes the Patina to be scraped off and the food to be exposed to lead.