Independent Women of Pompeii

Independent Women of Pompeii By Robin Fowler Last edited: Sunday, June 11, 2006 Posted: Tuesday, September 27, 2005

Excerpt from articles from my page on Suite 101.

The Roman city of Pompeii is legendary, almost fabled. It is most famous for being buried under a blanket of ash from the August 24, A.D. 79 eruption of Mount Vesusvius. When excavations on the ruins of Pompeii were begun in 1748, it was quickly discovered that the site was archaeological pay dirt. The subsequent excavations, which continue today, have uncovered an era of history frozen in time, an opportunity to see the day-to-day life and operations of a Roman city. The spectacularly preserved city has provided archaeologists insight into Roman art, architecture, politics, religion, and family life. It also offers a peek into the lives of non- Imperial Roman women, and the opportunities that were possibly available to them.There is vast evidence that shows what the lives of the Imperial Roman women were like. The wives, mothers, sisters, and daughters of the Roman Emperors were often well documented in art, drama, and poetry. Often, little specific information is known of the other Roman women. That is, the women from the non-Imperial upper classes all the way down the social stratum to the slaves. Discoveries at Pompeii have helped to clarify a lot of notions held regarding the lives of Roman women. Art, architecture, and graffiti have provided a huge source of interesting information. Archaeological evidence from Pompeii shows us that Roman women were not solely relegated to the job of homemaker. They had ample opportunities to participate in commerce, religion, and politics. There is evidence of Pompeian women holding down such occupations as weavers, landladies, salespeople, butchers, doctors, and even wealthy benefactors. The discoveries at Pompeii also uncovered some evidence of the independent status that some Roman women possessed. However, archaeological evidence can only tell so much of the story. We will probably never know the true extent of the independence that some of these women were permitted that was exclusive of male involvement. But what evidence that has been found provides a glimmer of hope that Roman women were not completely repressed or disregarded, at least in this one small Roman city.Perhaps the most famous woman with a sizeable amount of influence to be discovered out of Pompeii was an upper class priestess named Eumachia. Eumachia was a member of an old Pompeian family who earned their wealth as brick makers. She garnered additional affluence when she married a man who had his own big bank account as the owner of some vineyards on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius. Eumachia was quite the woman about Pompeii. Aside from being a wife and mother, she was a public priestess to the cult of Venus (Venus was the patron goddess of Pompeii). And she was the patroness of the fullers’ guild. Fullers were dry cleaners of a sort. They laundered the tunics and togas of the town, as well as prepared wool to turn into fine fabrics. It was one of Pompeii’s most principal industries. Being the patroness of this trade would have been quite notable for Eumachia and her family.When, in A.D. 62, a massive earthquake damaged or destroyed large parts of the city, Eumachia paid for the construction of a large building in the forum (the major economic and civic center of a Roman city). Archaeological evidence suggests that this building was most likely home base for the fullers. Thus, as a show of gratitude, the fullers commissioned a statue of Eumachia’s likeness in her honor complete with a complimentary inscription. This public show of appreciation would have proven significant for the likes of a Roman woman.Eumachia’s schedule must have been bursting at the seams. On top of her public duties as priestess and her business dealings with the fullers, she also found time to be involved in local politics. The construction of her considerable building in Pompeii’s forum was timed perfectly (if not coincidentally) with her son’s campaign for public office. The generosity of this multifaceted woman would have unquestionably been beneficial to her son’s election. Eumachia was obviously a dedicated mother, a shrewd businesswoman with a giving heart, and had the funding to back it all up. And to further showcase the wealth of her family, Eumachia had a massive marble sepulcher, or tomb, constructed on one of the more affluent streets of the dead in Pompeii, at the Nucerian Gate. Unfortunately, all of Eumachia’s money and influence could not protect her from Mother Nature, and she succumbed, with nearly all other citizens (of every class) of Pompeii, when Mount Vesuvius blew its top on that fateful August morning.Another woman whose story was discovered among the ruins of Pompeii is Julia Felix. Julia was a wealthy property owner who came upon her bags of money via a sizeable inheritance. The property that she owned, her grand villa, took up an entire block of the city. It was, of course, lavishly decorated and furnished. It seems that Julia Felix held none of the aspirations that her multi-tasking contemporary Eumachia did. Julia preferred to relax her days away in her courtyard garden, gazing at her many marble statues. That is, until the earthquake of A.D. 62 caused some damage to her property.At that time, her survival instincts (and frugality) kicked in. In an effort to avoid spending any of her own money, Julia rented out parts of her massive villa. For this purpose, she had converted these parts into public baths, shops, a tavern, and apartments. This proved to be a worthwhile venture for her, paying for the repairs to her home, and no doubt providing her with a nice amount of extra income. Thus, Julia Felix used her inheritance as a springboard to independence.Euamchia and Julia Felix are but two of many examples of Pompeian women striking out on their own and making it on their own separate from their family names. They were property owners, businesswomen, and public figures, with seemingly little or no male interference. Far more is known about the more famous imperial Roman women. Therefore, the discoveries at Pompeii of these fascinating characters provide an opportunity to get to know the women of Rome at all social levels. http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewarticle.asp?id=19627&AuthorID=30711

The ancient city of Pompeii is best known for being covered by an erupting volcano and being almost forgotten. From the time the city was rediscovered in the 1700s scientists and archeologists have managed to piece together evidence to show not just how people died but how they lived. We now know that before the eruption of Mt Vesuvius on August 24 79 AD Pompeii was a resort town. From the remains of Pompeii scholars have deducted the socioeconomic, religious and political life of Pompeii’s last inhabitants. Pompeii was a city where women declared themselves the equal of men. Women could own land, operate businesses, be priestesses and were often educated. Despite these equalities Pompeiian women were still mostly owned by men and from birth knew their position. New born boys were placed at the father’s feet while newborn girls were given straight to the nurse. Most girls were bought up by their mothers at home learning weaving and other domestic skills. Upper-class girls however were taught to read and write either at school or at home by slave tutors. It was believed by some that educated women made better wives and mothers. Literacy amongst the upper class (both women and men) was a symbol of status and respect. One of the most famous Pompeiian artifacts the fresco of the merchant Terentius Neo and his wife, depicts her holding a wax tablet and a stylus. Girls were considered grown up by the age of 14 when marriages were usually arranged by their family with the objective of uniting good families. At this time a woman would leave her father’s ownership and become the property of her husband. As many women as possible were kept married and bearing children. Women were expected to be married by the age of 20 and it was law to remarry after the death of ones husband. As at this time in Roman history there were fewer females than males so women could marry and remarry with ease. A woman’s major role was to be a good wife and mother. Motherhood was considered the esteemed occupation. In Pompeii women often entered into a business partnership with their husbands. They were allowed to keep profits themselves. It was common for a widow to take over her husband’s business. Wives of traders and craftsmen often ran the front of the shop while their husbands made the products or dealt with other aspects of the business. Women could own property and could decide how to administer it. Julia Felix is an example of an independent woman who inherited a large fortune in her own right. Tablets found at Herculaneum (a smaller city destroyed by the same eruption) show that women could buy sell and lease but were not allowed to become bankers. Women in Pompeii worked in, owned and operated many of the taverns, inns and bars, which often served as brothels a topic I will cover later. (more detail) Archeologists have uncovered written evidence recording the role of women in the medical profession. These women’s status was recognised by law and their fees were regulated. Many women worked in this profession as midwives, physicians and doctors. Records have also been found mentioning husband and wife medical teams. As Pompeii had a large foreign trade it is not suprising that women from the East came to Pompeii selling luxury items such as dyes, perfumes, clothes and food stuffs. Lower class women also worked in the trades. Some worked independently sewing and mending garments, while others worked as bakery assistants or in the fulling mills. However the status of these women was low like their pay rate. Like in most places female slaves existed in Pompeii. These women performed a wide range of tasks depending on the owner’s needs. Apart from household duties some of these slave women operated as nannies or wet nurses while others managed their owner’s businesses or worked as labourers. Wealthy women had their own personal attendants which was another duty of these slaves. Eumachia was Pompeii’s most prominent woman . She came from a wealthy and respected family and rose to hold a position of unusual importance as a priestess. She was also patroness of the fuller’s guild (cleaners, dyers and clothing makers). Eumachia provided this guild with a building in the forum. (However there is no evidence suggesting that women could join these guilds) Another female priest was named Mamia. Historians are unsure of which cult these women belonged to. However, one of the most popular cults among women in Pompeii was the cult of Isis, the Egyptian goddess. Both men and women in Pompeii could hold high positions in this cult. Isis was highly worshipped by prostitutes as it was believed Isis herself lived as a prostitute. Isis temples were favoured meeting places for prostitutes and brothels were often located nearby. Prostitutes were common in Pompeii. Here prostitution was not a criminal offence even though the woman herself was considered lowly. Prostitution was seen as a normal part of the sex life of Roman men. Prostitution was legally considered a business and prostitutes were required to register with authorities. Prostitution was such a profitable business that the emperor Caligula bought in a tax on it. Where the women operated depended on her class. High-class courtesans were paid highly by their lovers and therefore lived and operated in lavish surroundings. The poorer prostitutes did their business in archways. (The Latin word for arch fornix is where the English word fornicate originates.) Foreign prostitutes operated in Pompeii and were highly sought after partly due to the fact they were not subject to Roman social constraints and also because they were considered exotic. Many taverns and inns had rooms which were decorated with erotic paintings so historian have inferred these places often doubled as brothels. Roman sexuality operated according to a set of moral restrictions which were decided by the men. Restrictions were especially imposed upon upper-class women. An upper-class girl had to be a virgin when she married and was not allowed to have sex with any man except her husband. The emperor Augustus ruled that adultery was a public offence only for women. If a man had an adulterous daughter under his control he could kill her and a man was obliged to divorce his wife if she was caught in the act of adultery. No man was permitted to have sex with an unmarried or widowed free woman unless she was a prostitute. It was socially unacceptable for an upper-class woman to have sexual relationships with a male slave. However it was more acceptable for an upper-class man to have relations with a female slave. If the woman did not consent such relationships could have been forced as the slave girl belonged to her master. Rape was against the law. But it was a crime against the man who owned the victim not the woman herself. As a result of this it was up to the men owners to press charges. A child produced by a man and his slave woman would be of slave status whereas a child produced from the union of a woman and her slave would be free. Contraception in Pompeii was the woman’s responsibility. Many of these techniques would have caused great discomfort to the women but were still implemented nevertheless. Applying a mixture of olive oil, honey, cedar resin or juice of the balsam tree with or without white lead was believed to stop pregnancy. Unwanted pregnancies were terminated by energetic walking, riding a draught animal or by bathing in a mixture of linseed, fenugreek, mallow, marshmallow and wormwood. Records showing the success of these remedies have not been uncovered. Frescos uncovered show that Pompeiian women were present in the streets and therefore part of everyday life.. Despite this apparent equality that the women believed they had, they were not allowed to vote,they had no political power and entertainment areas were segregated. Women had their own rooms in the baths as mixed bathing was not allowed. Women were seated in a different area in the amphitheatre to the men. According to recent research undertaken by anthropologists at the University of Sydney, some Pompeiians were hairy, unhealthy and fat Studies of the bones recovered show that a considerable number of the women suffered from a hormone disorder which produces hairiness, obesity and recurring headaches. From this information we can conclude that the frescos are not accurate representations of all the women of the time. In the period that we are looking at, the decade before the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, some women were rejecting ....[the] traditional role . Birth rates declined and more women entered into business. In conclusion it should be pointed out that most of this information comes from frescos, records and of course skeletons extracted from the ruins of the city. There may be other aspects of these women’s lives that we know nothing about which might change our views on the lifestyle and role of women in Pompeii. Bibliography Bibliography · Desceudres, Jean-Paul Pompeii Revisited (1994) · Bradley, Pam Ancient History unit Pompeii and Herculaneum (1994) Open Training and education network. · Henessy, Dianne Studies in Ancient Rome (1995) · Etienne, Robert Pompeii the day City Died Thames and Hudson Publishing · Pomeroy, Sarah B. Goddesses, Whores, Wives and Slaves. (1975) Random House Word Count: 1505 http://www.term-papers.us/ts/ea/hte438.shtml

Independent Women of Pompeii The Political Power of Roman Women © Robin Fowler Underneath the fossilized mud and ash at Pompeii, the lives of influential Roman women have been uncovered. Underneath the fossilized mud and ash at Pompeii, the lives of Roman women have been uncovered. Many of these women did not fit the mold of the dutiful Roman matron or priestess.

Perhaps the most famous woman with a sizeable amount of influence to be discovered out of Pompeii was an upper class priestess named Eumachia. Eumachia was a member of an old Pompeian family who earned their wealth as brick makers. She garnered additional affluence when she married a man who had his own big bank account as the owner of some vineyards on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius. Eumachia was quite the woman about Pompeii. Aside from being a wife and mother, she was a public priestess to the cult of Venus (Venus was the patron goddess of Pompeii). And she was the patroness of the fullers' guild. Fullers were dry cleaners of a sort. They laundered the tunics and togas of the town, as well as prepared wool to turn into fine fabrics. It was one of Pompeii's most principal industries. Being the patroness of this trade would have been quite notable for Eumachia and her family.

When, in A.D. 62, a massive earthquake damaged or destroyed large parts of the city, Eumachia paid for the construction of a large building in the forum (the major economic and civic center of a Roman city). Archaeological evidence suggests that this building was most likely home base for the fullers. Thus, as a show of gratitude, the fullers commissioned a statue of Eumachia's likeness in her honor complete with a complimentary inscription. This public show of appreciation would have proven significant for the likes of a Roman woman.

Eumachia's schedule must have been bursting at the seams. On top of her public duties as priestess and her business dealings with the fullers, she also found time to be involved in local politics. The construction of her considerable building in Pompeii's forum was timed perfectly (if not coincidentally) with her son's campaign for public office. The generosity of this multifaceted woman would have unquestionably been beneficial to her son's election. Eumachia was obviously a dedicated mother, a shrewd businesswoman with a giving heart, and had the funding to back it all up. And to further showcase the wealth of her family, Eumachia had a massive marble sepulcher, or tomb, constructed on one of the more affluent streets of the dead in Pompeii, at the Nucerian Gate. Unfortunately, all of Eumachia's money and influence could not protect her from Mother Nature, and she succumbed, with nearly all other citizens (of every class) of Pompeii, when Mount Vesuvius blew its top on that fateful August morning.

Another woman whose story was discovered among the ruins of Pompeii is Julia Felix. Julia was a wealthy property owner who came upon her bags of money via a sizeable inheritance. The property that she owned, her grand villa, took up an entire block of the city. It was, of course, lavishly decorated and furnished. It seems that Julia Felix held none of the aspirations that her multi-tasking contemporary Eumachia did. Julia preferred to relax her days away in her courtyard garden, gazing at her many marble statues. That is, until the earthquake of A.D. 62 caused some damage to her property.

At that time, her survival instincts (and frugality) kicked in. In an effort to avoid spending any of her own money, Julia rented out parts of her massive villa. For this purpose, she had converted these parts into public baths, shops, a tavern, and apartments. This proved to be a worthwhile venture for her, paying for the repairs to her home, and no doubt providing her with a nice amount of extra income. Thus, Julia Felix used her inheritance as a springboard to independence. Euamchia and Julia Felix are but two of many examples of Pompeian women striking out on their own and making it on their own separate from their family names. They were property owners, businesswomen, and public figures, with seemingly little or no male interference. Far more is known about the more famous Imperial Roman women. Therefore, the discoveries at Pompeii of these fascinating characters provide an opportunity to get to know the women of Rome at all social levels. http://ancienthistory.suite101.com/article.cfm/IndependentWomenPompeii2

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/

Roman Women: Following the Clues By Suzanne Dixon

Women - were they any different in Roman times from how they are today? Sort truth from fiction to decide if things have changed since women were first depicted as loving or resentful wives, daughters, servants and workers. Ancient Roman fresco portrait of a young woman with stylus

Introduction

Where do we look for Roman women? The traditional answer has been - in Latin literature; that's to say in the histories, poems, biographies and political speeches composed by, and for, élite men.

'These women are symbols, not 'real women'.'

Few women, however, feature in this literature, and when they are included, it is often to make a point about modern morals or the importance of home life. These women are symbols, not 'real women'.

State inscriptions are another possible source of information but, like Roman history books, they seldom mention women. Roman tombstones and statue bases celebrate women, but in a formulaic way (as do our modern-day equivalents), so they do not usually bring individual women to life for us, and it seems that all Roman children were sweet, all wives were chaste, all marriages were argument-free. And even when these ancient inscriptions do appeal to us, there is the possibility that we are over-influenced by a sentimental portrait, which leaves out all the complexities of living relationships.

Roman paintings and sculpture present yet another avenue to the past. Women's portraits in the Roman tradition are often quite realistic, but they, too, fall into certain patterns, and sometimes individual heads seem to have been imposed on standard bodies.

Archaeology offers a different perspective, and Pompeii in particular is famous for having preserved for centuries, under lava, the details of the everyday life of the town. Nearby Herculaneum also shows us houses and flats, workplaces, bars and shops that are seldom even hinted at in the rather rarefied literature of Roman times.

Virtuous women

We know of good women from literature, legend, coins and statues but, above all, from the many epitaphs that have survived from Roman Italy - such as the following, concerning 'Claudia'.

'Stranger, my message is short. Stop and read it. This is the unlovely tomb of a lovely woman. Her parents gave her the name Claudia. She loved her husband with all her heart. She bore two children, one of whom she left on earth, the other beneath it. She had a pleasing way of talking and walking. She tended the house and worked wool. I have said my piece. Go your way.' (Corpus of Latin Inscriptions, CIL 6.15346)

Bereaved Romans often praised their mothers, wives and daughters on their tombstones, although their words were usually much briefer than this famous epitaph from Italy in the late second century BC. Often, however, they did echo the key feminine virtues mentioned in the epitaph, those of affection, good housewifery and chastity. Wool work was very much a symbol of a good woman.

'Augustus instigated the practice of holding up the women of the imperial family as inspiring models of virtuous womanhood ...'

Every Roman schoolchild also learned the story of another good woman, Lucretia, who attracted the unwelcome attentions of a tyrant by her beauty and her domestic industry (working late at night at the loom). Her rape and subsequent suicide was said to be the origin of the Roman revolt against the Etruscan monarchy, and the foundation of the Roman Republic in 509 BC. The story is told by the historian Livy in his first book (late first century BC).

Augustus instigated the practice of holding up the women of the imperial family as inspiring models of virtuous womanhood in the first century AD. Later emperors carried it further and in the second century AD empresses such as Sabina (wife of the emperor Trajan) were depicted as embodying, for example, pietas (family feeling). Faustina the younger, wife of Marcus Aurelius, often featured on coins symbolising various virtues, while Marcus's daughter-in-law, Lucilla, was particularly associated with modesty.

Letters and epitaphs tell of the particular grief of Roman parents if a girl died before marriage - and they seem truly to have delighted in their living daughters. The first and second century writer Pliny the Younger (Letter 5.16) paints a touching portrait of his friend's daughter, Minicia Marcella, who died at the age of 13.

Alluring mistresses

Erotic fresco painting from Pompeii Roman poetry is the main basis for (mis)information about adulterous Roman wives or glamorous mistresses. Propertius (who flourished 30-20 BC), Tibullus (48-19 BC) and Ovid (43 BC-AD 17) wrote love poems in the first person, each about a named mistress, following the lead of Catullus (c.84-54 BC), who had written short lyric poems about 'Lesbia'. These poems are set in a kind of fantasy world, and had a great influence on later European poetry.

To give just a flavour of his style, perhaps the most famous poem (LXXXV) by Catullus is:

'I hate you and I love you. Perhaps you ask how I can? I don't know, but I feel it to be true and I am in torment.'

Scholars have speculated that the 'Lesbia' he addressed in some poems was the elegant widow Clodia, who was attacked by the orator Cicero in court (in his defence of Caelius, 56 BC) for her loose living, but I think that is wishful thinking.

Ovid's delightful short poem about a rendezvous with the imaginary 'Corinna' in the evocative half-light of the afternoon has inspired many poets. Marlowe's version is great poetry, and a good rendering of the Latin. Here is an extract:

'In summer's heat and mid-time of the day To rest my limbs upon a bed I lay ... Then came Corinna in her long loose gown, Her white neck hid with tresses hanging down ... Stark naked as she stood before mine eye, Not one wen in her body could I spy. What arms and shoulders did I touch and see, How apt her breasts were to be pressed by me, How smooth a belly under her waist saw I, How large a leg, and what a lusty thigh. To leave the rest, all liked me passing well; I clinged her naked body, down she fell: Judge you the rest, being tired she bade me kiss; Jove send me more such afternoons as this! Ovid, Loves (Amores) 1.5 The second-century satirist Juvenal devoted his longest poem to the horrors of marriage. It is a gallery of awful married women whose vices (such as body-building and correcting their husbands' grammar) include committing adultery with men, women and even donkeys! It's racy reading, but not exactly reportage.

At a pithier level, the eruption of Vesuvius over Pompeii in AD 79 caused a whole range of everyday comments about women to be preserved, although needless to say we don't have the women's version of the stories uncovered there.

'It is known for sure that married men and women had affairs ...'

We have a graffito from a Pompeian workshop which describes the cloth-worker Amaryllis in lewd terms. And a famous exchange on a pub wall records some banter between a weaver, Successus, and his mate, Severus, over the unrequited passion of Successus for the lovely barmaid Iris (Corpus of Latin Inscriptions, CIL 5.1507; 4.8259). Less romantically, a customer at another pub claimed to have made love with the landlady (CIL 4.8442).

Other depictions of women can be seen in the various erotic paintings on Pompeian walls. Some of these paintings are apparently in-house advertising in brothels, and others are simply for domestic entertainment. Certainly Roman men attended brothels or frequented streetwalkers, while most prostitutes would have been slaves, and doubtless had short and miserable lives.

It is known for sure that married men and women had affairs - even after the emperor Augustus made them illegal. But the Roman orgy is a modern invention (not even Juvenal thought of such a thing). Sorry if that's a disappointment.

Working women of Roman Italy

A fresco portrait of Terentius Neo and his wife People did not always work for a wage in the ancient world. Most people worked on the land and in the home, while upper-class men and women supervised households and estates.

Although there were specialist cloth shops, all women were expected to be involved in cloth production: spinning, weaving and sewing. Slave and free women who worked for a living were concentrated in domestic and service positions - as perhaps midwives, child- nurses, barmaids, seamstresses, or saleswomen. We do, however, have a few examples of women in higher-status positions such as that of a doctor, and one woman painter is known.

'Women's domestic work was seen as a symbol of feminine virtue ...'

How do we know about women's work? From men saying in print what women should be doing - poets (like Virgil), and philosophers (like Seneca), and husbands praising their dead wives on tombstones not only for being chaste (casta) but also for excelling at working wool (lanifica).

We can also learn about women's work from pictures on vases and walls (paintings), or from sculptural reliefs on funerary and public art. Septimia Stratonice was a successful shoemaker (sutrix) in the harbour town of Ostia. Her friend Macilius decorated her burial-place with a marble sculpture of her, on account of her 'favours' to him (CIL 14 supplement, 4698).

Graffiti such as the ones on the wall of a Pompeian workshop record the names of women workers and their wool allocations - names such as Amaryllis, Baptis, Damalis, Doris, Lalage and Maria - while other graffiti are from women workers' own monuments, usually those of nurses and midwives (see CIL 14.1507).

Women's domestic work was seen as a symbol of feminine virtue, while other jobs - those of barmaid, actress or prostitute - were disreputable. Outside work like sewing and laundering was respectable, but only had a low-status. Nurses were sometimes quite highly valued by their employers/owners, and might be commemorated on family tombs.

Reliability of sources

As you will have noticed by now, it is not a simple matter to just 'follow the clues' when looking for information about the far distant past. Even assembling a variety of ancient sources does not necessarily result in a truthful or complete picture.

Collecting evidence about Roman women's lives involves ranging over completely different kinds of information, and sifting each piece carefully, with due attention to the purpose of each source and the bias or ignorance of its author. A love poet, for example, wants to express his feelings about a real or imagined beloved, not to give you a rounded portrait of a real woman - while a son mourning his mother's death will mention only her virtues.

'Every type of evidence has to be sifted and looked at from different angles ...'

Any writer's choice of words, image and medium will be governed by his budget, and by the conventions of his time and social group. All of these aims and limitations affect the portrait presented. Bear in mind that the great majority of these sources are not authored or commissioned by women, but by men who are striving to make a particular point. When trying to work out what the lives of Roman women were really like, you should be at least as critical of ancient sources as you are of modern media coverage of celebrities. Every type of evidence has to be sifted and looked at from different angles if we hope to catch the essence of Roman women, and end up with some kind of understanding of their everyday lives.

Find out more books

Women's Life in Greece and Rome edited by Mary Lefkowitz and Maureen Fant (Johns Hopkins, 1992)

Women in the Classical World: Image and Text by Elaine Fantham et al (New York, 1995)

Roman Women edited by Augusto Fraschetti (Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press, 2001)

Women in the Classical World: Image and Text by Elaine Fantham et al (New York, 1995)

Reading Roman Women by Suzanne Dixon (London, 2001)

Status: Roman Working Women in Ostia by Natalie Kampen (Berlin, 1981)

I Claudia: Women in Ancient Rome by Diana Kleiner and Susan Matheson (New Haven, 1996)

I Claudia II: Women in Roman Art and Society by Diana Kleiner and Susan Matheson (Austin, 2000)

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 Roman Empire: The Paradox of Power - http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/romans/empire_01.shtml  Resisting Slavery in Ancient Rome - http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/romans/slavery_01.shtml  Social Pecking Order in the Roman World - http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/romans/social_structure_01.shtml  Pompeii: Its Discovery and Preservation - http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/romans/pompeii_rediscovery_01.shtml  The Roman Way to Building a Career - http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/romans/careers_01.shtml

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Historic Figures

 Virgil - http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/virgil.shtml  Augustus - http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/augustus.shtml  Julius Caesar - http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/caesar_julius.shtml

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External Web Links

 Study of Women and Gender in the Ancient World - http://www.stoa.org/diotima/

Published on BBC History: 2003-09-08 Ancient Roman Women: A Look at their Lives by Moya K. Mason

Any historical investigation into the lives of ancient women involves individual interpretation and much speculation. One can read the ancient sources concerned with women and their place in society, but to a large degree, they are all secondary sources that were written by men about women. No ancient journals or personal diaries written by Roman women were uncovered, so it is not known what their hopes and dreams were, or if they had any. What Roman women felt about most political issues and the numerous wars and upheavals is also a mystery. Nor can we read about what women thought of slavery, marriage, or the fact they had no legal rights over their children or even themselves. The scope is truly limited, but many questions may still be asked and considered, such as: what was the role of Roman women in their society? Were they considered citizens who had personal freedom, or were they sequestered away and given little or no education? Was individuality and personal choice a part of women's lives, or were they overshadowed by the patriarchal society of which they were a part? The answers may be difficult to uncover, but they are important questions when one realizes that so much of Roman civilization went on to lay the foundation of our own modern society. Understanding the past makes the present that much clearer and hopefully provides insight into the future, thereby helping society not to make the same mistakes again.

When looking at the sources for ancient Roman women, it is quickly evident that most of them deal with the aristocracy. It was men from the upper classes who received the best education and the best positions in society, and this enabled them leisure time to reflect on their world and to write about it. As is the case with most people, they wrote about their own experiences and when it came to women, it was their own relatives and wives whom they depicted on paper. Certainly, aristocratic women and those from the other upper levels of Roman Society did not make up the majority of the female population, but it is pieces of their lives that we have to look at. Evidence for what the poorer women suffered during the Roman Republic and the Empire is very fragmentary, however, women of all economic levels shared one overwhelming and pervasive role and responsibility, no matter the social position they possessed: that of child bearer.

Women, or more correctly, girls, were usually married by the time they were twelve years old, sometimes even younger.(1) In our modern world, this seems scandalous, but everything must be put into societal contexts. Life expectancy was very different in ancient Rome compared with today. Granted, there would be some people who died of old age, but the majority only reached their twenties and thirties,(2) if they were lucky. Girls married very young and often died in childbirth or because they were weakened from having too many children without reprieve.(3) A funerary inscription to a woman named Veturia provides a good example: she was married at eleven, gave birth to six children, and died at twenty-seven.(4) Women were expected to have as many babies as they could because they were never sure how many of the children would reach maturity. (5) Cornelia, mother of the Gracchi, gave birth to twelve offspring, but only two boys and one girl survived.(6)

Aristocratic families wanted male children to carry on the family name and lineage,(7) and expected their wives to be perpetually pregnant.(8) Infertility was actually grounds used for divorce, and women would often offer a divorce so that their husbands would have the opportunity to have children with someone else.(9) Women from the lower classes would not be expected to have as many children because they did not have the means to support them.(10) These women may also have worked outside the home to help support their families,(11) but their husbands would still have wanted a son to carry on their names and if, they were a rural family, to help work on the farm. But certainly there was a difference between the higher echelon of Roman society and the lower classes: upper class women had more children. Women did not have a choice between having children or not, and they could not overrule the husband if he chose to expose a newborn. Many female infants were exposed by their families because they could not carry on the family name and they also required a dowry at the time of their marriage.(12) Eva Cantarella in Pandora's Daughters, states:

The earliest power that the father could exercise over a filias familias was that of exposure. At birth, in a highly symbolic rite, newborns -- male and female -- were deposited at the feet of the father. He -- without explanation or justification -- either recognized the child as his by picking it up, or withheld his recognition by leaving it where it was. The recognized child became a member of the familia; the unrecognized child was abandoned to the river or left to die by starvation.(13)

Most of the exposed were girls, but some were sickly or weak-looking males.(14) On an Oxyrhynchus Papri, a letter from a husband to a wife instructs her to let the infant live if it is a boy; [but] "if it is a girl, expose it."(15) It was as simple as that. This practise of exposure greatly reduced the female population, as did the neglect of girls. Augustus was so concerned with the decline in Roman population, particularly in the aristocracy that he passed both the Julian Laws in 18 BC and the Papia-Poppaean Laws in 9 AD. These laws placed penalties on celibacy and not marrying; and rewarded marriage and having children. Neither set of laws really helped generate a great increase in the population rate of Rome.(16)

Although the role of women in ancient Rome was primarily child-bearing, women also played an important in raising the children.(17) This differed greatly from the Athenian tradition which placed both the cultural and educational facets of raising boys exclusively in the hands of men. In the Roman world, women were encouraged to teach the children Roman culture.(18) When the boys grew up, the mother would spend her money and time to advance their political careers.(19)Even the girls would receive this sort of home education because they would be expected to teach their own children one day.(20) In The Elements of Oratory, Quintilian reports that Cornelia, mother of Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus, played a major role in their education and cultivation.(21) Roman women had children, but they were not exclusively "tools of reproduction"(22) -- they "were also a fundamental instrument of the transmission of a culture ... [and] it was their job to prepare them to become cives romani ... "(23) Who were they preparing to become Roman citizens? Were only the males given citizenship, as was the case for centuries in Athens? This is a difficult question to answer.

In the introduction of As the Romans Did, Jo-Ann Shelton discusses how the Romans "took the remarkable action of granting Roman citizenship to every free person within the borders of the Roman Empire."(24) It does not sound as if women were excluded. In Women and Politics in Ancient Rome, Richard A. Bauman says that "the public position of women was so unfavourable that it has even been doubted whether they were Roman citizens. The doubts are unfounded ..."(25) So it seems that they had a higher position than the Athenian women, who were not considered citizens. They did have something in common: neither was allowed to vote or to participate in political activities. This applies primarily to the Republican Period, since the kings made the decisions during the Monarchy and the Emperor had the final say during the Roman Empire. In Augustus' time, the assemblies began to fade into the shadows. Regardless of the laws, inscriptions uncovered in Pompeii from the first century AD prove that women had an interest in politics. An example, painted on the side of a house states: "Nymphodotus, along with Caprasia, asks you to vote for Marcus Cerrinus Vatia for the aedileship."(26) Another, found on the side of a wine shop reads: "Caprasia along with Nymphius -- her neighbors too -- ask you to vote for Aulus Vettius Firmus for the aedileship; he is worthy of the office."(27)

Women had more than a passing interest in politics years earlier when the Romans initiated the Oppian Laws. These laws prohibited women from buying any luxury items such as jewelry or fancy clothes(28) -- they could not buy anything that cost any amount of money. The government felt that there would be more money available to fight Hannibal. The women went along with this because they were willing to do their share for the war effort, but twenty years later, they tried to have the law repealed.(29) Livy, in his A History of Rome, explains how the women poured into the Forum, where the assembly was under way. They were trying to convince their male relatives to vote in favour of the repeal. One of the opponents of the repeal gives us some insight into what some men felt about the incident. Marcus Porcius Cato wonders "what kind of behaviour is this, running around in public and blocking streets and talking to other women's husbands? ... it is not right, even in your own homes for you to concern yourselves about which laws are passed or repealed here."(30) The law was abolished and women had won a victory. It showed them that they had strength in numbers. One can only imagine the scandal it caused within families. This incident makes one wonder what other things were off limit to women. Where did they go when they left their homes?

It seems as if they regularly attended Roman public baths, since bathing "was a recreational activity enjoyed by people of all ages, sexes, and social classes."(31) There were often separate baths for women and men, but if not, the women bathed in the morning and the men in the afternoon. This was an integral part of the lives of most Romans, and for the upper classes, so were dinner parties. Women were able to accompany their husbands to these affairs, which could vary from quite ordinary functions to wildly fantastic ones like the kind Trimalchio presented. In Petronius' book The Satyricon, one notes that women were present for the festivities and that Scintialla arrived with her husband Habinnas, having just left another banquet.(32)

Women were also able to attend religious festivals, such as the Ambarualia and the Lupercalia.(33) Women could also attend amphitheater events like gladiatorial matches and circuses. There is even evidence that women fought as gladiators,(34) but they were not allowed to be seen on stage as actors.(35) Ovid, in his Love Affairs advises men that the racetrack is a good place to meet women, which is evidence that they could even attend those events.(36) It is very intriguing that Roman women who had so few legal rights could also possess so many personal freedoms: the Roman women were certainly not sequestered away in gynaeconitis as Athenian women were in Greece. Girls did receive some informal education in their homes and learned to read and write. Both mothers and fathers had a role to play in the transmission of Roman culture and education to their children, however, it was frowned upon for women to become too educated, as can be seen in Juvenal's writings. He scoffs at the women who have opinions on Homer, grammar, and ethics, and he implies that these sorts of women have forgotten their place in society by being so knowledgeable -- it was not their place.(37)

Women were already finished their educations and having babies when their male contemporaries were practicing eloquence or studying philosophy abroad in places like Athens. Of course, this would only apply to males from upper class families. Women from the lower classes received enough education to assist them in running small businesses and working as dressmakers or salespeople in the markets.(38) It would seem as if a dichotomy existed within the lives of Roman women. Sarah Pomeroy, in Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves, points out that "Roman women were involved with their culture and were able to influence their society ... Roman women dined with their husbands and attended parties, games, and shows."(39) Eva Cantarella makes some similar observations:

The Romans did not believe that women should be shut up in a special part of the house or that they should be forbidden to dine with men or go out in the street ... Perhaps the liberality of the Romans toward their women is not altogether accidental. Given their duties, women had to participate in some way in men's lives in order to assimilate their values and become more faithful transmitters of them.(40)

Women did have some personal freedoms, but they had little chance for individuality or personal choice. They were under the constant supervision of their fathers, male relatives, and husbands, who regularly kissed them on the mouth to find out if they had drunk wine. (41) Drinking wine was strictly forbidden for Roman women and they could be punished by death. In Memorable Deeds and Sayings from the first century AD, Maximus tells of how Egnatius Metellus beat his wife to death for drinking wine.(42) It was believed that wine caused women to have adulterous relationships, which were very common because so many of the marriages were for political or economic reasons, and not for love or passion. Women often were expected to marry men who were much older then themselves. They married whoever they were told to. Women found to have committed adultery could be put to death by their fathers or guardians.(43)

Another controlling device that was used against Roman women was the practise of not allowing them to have personal names. Instead, a woman took her father's middle name or nomen and feminized it. From a Roman woman's name, you could tell who her father was and therefore, her position within society.(44) Women existed within their families and had no identity of their own. Their fathers had absolute control over their lives and could even sell them into slavery or force them to get a divorce.(45) If they had children at the time of the divorce, women were forced to leave them behind. When marriages dissolved, women had no legal rights concerning the offspring and often never saw them again. Marriages were often without manus, meaning that the father kept the property of his daughter and would therefore, retain a hold over her wealth. A marriage with manus gave power over the women to her new husband, as well as ownership of her property. In either case, the women were not permitted to do anything they wanted with their own money, since personal wealth is always equated with power. Of course, there were some exceptions: mothers could spend money on their sons' political careers or education, and one can also read about Cicero's wife, Terentia, who had personal wealth and made land investments on her own. It would seem likely that women with wealth would have more power over their lives, but this would depend upon her father or guardian or husband. Women were expected to have a legal guardian because they were not considered smart enough to act in their own best interests. When Cornelia, mother of the Gracchi, was widowed, she refused to marry again and as a result, made her own decisions, but this was very rare. The only real power that most women possessed was over their personal interactions within the circle of their friends and family. Still, women had to know their place, remain modest, be tireless, and both loyal and obedient -- emotionally, physically, and financially to their families. That was what Roman men were looking for.(46)

So it is evident that women had certain prescribed roles to play within Roman society: child bearer, mother, daughter, and wife. They were considered citizens, but they were not permitted to vote or participate in government procedures. If they did try, it was frowned upon. Some women were more educated than others and they all had some personal freedoms. Lower class women could work, but upper class women were expected to meet the expectations that their families had set out for them and stay at home. None of the women really had their own identities or an array of personal choices put before them. There are always some exceptions and surely there were individual women who were considered very radical in their time. Women were overshadowed by the men in their lives because Rome was a very patriarchal society, built on a peasant culture and on the old customs of mos maiorum.(47) As Cicero said, "the strength of Rome is founded on her ancient customs as much as on the strength of her sons."(48) Women probably did not have much of a life, especially those of the lower classes, and they died at a young age. One can only hope that they had pleasures that were never documented by the men who wrote about them. Some did get involved in the rites of Bacchus(49) and probably did enjoy themselves a great deal for short periods of time -- before they were caught.

But we will never know what the women of ancient Rome thought about their inferior social position or what they thought about the many layers of separation that existed between themselves and Roman men. The ancient Roman world was a very patriarchal culture, with men holding all the positions of power. Women and children really did not have many rights. In reality, life must have been difficult for the majority of people in Rome when one considers all the years of war and conquer: life was not very easy for anyone. Although the Romans were not pioneers in social equality, the civilization had a great influence on both men and women who came later. They were building an empire and as the legendary H.I. Marrou stated in his book, A History of education in Antiquity:

If Greek civilization in its turn had remained the jealously guarded preserve of a few Aegean cities, it too would have disappeared long ago, without renewing, as it has, the face of the earth. And the fact that it has fulfilled its destiny is largely due to Rome. Rome's historic function was to complete the work begun by Alexander, and plant Hellenistic civilization from the Sahara to the lochs of Scotland, from the Euphrates to the Atlantic; and to give it such deep roots that it could withstand the storms of Teuton and Slav invasions, and the Arab invasion, if not that of the Turks. It is this profound labor, ensuring the renaissances of the future, that constitutes Rome's real honor and imperishable glory.(50)

Notes 1 Jo-Ann Shelton, As the Romans Did (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988) p. 37.

2 Ibid., p. 292.

3 Ibid.

4 CIL 3.3572.

5 Shelton, p. 292.

6 Ibid., p. 24.

7 Ibid.

8 Ibid.

9 CIL 6.1527, 31670 (1LS 8393).

10 The Law Code of Theodosius 11.27.1.

11 Shelton, p. 306.

12 Ibid., p. 27-28.

13 Eva Cantarella, Pandora's Daughters (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1987) p. 115.

14 Shelton, p. 27.

15 Oxyrhynchus Papri 744 (Select Papyri 105).

16 A.D.A, pp. 174, 184, 187; Dio Cassius, Roman History 54.16.1- 2; and Tacitus, Annals 3.25.

17 Tacitus, A Biography of Agricola 4.2-4.

18 Ibid.

19 Quintillian, The Elements of Oratory 1.1.6-8, 15-17, 20. 20 Shelton, p. 300.

21 Quintillian, 1.1.6-8, 15-17, 20.

22 Cantarella, p. 134.

23 Ibid.

24 Shelton, p. 3.

25 Richard A. Bauman, Women and Politics in Ancient Rome (London: Routledge, 1992) p. 2.

26 Mary R. Lefkowitz and Maureen B. Fant, Women's Life in Greece and Rome (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1992), p. 152.

27 Ibid.

28 Shelton, p. 299.

29 Ibid.

30 Livy, A History of Rome 34.2.2, 2, 8-11, 14.

31 Shelton, p. 31.

32 Petronius, The Satyricon.

33 Shelton, p. 33.

34 Lefkowitz and Fant, p. 213.

35 Shelton, p. 35.

36 Ovid, Love Affairs 3.2.1-14, 19-26, 33-38, 43-59, 61-84.

37 Juvenal, Satires 6.434-456. 38 Jane Francis, lecture notes.

39 Sarah Pomeroy, Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves (New York: Schocken books, 1975) p. 189.

40 Cantarella, p. 134.

41 Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights 10.23.

42 Valerius Maximus, Memorable Deeds & Words 6.3.9.

43 ADA, p. 113-116, 123, 126.

44 Jane Francis, lecture notes.

45 Shelton, p. 18.

46 Jane Francis, lecture notes.

47 H.I. Marrou, A History of education in Antiquity, (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1956) p. 231.

48 Ibid.

49 Livy, 39.8, 9, 14, 17, 18.

SVLPICIAE ELEGIDIA

INTRODUCTION: Many women, we know, wrote poetry in ancient Rome. The works of only one have survived. These six poems by Sulpicia, the niece of the distinguished statesman and patron of letters Valerius Messalla Corvinus, allow us to hear an aristocratic female voice from the late first century B.C. and the Augustan milieu of Horace and Vergil. Sulpicia's work has been handed down as part of the Corpus Tibullianum, a collection of poems by Tibullus and other poets affiliated with Messalla.

At last. It's come. Love, the kind that veiling will give me reputation more than showing my soul naked to someone. I prayed to Aphrodite in Latin, in poems; she brought him, snuggled him into my bosom. Venus has kept her promises: let her tell the story of my happiness, in case some woman will be said not to have had her share. I would not want to trust anything to tablets, signed and sealed, so no one reads me before my love-- but indiscretion has its charms; it's boring to fit one's face to reputation. May I be said to be a worthy lover for a worthy love.

Birthday's here and I hate it-- of all the days to be spent in gloom out in the dreary country without Cerinthus. What is sweeter than the city? Is a house in the country on the banks of that frigid stream in Arretine country, any place for a girl? Now Uncle Messalla, do take a rest-- you've always looked after me too well. There are times, you know, when travel's a bad idea. I'VE BEEN KIDNAPPED I'VE LEFT BEHIND MY MIND MY FEELING VIOLENCE DOESN'T LET ME BE MY OWN MISTRESS.

3. You know the dreary trip contemplated for a girl? Now I can be at Rome for your birthday. May that day be celebrated by us all, which now comes, perchance, as no surprise to you.

Thank you for taking such pains over me, for keeping me from making a fool of myself. I do hope you enjoy the bimbo. Her flashy clothes do cast a subtly shabby light on SVLPICIA SERVI FILIA. (They are a little worried about me, afraid I might trip up, marry a nobody.)

Do you think kindly of your girl, Cerinthus, now that a fever attacks my limbs? I wouldn't wish to get well except on one condition: that I could think you wished it too. But what would be the good in getting well, if you can bear my sickness with unfluttered heart?

May I never be, o dawn of my life, as warm a care to you as I seem to have been a few days ago, if --fool that I am-- I've done anything in all my short life that I might admit to regretting more than leaving you alone last night-- passionate only to hide my passion.

Translator's Notes

I.5 Aphrodite in Latin: in her Latin, Sulpicia juxtaposes Cytherea, a Greek epithet for Aphrodite, with the Camenae, the Italian and Roman goddesses of song and poetry, counterparts of the Muses.

I.8 Venus: the Roman goddess of erotic love. Her Greek counterpart is Aphrodite (l.5).

I.13 tablets: wooden tablets coated in wax were the usual material for writing letters, drafts, and other more or less ephemeral documents. II.4 Cerinthus: like most Roman poets, Sulpicia disguises her lover with a pseudonym. The identity of "Cerinthus" is unknown; he has been identified, without much reason, as the "Cornutus" mentioned elsewhere in the Corpus Tibullianum.

II.10: Uncle Messalla: Valerius Messalla Corvinus (64 B.C. - A.D. 8), a prominent soldier, orator, statesman, and patron of the arts.

IV.6: SVLPICIA SERVI FILIA: "Sulpicia, the daughter of Servius;" Sulpicia here refers to herself in the formal, public style of an aristocratic inscription.

Be sure to see Diotima's bibliographies on Sulpicia and on Women Writers in Greco- Roman Antiquity.

Permission is hereby granted to distribute for classroom use, provided that both Lee Pearcy and Diotima are identified in any such use. Other uses not authorized in writing by the translator or in accord with fair use policy are expressly prohibited.

http://www.stoa.org/diotima/anthology/sulpicia-anth.shtml

Lower Class Women in the Roman Economy Susan Treggiari

The subject of this paper1 is the female of the species opifices and tabernarii, “craftsmen and shopkeepers and all that scum of the cities,” as Cicero once indiscreetly called them.2 We need not believe him when he claims3 that they were always and everywhere ready for riot or revolution because they were to wretchedly poor, but for many of these workers it may have been hard to make ends meet, so that we should not be surprised to find wives or children gainfully employed. However, the range of jobs and the range of prosperity is wide, for we shall deal with a broad stratum of urban workers which includes importers of manufactured articles or raw materials, skilled craftsmen producing and selling luxury goods, humbler dealers, shopkeepers and pedlars of cheap objects, people who offered services.

Literary sources pay little attention to the lower classes, except when they become a “mob,” or to urban workers except when they get in the way or make a noise disturbing to a person of refined tasted or scholarly habits.4 For the ideas of workers about themselves, we rely chiefly on tomb inscriptions. So it is not surprising that most of our information about women from this section of society comes from epigraphic sources. The material used here is almost entirely epigraphic. Greek material5 has been almost ignored, and the focus is on the Latin West. Since inscriptions are not often closely dated, there is no sharp cut-off date, but only a few Christian inscriptions have been used. The aim is to give a fairly full but not exhaustive, picture of the participation of women in various urban jobs from the late Republic down to about the time of Constantine, in Italy and the western provinces. Upper-class women with business interests in, for instance, the manufacture of bricks, terracotta lamps or lead pipes;6 small “professionals” such as doctors and midwives; entertainers, among whom were large numbers of women, such as singers and mime-actresses, and domestic slaves7 will all be omitted.

Our comparison group is of male urban workers, opifices, tabernarii, mercennarii.8 Despite the expense of the monument,9 a fraction of them put up inscriptions detailed enough to mention their job. Others are known because they belonged to a guild. There are over 225 names in western Latin inscriptions for such city jobs,10 ranging from silversmiths, goldsmiths of various types, garland-makers, jewellers, fruit-sellers, butchers, bakers, cobblers, all of whom are relatively well attested, to dealers who specialised in cheese or honey, or salumeria, or honey-cakes, or heavy cloaks or silk; men who made nails, ivory furniture or the eyes for statues. Then there are porters, dockers, muleteers, horsebreakers, bath attendants, warehousemen, undertakers, auctioneers, debt- collectors, itinerant salesmen.

When we come to the women, their range is more limited. There is just one tomb inscription to a woman who apparently ran a workshop, officina (9715), in Rome. But some were involved in crafts which we might expect to find labelled “masculine.” The making of delicate work in gold-leaf -- particularly garlands and jewellery -- was a craft which reached a high level. The practitioners are, as far as I know, attested only on inscriptions from Rome itself, where there was a collegium bratiariorum inauratorum (95). Two brattiarii who dedicate to the Concordia of the guild are men, as is the worker in a relief labelled aurifex brattiar (9210), but the tow other extant inscriptions each name a man and a woman. One runs “Gaius Fulcinius Hermeros, freedman of Gaius, brattiarius; Fulvia Melema, lived 48 years, brattiaria” (9211), and the other “Aulus Septicius Apollonius, freedman of Aulus, brattiarius; Septicia Rufa, freedwoman of Aulus, brattiaria, two ollae” (6939). It seems to me probable that these two women did not merely sell gold-leaf work, as Le Gall (125-126) suggests for Melema, but also produced it, perhaps leaving the heavy hammering work for the men. I assume too that both couples are married; Rufa may have been freed by Apollonius, or be his conliberta.11 In a similar luxury trade, there is a group of five jewellers, gemmari, from the Sacred Way. They are all ex-slaves, two freed by a woman called Babbia and three by a Quintus Plotuis. The first of the group is Babbia Asia, and if the grammar is correct, she is included in the masculine plural gemari (sic) de sacra via which comes at the end of the list (9435). We can back this up by pointing to a woman seller, and probably setter of pearls, also from Rome (5972). In all three crafts, in the precise arrangement of delicate gold leaf, in the cutting of cameos and incising of gemstones, and in pearl- setting, women might well have the advantage over men in designing and technical skill, as well as showing talent as saleswomen. Nimble fingers would also be needed in two other crafts: that of the auri netrix (9213), who spun gold thread, and of the auri vestrix (9214). We can only guess whether the latter embroidered in gold thread, as Le Gall thinks (p. 125), or made clothes in cloth of gold. The gold-spinner, who belongs to the fourth century, was, if the text is right, only a child of nine at the time of her death. She is commemorated by her parents, but unfortunately they do not tell us their own jobs.

These last two women bring us into a field which has always been connected with women’s work, clothes-production. Presumably many garments were made up at home with material bought from the sellers of woollen or linen cloth. Rich people had vesifici and vestificae among their household staff.12 But ordinary Romans could also buy ready-to-wear clothes, either from specialists like the cloak-sellers or -- at least in Gaul -- the cucullarii,13 and from vestiarii, for more ordinary garments. Vestiarii too might specialise: we hear in Rome of vestiarii tenuiarii (9977, 9978, 37826, 33923). Only one woman appears to be specifically mentioned as a vestiaria. She is in a group of five libertini, vestiarii de Cermalo minusculo, who commemorate their patron, also a freedman (33920). But other women may be involved in their trade, at least as links if not as active workers. There is for example an inscription which reads, “[Camer]ia Iarine, freedwoman of Lucius, set up this monument to [Lucius Cam]erius Thraso, freedman of Lucius, her patron; [and] to Lucius Camerius Alexander, freedman of Lucius, his patron, and to [Lucius C]amerius, her freedman and husband, and to all their descendants, all these [vest]iarii tenuiarii from the vicus Tuscus” (37826). Here the woman is an essential link in the chain which goes from Alexander through his freedman Thraso, through her, to her freedman and their unnamed children. Her importance is highlighted by the fact that she freed her husband, which is less commonly attested than husbands freeing their wives.

Then there are sarcinatrices. The root meaning is “mender,” but presumably they also made up new clothes. Some support for this guess may be found in the fact that among domestics, vestifici (of either sex) and menders (almost invariably women) are not found in the same household, so that it seems likely that their spheres of duty overlapped or perhaps were identical. Unlike vestiarii, commercial sarcinatrices will have worked on the clients’ own material, like the little modern dressmaker, whether they were doing the simple sewing which was all that was needed on Roman clothes, or performing repairs and alterations.14 We know this because they were liable for damages. Gaius, in a Digest section on peculium (15.1.27), says that an action may lie against the peculium of a slavewoman or of a filiafamilias if she is, for instance, a weaver or a sarcinatrix. This is also good evidence that these were obvious jobs for dependent women to do. But freeborn women who were sui iuris or women who had been freed from slavery would be just as likely to do such work professionally. It is not easy in the inscriptions to be sure when we have a commercial needlewoman rather than a domestic. There are six or seven from Rome and one or two from elsewhere in Italy which may attest professionals (9875- 79, 9883; v. 2542, 2881), but only one indisputable case: “To Matia Prima, freedwoman of Gaia, needlewoman from the Six Altars, lived 46 years, from T. Thoranius Salvius, freedman of Titus . . .” (9884). The great domestic occupation of women, whether dominae or servants, was of course lanificium, spinning wool. Domestics whose special job this was were called quasillariae (basket-women) in the inscription, lanificae by the jurists. But spinning may also have been done part-time by other women servants whose specialised job was something else. This would account for the patchy attestation of quasillariae, but the comparatively regular appearance of wool-weighers, even in households where quasillariae do not occur. Quasillariae are oddly distributed, because of eleven known from Rome eight come from the columbarium of the Statilii. It seems likely that, although they belonged to a rich familia, part of their work went into commercial production. The same family also had weavers and fullers.15 Commercial work by slaves would of course have been quite normal on the country estates of great nobles; what is unusual here is that it seems to be taking place in Rome. But, apart from this one possibility, there is no other evidence of commercial spinners in the inscriptions. The reason, presumably, is that spinning was piece-work, the last resort of the poor but honest free woman, as sewing was in the 19th century.16 Women so poor could not afford monuments in any case. But Apuleius gives a pathetic speech to a woman who eked out the family income by these means. Her husband just kept going by working as a labourer on fabriles operae. An unexpected holiday forced on him by his boss (officinator) meant that he had to sell an old storage jar for five drachmae in order to pay for supper. His wife claims that she works night and day, wearing her fingers to the bone with spinning, in order to make enough money to keep them in lamp oil: “at ego misera pernox et per diem lanificio nervos meos contorqueo, ut intra cellulam nostram saltem lucerna luceat . . . .” But, like most of the wives in Apuleius, she had some energy left over, although she did not ordinarily earn an income from it (Met. 9.5).

On a more organised commercial scale, there were some women weavers, as the passage from Gaius shows (Dig. 15.1.27). But they too would be poor or slaves, and the few who appear in inscriptions are in domestic service (6362, 33371). Despite the name, the great imperial gynaecia of the late empire were staffed by men. But women weavers were numerous in Egypt, and Pausanias says that because of the flourishing manufacture of cloth made from byssos at Patrae, the female population of the town was double the male (7.21.14). The only woman cloth-seller I have found in the inscriptions is a lintearia. She may have woven the linen which she sold (ii. 4318a, Tarraco). The workers who finished off woollen cloth are better attested. One very prosperous family group, whose involved inscription seems to indicate that the daughter bequeathed three shops, had a mother who sheared the finished cloth to produce an even nap -- tonstrix -- and a son who is styled simply lanarius. He had a shop on the vicus of Fors Fortuna. He husband’s job is not mentioned.17

More surprising among women who make things is a female shoemaker, sutrix, from Ostia. The inscription itself is damaged, but the relief which accompanies it is said to show a seated woman with a cobbler’s last (xiv. 4698).

I pass now to those who are primarily dealers. First a Christian lady who sold bottles, lagunaria, very probably was not a glassblower as well.18 On the whole, it seems likely that the clavaria who was prosperous enough to set up a monument to her husband (who was also a clavarius) and to a freedwoman and a little girl, managed the business-side of the nail-making (v. 7023, Taurini). Women who sold perfumes, unguentariae, may have made some of them too. This is a relatively well-attested profession, and although philosophers objected to perfumes as luxurious and deceptive and therefore down-graded perfume-selling the perfumers who record themselves seem to be of secure position (though often freedmen). Despite Greek slurs on myropolides,19 Roman women perfumers are of the utmost respectability: the two on whom we have any detail are a well-deserving mother from Puteoli, who died at 71, and a lady from Rome, commemorated in verse by a husband of 30 years’ standing.20 Dealers in incense were just as substantial. Two Roman inscriptions to thurarii include women: one, from the late Republic, attests Hilara, freedwoman of sextus, and sextus Trebonius, freedman of sextus. These are perhaps husband and wife; they are both called thuraii, and since their tomb measured 20 feet by 28 they were prosperous.21 A longer inscription commemorates as liberti and thurarii five men and two women who were freed by three freeborn Trebonii, Gaius, Publius and Publius, who are probably cousins.22

Despite the difference in the praenomina of the patroni in the two inscriptions, it seems likely that there is some link. If so, the interests of different branches of the family in this trade must have been quite considerable. Even if we take the second inscription in isolation, we can speculate whether the freeborn Trebonii took an active part in the business, or whether they had set up their freedmen in it as managers or had financed them, or whether the freedmen had taken over the business, and whether there was just one shop or a chain of shops. A similar example from the same period concerns sellers of purple. In the late Republic, a freedwoman called Veturia Fedra (or possibly Flora) commemorates her patron, Decimus Veturius Diog(enes) and her husband and colliberius, D. Veturius Nicepor and their joint freedman Philargyr(us).23 The old reading of the text has only Veturia named as engaged in the trade, purpuraria Marianeis, purple-seller in the district of the monuments of Marius, on the Esquiline. But a more recent reading of the inscription by G. Barbieri, adopted by Degrassi, has purpurari a Marianeis, which means that all four were engaged in the trade.24 Then in the early Empire, there was a D. Veturius D. 1. Atticus in the purple trade on the vicus Iugarius; his wife was Veturia D. 1. Tryphera (NS 1922, 144). Lastly, there is on the vicus Tuscus the shop of a purpurarius called L. Plutius Eros, commemorated by Plutia Auge, probalby his colliberta or liberta and wife who also dedicates the monument to a Veturia Attica, freed by two Gai Veturii (xiv. 2433). It is likely that there is a connection between this Attica and the D. Veturii, both because of the names and because of the trade, but we cannot tell precisely what it was. Original patrons must have had the praenomina Gaius and the much rarer Decimus, but there may be quite a number of sons or freedmen intervening in the series from which we fortuitously retrieve these three examples. Loane (76-77) takes account only of two possibilities: that freedmen of D. Veturius may be working branch shops of his “firm” as managers, and that they may have become independent after training as slaves and manumission. In reality, the possibilities are more complex: we have to allow for at least two Gai (cousins or colliberti?); we may note a possible relationship (father and daughter?) between Atticus and Attica, although they have different patrons;25 so we do not know why Veturia Attica is commemorated with the Plutii (friendship and trade connection, or, ore likely, some family relationship, such as, to risk a possible but unprovable guess, that she is the daughter by a previous marriage of Plutia to a Veturius atticus). Probably some freedmen in our postulated longer series were branch-managers, some had separated from the parent firm, some may gave inherited businesses from their patrons. Sons as well as freedmen may also take over. Women appear to have taken part in the trade and probably to have made marriages which attest and cemented relationships between colleagues of different families in the same line of work.26 In other family groups it is perfectly clear that women work ins the purple-trade: we have at least two others from Rome.27

Other women dealers may be listed more briefly: from Rome, a fruit seller with a male partner;28 a freedwoman fishmonger from the horrea Galbiana (9801: piscatrix); a dealer in resin (9855: resinaria, aged 80); a conditaria whose husband was in the same trade;29 a seller of barley;30 a female pouleter shown on a relief;31 a negotiatrix frumentaria et legumenaria (dealer in wheat and pulse), commemorated by her husband and patron, who was a substantial citizen who had other liberti and libertae.32 Outside Rome, there is a seller of seeds from Praeneste (xiv. 2850: seminaria) and (outside our area) a seller of beans from Beirut (iii. 6672). There is a baker from Rieti and another from Carthage, both freedwomen.33 A vinaria from Pompeii, whose thirst is mentioned in a graffito, could in theory be a winemerchant, but it is more likely that she is the hostess of a drinking shop, or a barmaid, a favourite topic on Pompeian walls.34 Of all these dealers, only the wheat and pulse dealer certainly calls herself a negotiatrix.35 The masculine equivalent (negotiator) is often used to enhance a dealer’s status. The jurists, however, use the noun or the related verb without any snobbish motive. Ulpian has the verb to describe the business activity even of a slavewoman (Dig. 14.4.5.2), and Paulus in citation of an actual case put to Scaevola uses negotiatrix. A legacy of feminine accessories in gold and jewellery from a mother to her daughter (“filia mea dulcissima e medio sumito tibique habeto ornamentum omne meum muliebre cum auro et si qua alia muliebria apparuerint”) was made hard to interpret because the mother happened to be a negotiatrix and to have stocks of women’s jewellery at her place of business (Dig. 34.2.32.4).

The employment of women as managers in shops and other businesses also attracted the jurists’ attention, but “it does not much matter,” says Ulpian (Dig. 14.3.7), “who the manager is, male or female, free or the owner’s slave or someone else’s slave . . . . If a woman is put in charge, she will be liable to an agency action. And if a filiafamilias or a slavewoman is put in charge, an action lies.” Gaius remarks that many people put boys or girls in as managers of tabernae (Dig. 14.3.8).

When we come to what would now be called service and industries, women assume rather more importance than they did as producers or dealers. The women who are most often mentioned by the literary sources all belong to this branch -- the working woman par excellence, the meretrix, the brothel-keeper; the innkeeper or cookshop owner. It is natural that prostitutes do not mention their job on tombstones. The only epigraphic evidence on them is provided by the Pompeian graffiti, scrawled by themselves as advertisements or by their grateful or, perhaps, sometimes malicious clients. These were very cheap tarts, of the lowest position, and appear to have been slaves.36 It is unlikely that such women would have achieved a respectable tombstone elsewhere. Nor, I think, do keepers of brothers mention the fact on their memorials. But their friends might do it for them. There is a monument from Beneventum, put up by a freedwoman, to her family and son and to her freedwoman, Calybene, the procuress. It appears that her earnings paid for the tomb, but they were won without cheating anyone else.37

Women who worked in inns and cookshops were expected to be prostitutes as well. Ulpian defines as a prostitute not only a woman who works in a brothel, but one who prostitutes herself in a tavern as commonly happens, or anywhere else: “Palam quaestum facere dicemus non tantum eam, quae in lupanario se prostituit, verum etiam si qua (ut adsolet) in taberna cauponia vel qua alia pudori suo non parcit” (Dig. 23.2.43. pr.). Women working in taverns, like prostitutes, were exempt from the Lex Julia de adulteriis: “cum his, quae publice mercibus vel tabernis exercendis procurant, adulterium fieri non placuit” (Paul. Sent. 2.26.11). Constantine modified this rule so that the mistress of an inn (domina tabernae or cauponae) was liable under the adultery law, unless she was in the habit of serving the drinks in person. If she did come into direct contact with the clients in this way, she, like the inn-servant, the ministra, retained her classical immunity.38

The bad reputation of copae or cauponae is also reflected in the literature, for instance in The Golden Ass.39 But there is a strong element of folk tradition about bad hosts and hostesses, which lasts into modern times, and is often paralleled by a favourable tradition. In Latin literature it is hard not to enjoy the Virgilian copa from Syria. There is a similar coarse appreciativeness about the epigraphic evidence, whether on hostesses or their staff. A drinking cup from Paris has an inscription which probably reads, “Hostess, fill my cup with beer! Host, have you got spiced wine? Yes. Come on, fill it up!”40 Then there is the famous inscription from Aesernia, with the dialogue between the traveller and the copo about his bill (ix. 2689; ILS 7478). Since the figures represented in the relief are the traveller and a girl, who counts on her fingers, it has been argued that the masculine copo can be used also of the copa.41 But the only corroborative evidence is the drinking cup from Paris, where it is quite likely that the drinker hedges his bets by addressing an innkeeper of each sex, just as he mentions both wine and beer. So it seems that in the Aesernia conversation, the traveller may be talking to an offstage male innkeeper, through his wife or maidservant: “innkeeper, let us reckon it up . . . .” (ix. 2689). Presumably the man who put up the memorial to himself and Fannia Voluptas, is the innkeeper himself, and Fannia may be his wife and the woman in the relief. Other women who kept tavern have been identified at Pompeii by the graffiti on the walls, but the identification falls short of certainty.42 The girls who worked in inns are occasionally named, for instance on the wall of a drinking club a certain Hedone, who says, “for one as you can get a drink here, for two you get a better drink and if you pay four you can have Falernian” (iv. 1679), or the inn servant, coponiaes ancilla, Iris, with whom the weaver Successus was in love (8259).

You could also drink in popinae, which offered food of a coarse and appetising type, but not accommodation. If the taberna cauponia is roughly the equivalent of the English pub, the popina can rank as the remote ancestor of the Italian rosticceria. It supplied the hot food and drink which the poorer apartment-dweller would otherwise have been unable to enjoy. For the upper classes, who had their own kitchens and cooks, slumming was the first step on the road to ruin for young men, who were introduced here to dice and low companions. It is hard to imagine that the lower classes despised such a useful institution.43 Kléberg (44) counts one hundred and eighteen cookshops in Pompeii. Of two inscriptions to female proprietors, one shows a freedwoman popa married to a sculptor, and the other is an effusion in hexameters on sweet Amemone “whose fame was known beyond the bounds of her native land, for whose sake many praised Tibur . . . .”44

While tabernarius originally meant the owner of any shop or booth, tabernaria is used only of the keeper of a tavern. This difference in usage may indicate how natural it was felt to be that womewn should run inns. Serving food and drink in popinae would also be a normal extension of a housewife’s domestic functions.45

My last example once more shows women doing commercially a job which others did in the households of the rich -- hairdressing. Female barbers existed, as we learn from an unpleasant epigram by Martial on a tonstrix who kept her booth on the Argiletum at the mouth of the Subura (2.17). In inscriptions, it is difficult to disentangle barbers from wool-shearers.46 But hairdressers, ornatrices, certainly occur. They will have catered to those women who did not own maids. It is not always possible to distinguish domestic hairdressers from those who worked in shops, but from Rome there are at least three. Nostia Daphne, a freedwoman hairdresser in the Vicus Longus, is commemorated with a goldsmith from the same street, probably her husband. Another inscription names a Cleopatra who is a hairdresser in the same street, probably in conjunction with a Nostia freed by a Daphne, whom it is tempting and probably fair to identify with our Nostia Daphne. Lastly, there is Pollia Urbana, freed by a woman and C. Pollius, who works as a hairdresser in the Campus Martius, commemorated with a freedman of another gens, probably her husband, who works as a barber in the same place. It is probably not rash to suggest that they ran a uni-sex establishment together.47 Women’s hairdressers, I take it, had to be women, just as obstetricians were. This helps account for representation in our sources by at least three. They only other trades in which we find as many are those of popinariae (three), purpurariae (three) and unguentariae (five). The comparatively good documentation of popinariae may be held to reflect the importance of women in all types of catering, as cook-shop owners, bar- owners and hoteliers, or as helpmates of their husbands in the trade. Documentation of purple-sellers and unguentariae, while probably attesting a traditional skill at least in selling expensive cloth and perfumes, may also reflect the comparative prosperity of such luxury-dealers, which gave them a slightly better chance of putting up a monument that other female workers had.

It is unnecessary to suppose that any of these rarely-attested women was a unique female practitioner of her trade. None of the jobs is really surprising. The frequency with which a woman is paired with a man, usually a husband,48 in the same trade suggests that many of them worked alongside husbands, either because they adopted the husband’s trade after marriage, or because men looked for wives who were already in the same (or a related)49 trade, which no doubt they generally derived from their fathers and perhaps mothers. Often it would seem reasonable that the wife specialised in selling, while her husband produced the goods in the back shop, although we have seen that many opifices et tabernariae produced and sold. A tradition still exists that in the sale of foodstuffs such as fish and vegetables women predominate -- fishwives and market- women. A visit to Rome’s great modern open-air market, which functions during the morning in the large square of Piazza Vittorio Emmanuele, will make this sufficiently clear. Male talent is more in demand for heavy jobs such as bread-making and butchery, but women can sell their products too.

Women who appear on epitaphs alone may of course be in trade in their own right. But they may also be carrying on the business of a dead husband. This fairly obvious suggestion may be supported by the practice of mediaeval guilds. In thirteenth-century Paris, for example, as documented by the rules given in the Livere des métiers, the widow of a draper could continue her dead husband’s business, unless she remarried “autre homme que dudit mestier.” If her new husband was an outsider, she could carry on “si elle . . . le savait faire de sa main,” if she was herself a draper. Similarly the widow of a type of shoemaker, çavetonnier de petiz souliers de basenne, could carry on the business without paying a fee, but if she re-married must pay the fee before she worked or employed others to do the work. A similar rule applies to the widow of a poulterer. The widow of a fuller may continue, with the help of two apprentices, the children of her late husband and her (or his?) brothers, but if she re-marries must give up the business unless her new husband is also a fuller. Probably the same sort of practices applied in other lines of trade, for which they are not specifically mentioned. Exclusion of women apprentices from a trade is rarely laid down -- it appears for carpet-making, because the work was too heavy. Certain trades, conversely, were just for women: spinning (filleresses de soye à grans fuiseaus and à petitz fuizeaux -- the spelling varies from line to line), weaving silk or making head-dresses of gold (fesserresses de chappeaux d’or). Finally, there were trades in which a woman was allowed to operate independently just as a man was, such as that of retailer of poultry.50

Since in Roman society, even among the bourgeoisie and slaves and, consequently, freedmen, the husband was usually older than the wife, if she survived the dangerous child-bearing years she stood a good chance of surviving her husband, and therefore, if there were no sons yet old enough to carry on the business, of controlling his shop or workshop. Such widows also ran a good chance of not being commemorated. Most of the women we have discussed are in fact commemorated with a man, presumably a husband; where there is no information who paid for the inscription, the plaque was clearly associated either with a columbarium (probably that of a burial society) or with a grander family tomb. Occasionally we find the husband clearly responsible for the inscription: for instance the dutiful Abudia Megiste, the wheat- and pulse-dealer, is commemorated by her husband and patron, who also dedicates the tomb to their freedmen and freedwomen and their descendants and to their freeborn eight-year-old son (9683). The popinaria of Tibur is praised by her husband in verse (xiv. 3709). Other women achieve commemoration by a child (9277, xii. 4514), patrona (ix. 2029), or freedwoman (9855). Women who pay for monuments come probably to three. The clavaria (nail-maker or -seller) during her lifetime commemorates herself, her husband (who had presumably died) and a freedwoman and a delicata (v. 7023). The Carthaginian bakeress, very much alive, is commemorated together with her (? dead) baker-husband and another live male, more probably her son than a second husband (viii. 24678). But the clearest example of a prosperous lady carrying on a firm is Veturia the seller of purple, although unfortunately we cannot show that she inherited the business from her husband or had complete control of it. There is a correlation between the prosperity and the documentation of women who apparently controlled firms: only those rich enough to put up a fairly elaborate inscription give us enough information to indicate that they are, either as widows or in their own right, at the head of a business.

The women under consideration were not admitted as members to trade guilds,51 and not important enough to be patronesses of guilds. It is rare for them to leave votive inscriptions: xiv. 2850 is a dedication to the goddess Fortune at Praeneste by the dealer in seeds from the Porta Triumphalis in Rome. In passing it may be noted that one motive for naming a person’s job and the location of the business, whether on a religious monument such as this, or on tombs lining the main roads leading into the city, was advertisement. It did no harm for the sons and heirs of M. Antonius Teres, a dignitary of Misenum, to remind passers-by that he was a very celebrated dealer in pigs and sheep (33887). The language is more elegant, the sentiment much the same, as in the notorious English epitaph, “Beneath this stone, in hopes of Zion, / doth lie the landlord of the Lion; / his son keeps on the business still, / resigned unto the heavenly will.” Despite these advantages, a very small proportion, not as much as one per cent, of Latin lower-class epitaphs mention a job of the sort we are considering. But the scarcity of women in such jobs is still striking. The attested range of women’s jobs is much narrower than that of men, about 35 discussed here compared with my rough estimate of 225 for men in the Latin West. Women appear to be concentrated in “service” jobs (catering, prostitution); dealing, particularly in foodstuffs; serving in shops; in certain crafts, particularly the production of cloth and clothes, “fiddly” jobs such as working in gold-leaf or hair-dressing; certain luxury trades such as perfumery. This is probably a fair reflection of at least part of reality. (If the Romans were using women to unload the Ostian grain ships or clean out the Cloaca Maxima we would not expect to hear of them, but the hypotheseis is not compelling.)52 I would suggest that the opportunities open to the respectable woman whose family circumstances demanded that she work were limited: even more naturally than Lucian (Somnium) she would go into the family business. And, more often than not, her contribution would not be thought worth specifying either by her father or husband, or by herself. How often does the wife who serves behind the counter in a European butcher’s or baker’s have her name on the sign? Only once, on an antique shop in St. Giles’ in Oxford, have I seen “...and Daughter,” and once, at Webbwood in Ontario, “...and Wife” on a general store. Figures for the participationof the women of the family in Canadian small businesses are unavailable. In the Livre des métiers, the work of the woman will only need to be taken into account if she is widowed -- but we must assume that very many women, wives and daughters, were working alongside the men. The fact was no doubt so obvious to contemporaries that they only occasionally hint it to us. Nor, one may suspect, was it of as much interest to the women themselves when they ordered their tombs as were other details of their family lives. It is perverse of a modern to ask the question, “What did lower-class women do?” Productive work was just one of the things which many of them did and had to do.

University of Ottawa

Notes:

1 This is a revised version, with fuller documentation, of a paper read at the annual meeting of the Association of Ancient Historians held at Stanford and Berkeley in May 1976. An account of the comments made by R. Sealey on that occasion will be found in the Women’s Classical Caucus Newsletter 3 (Spring 1978) 4. My original intention had been to expand the list of inscriptions provided by J. Le Gall, “Métiers des femmes au Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum,” REL 47 bis (1969) 123-130 (henceforth Le Gall). Le Gall’s method had been to search the indexes of CIL, a method he could not follow for volume vi, which has no subject indices. (The new computer index, vi. 7, produced by E. J. Jory, is extremely useful for checking the incidence of a job-name, once one knows the name. It is still easy to miss examples, if one forgets to check all possible cases, abbreviations and variant spellings. There are no subject indices as in other volumes of CIL.) For vi, Le Gall appears to have read the sections on artifices and on certain columbaria in Part 2. For the columbaria, staff whose job is known are listed first, but it is still very easy to miss examples: one of the problems is that, when a couple is commemorated and both man and woman have a job, it is the man’s job which determines where the inscription will appear in the collection. I have searched CIL vi, established from it a basic list of jobs performed by women, and followed Le Gall’s method for the remaining volumes, checking the feminine nouns in the indices of artes et officia privata and any groups of male workers who seemed likely to have female colleagues not mentioned specifically in the index. This procedure produced twelve jobs not in Le Gall (? aurifex, ? conditaria, ? gemmaria, lagunaria, linaria, margaritaria, ornatrices, purpuraria, seminaria, ? sutrix, thurariae, ? vestiaria) which fall into my more tightly defined category of working women. (Le Gall, who says his list is not exhaustive, gives very little space or discussion to this category, includes dometics and emphasises medical workers -- doctors and midwives. A propos of the latter, it is perhaps worth noting in passing that in ii. 4314 medicae manus should not be translated “hands of the woman doctor:” medicae is surely an adjective as in Vergil, Aen. 12.402). Arabic numbers alone will be used to refer to CIL vi; Roman numbers followed by Arabic to other volumes of CIL.

2 Flacc. 18, on Greek cities.

3 Dom. 13. 89; Cat. 4.17.

4 E. g., Sen. Ep. 56.2: “. . . alipilum cogita tenuem et stridulam vocem, quo sit notabilior, subinde exprimentem nec umquam tacentem, nisi dum vellit alas et alium pro se clamare cogit. piget iam enumerare varias exclamationes et botularium et crustularium et omnes popinarum institores mercem sua quadam et insignita modulatione vendentis.” But Seneca refused to be distracted by these, or even by a faber in the same building and a neighbouring ferrarius (ibid. 4). Martial (e.g., 12.57) was less philosophic.

5 On this and an earlier period, see the delightful article of M. Tod, “Epigraphical Notes on Freedmen’s Professions,” Epigraphica 12 (1950) 3-36, who mentions seamstresses, wool-sellers, cloak-seller, lyre- and flute-players, washerwomen, hucksters, a honey- seller, a salt-seller, nurses and a doctor-midwife.

6 On these, Le Gall 125 is unsatisfactory. See H. J. Loane, Industry and Commerce of the City of Rome (50 B. C. - 200 A. D.) (Baltimore 1938) 109-111 (henceforth Loane); A. M. Duff, Freedmen in the early Roman Empire (Cambridge 1928) 111-113; Tapio Helen, Organisation of Roman Brick Production in the first and second centuries A. D. (Helsinki 1975) passim, but especially 89-113 on women landowners, and 113 on women officinatores (of lower status). For more recent work on the braoder question of who is involved in industry see P. D. A. Garnsey’s forthcoming paper (Trimalchio and the Independent Freedmen of Rome.”

7 Cf. Treggiari, “Jobs for Women”, American Journal of Ancient History (henceforward AJAH) 1 (1976) 76-104.

8 Opifices, strictly, work in a workshop, officina, making things. They overlap with artifices (artists and craftsmen). Some are wage-earners, mercennarii, some are masters. Tabernarii work in shops, booths and taverns. Some are both opifices and tabernarii, producing what they sell in the shop. The difficulty of distinguishing master from employee persists when we deal with individual job-names. Mercennarii also include people who offered services to the public, such as porters (Apul. Met. 1.7; Petr. Sat. 38.7, 46.8) or the plucker of under-arm hair (Sen. Ep. 56.2, quoted in n. 4) who, surprisingly, could be a very prosperous citizen (9141).

9 R. Duncan-Jones, The Economy of the Roman Empire. Quantitative Studies (Cambridge 1974) 79-80, 127-131.

10 It would be long and probably tedious to list them. I offer a select list of 162 jobs from Rome itself in “Rome: Urban Labour,” Seventh International Economic History Congress (Edinburgh 1978), Theme B3, 162-165.

11 Women goldsmiths occur. One, from the late empire, may be in trade (9206: Locus Masumille aurificis cu[m] Sevarin[o]).

12 AJAH 1 (1976) 84-85.

13 Sagarii: e.g., 956, 7971, 9864-9872, 33906, 37378, 37402; v. 5918, 5926, 5928, 5929 (Milan); v. 6773; ix. 2399, 5752. Cucullarii: xiii. 2953. 14 AJAH 1 (1976) 85. Note that the Italian word for a dressmaker, la sarta (tailor: il sarto) derives from sarcire, etc.

15 76360 (tetor = textor or tector), 6361, 6362, fullones: 6287-6290. Cf. AJAH 1 (1976) 82.

16 See, for instance, Mrs. Gaskell, Ruth (London 1906) 1-11. Patricia Branca, “A New Perspective on Women’s Work: a Comparative Typology,” Journal of Social History 9 (1976) 129-153 especially at 133-136, has some interesting remarks on dressmaking, work which occupied 730,000 women in England in 1871, while 580,000 worked in textiles and 1,700,000 as domestic servants.

17 9941: Galloniae D. 1. Paschusae tostrici; 9493. Another tostrix may be a barber (xii. 4514, Narbo).

18 9488: ad Porta Trigemina. An inscription with the word scap[h]iaria has been condectured by S. Panciera, “Nuovi documenti epigraphici per la topografia di Roma antica,” Rend. Pont. Acad. Arch. (1970/1971) 121-125, to refer to a woman who made vessels called scaphia and/or sold them in the temple of Bellona.

19 RE 1.A.2 (1860) (Hug).

20 x. 1965; vi. 10006. Others are 33928 (two) and xii 1594 (Dea Augusta Vocontioum).

21 9934 = i2.139 = ILLRP 818.

22 They are C. P. P. Treb[oni]orum P. P. C. [f(ilii)]. (9933 = i2.1398 - ILLRP 816)

23 i2.1413 = 37820 = ILLRP 809. Barbieri reads and Degrassi in ILLRP prints Flora. The expansion of Nicepor to Niceporus (ibid.) seems unnecessary.

24 On either reading the grammar is loose. The complete text reads as follows:

V(ivit) D. Veturius D. 1. Diog(enes), / 1 D. (Veturius) D. 1. Nicepor / v(ivit) Veturia D. 1. Fedra (Flora, ILLRP) / de sua pecunia faciund(um) coir(avit) / sibi et patrono et conlibert(o) / et liberto. / Nicepor conlibertus / vixit mecum annos xx / purpuraria Marianeis (purpurari a Marianeis, ILLRP) / viv(it) D. Veturius D. ?. 1. Philarcur(us).

The inscription, according to Degrassi, was at the Nuziatura Apostolica d’Italia, Via Po 29, Rome.

25 Names often run in slave/freed families. Cf., for instance, 7303: Spendusa, daughter of Spendo; 7379, 7370, 7374.

26 A role which was institutionalised when membership of a trade guild was made hereditary, so that Honorius tried to make bakers marry bakers’ daughters and compelled the husband of a baker’s daughter to enrol in the collegium pistorum if he was an outsider. (CTh 14.3.21, A. D. 403; cf. J..-P. Waltzing, Etude historique sur les corporations professionelles chez les romaine depuis les origines jusqu’à la chute de l’empire d’occident [Louvain 1895-1900] II. 301-311, henceforth Waltzing.

27 9846, with Loane 76n. 58; 9848; conceivably also ii. 1743, where the restoration [pi]peraria is, however, more attractive than [pur]peraria (sic). Lydia (Acts 16.14) is firm evidence.

28 37819: pomararii; 79686: the inscription, a useless fragment, is accompanied by a relief showing a basket of fruit, a man holding a fruit, and (perhaps) a woman.

29 9277: Mercuriane fecit paren[tibu]s subus (sic) AVL Maximus [con]ditarius de castris pra[etor]ibus, AVL Hilariias (Hilaritas) conditaria eos in pace. AVL may stand for annos vixit L.

30 9684: . . . Pollecila que ordeu bendet de bia noba (sc. Pollecla quae hordeum vendit de Via Nova), from the Catacomb of Domitilla.

31 9685. Cf. J. M. C. Toynbee, Animals in Roman Life and Art (London 1973) 56-57, pl. 14, for a relief of a woman selling fruit, poultry and game. ii. 4592 may attest a pigeon-dealer at Barcelona.

32 9683, from the Scala Mediana. Cf. Loane 122-123. There is also a girl selling vegetables on a painting from the house of Julia Felix at Pompeii, for which see R. Etienne, la vie quetidienne à Pompei (Paris 1966) 216.

33 ix. 4721, viii. 24678 (pre-Flavian): furnariae. “Baker” seems the most likely sense of furnaria. Furnarius might, I conjecture, have a wider sense, still including “baker.” It has been suggested that in the late empire, furnarii baked the bread the pistores made. This last possibility should not, in my opinion, be elevated into a general rule. Note that Italian has fornaio for “baker.” For discussion, see Nina Maxey, Occupations of the Lower Classes in Roman Society (Chicago 1938; reprinted in Two Studies on the Roman Lower Classes [New York 1975]) 22-23.

34 iv. 1819. For barmaids cf. T. Kléberg, Hôtels, restaurants et cabarets dans l’antiquité romaine (Uppsala 1957) 87-91 (henceforth Kléberg).

35 I am not convinced that we have negotiatrices in two damaged inscriptions, one from Narbo (xii. 4496; cf. Le Gall 126) and one from Rome (AE 1973 71, held by the editors to attest a lady importer of wine and oil from Baetica, which would be, as they say, very interesting).

36 Cheap: 2 asses (iv. 1969, 4023, 4150, 4592, 5105, 5338, 5345, 5372, 7068); 3 asses (iv. 4439); 5 asses (iv. 2450, 5204); 8 asses (iv. 5203); 9 asses (iv. 5127); 1 denarius (iv. 2193). Vernae are specified in iv. 4023, 4025, 4593, 5105, 5204, 5206, 5345: this could mean “native” rather than “home-born slave,” but in this context the two would come to the same ting. iv. 4592 gives a Greek. All the girls have a single name, of slave type, but, since this is not a context where one would expect tria nomina, the argument for slave status must not be pressed.

37 ix. 2029: Vibia L. 1. Chresta mon(umentum) fecit sibi et suis et C. Rustio C. 1. Thalasso filio e(t) Vibiae D. 1. Calybeni libertae lenae ab asse quaesitum lucro suo sine fraude aliorum. H. M. H. N.S.

38 CTh 9.7.1; CJ 9.9.28. Cf. Kléberg 81-82.

39 Met. 1.7 ff., 9, 21. Cf. Kléberg 83-85.

40 xiii. 10018.7: (h)ospita, reple lagona(m) cervesa. copo, c[on]ditum habes? est. reple, da. I follow the reading of Kléberg 110. For a laudatory inscription to an innkeeper see IG xiv. 24 (Syracuse): “Hail, Dekomia, excellent Syrian hostess!”

41 DE ii. 2.1206-1207; Kléberg 124.

42 Kléberg 75-76.

43 See further G. Hermansen, “The Roman Inns and the Law. The Inns of Ostia” in J. A. S. Evans, ed., Polis and Imperium. Studies . . . Salmon (Toronto 1974) 167-181. 44 9824; xiv. 3709; CLE 603, as conjecturally restored. There is also a Christian propin[aria] (Kléberg 74).

45 Kléberg 23. Similarly in Oxford in 1380-1381 there were twelve tapsters, all women (C. E. Mallet, A History of the University of Oxford, I [London 1924] 163).

46 The tostrix (9941) cited by Le Gall (125 n. 6) as a rôtisseuse is surely a tonstrix of one type or the other. (For omission of n see, for example, n. 47).

47 37469: Nostia ?. 1. Daphne ornatrix de vico longo. M. Nerius M. (1.) Quadratu(s) aurifex d(e) vico longo. 9736: --i Nostia / --is Daphnidis 1. --e Cleopatra ornatrix de vico longo. Note that these two inscriptions are linked, but because of the broken stone in the second we cannot be sure that Cleopatra is a Nostia freed by a Daphne. Supposing the last line to be complete and its sixteen spaces a rough guide to the other lines, we have a lacuna of eight letters or spaces in line 1, only two in line 2 (so that Nostia --is Daphnidis 1. probably refers to one person), five spaces in the penultimate line (so that we cannot restore Nostia as part of Cleopatra’s name). 37811 (from a columbarium plaque): Pollia C. ?. 1. Urbana ornat(rix) de Aemilianis ollas II. M. Calidius M. 1. tosor Apoloni(us) de Aemilianis. (See G. N. Olcott, AJA 12 [1908] 42-43, for first publication). There is also a group of nine ornatrices, seven of them slaves of different owners, on a late republican tomb inscription from Ostia (xiv. 5306). They may represent a shop or a school. Cf. R. Meiggs, Ostia (Oxford 1960) 226. 48 Brattiaria and brattiarius (9211, 6939); clavaria and clavarius (v. 7023), conditaria and conditarius,(9277), furnaria and furnarius (viii. 24678), two pomararii (?pomarii, 37819) a pair of purpurarii (9846).

49 Tonsor and ornatrix (37811).

50 René de Lespinasse and François Bonnardot, eds., Histoire générale de Paris. Les métiers et corporations de la ville de Paris. xiiie siècle. Le livre des métiers d’Etienne Boileau (Paris 1879): draper 78; çavettonier 187; fullers 107, 148; carpet-making 102; fileresses 68-72; weaving 74-75, 83-84; fesseresses . . . 207-208. Poulterer: “Fame qui onques n’ont seigneur ou autre puet achater le mestier de polaillerie et estre Polaillere ausi franchement come un home en toutes choses” (148).

51 Stated as probably, at least up to the 4th century A. D. and with the exception of a few guilds in all-female professions, by Waltzing I 348-349. The ornatrices from Ostia (n. 47) might be a guild and would support Waltzing’s exception. I have found no indication of women members in men’s trade-collegia, though they might be patronae or beneficiaries of collegia. Women were members and indeed officers of funerary collegia.

52 Women and children unloaded ships at Antioch (Libanius Or. 11.261). http://www.uwo.ca/english/florilegium/vol1/treggiari.html

Roman Prostitutes

For my paper, I chose to research prostitutes who lived in Rome, roughly from the reign of Caesar Augustus, which started at 27 BC, to about 200 AD. Prostitution is something that was considered a problem by many people back then, as it still is today. I thought it would be interesting to see how prostitutes who lived hundreds of years ago lived and worked, as well as to look at the laws, restrictions, and stigmas that concerned them.

Rules and Registrations of Prostitutes.

The earliest Roman laws relating to prostitution that we know of are from

Augustus’ legislation on marriage in 18 BC. These laws, known as the Julian laws, prohibited the intermarriage of Roman citizens with prostitutes, as well as the relatives and descendants of prostitutes. The wives, daughters, and granddaughters of senators and Roman knights were not permitted to become prostitutes and they were not allowed to marry people who had been slaves. However, if the daughter of a senator or knight became a prostitute and she had been condemned in a criminal court for her behavior, then she could marry a freedman since she had forfeited her rank (Gardner 32). Many times, women who ignored their status and became prostitutes were fined, but they were occasionally banished (Bullough 54). Prostitutes were only sometimes eligible for receiving legacies and inheritances, and when they were, the most they could receive of it was restricted to one-quarter (Gardner 133).

Tiberius (14 AD) put into affect legislation against adultery. Married women who were registered as prostitutes were subject to severe penalties. To encourage the prosecution of such women, husbands and informers were suitably rewarded. Taxes on registered prostitutes were introduced in the reign of Caligula (37-41 AD). Prostitutes paid to the state the sum that in one day they received from a single customer (Bullough

49). Prostitutes were forbidden to approach the temple of Juno, since it was believed that they would pollute it (Bullough 54). During his reign, Emperor Domitian (81-96 AD) prohibited prostitutes from riding in litters, and he prevented them from receiving inheritances and legacies at all (Bullough 54). Hadrian (117-138 AD) extended that, refusing to allow prostitutes to receive a legacy under a soldier’s will (Gardener 133).

Prostitutes and the Aedile

We know from sources like Tacitus, a Roman historian who lived the first and early part of the second century, that women who wanted to be prostitutes were required to register themselves with the office of the aedile, an office that concerned itself with prostitution. She gave her name, age, place of birth, and a pseudo-name if she chose to take one. The aedile then gave her a license (licentia stupri), asked her how much she planned to charge, and added her name to his roll (Sanger 64). Once a woman registered as a prostitute, there was no way that she could get her name off of the roll (Henriques

Prostitutes carried on their trade under the watchful eye of the aedile. He patrolled the streets and entered brothels at all times of the day and at night, seeing that all houses were closed between daybreak and three in the afternoon. When fights broke out, he arrested and punished the offenders. He fined any brothel-keepers if any of the women in their house were not registered. He insisted that prostitutes wore the garments prescribed by the law (Sanger 67). However, he was bound under law to enter a brothel only if he had the permission of his office, and if he was accompanied by the proper authorities. It was also his job, when a prostitute filed a compliant, to sentence any customer of hers to pay the sum due to her (Sanger 68).

One of the aedile’s duties was to drive out from the city any prostitutes that were unregistered; however, this law was impossible to enforce consistently. When Trajan was emperor (between 98-117 AD), the police were able to count 32,000 registered prostitutes

(Henriques 94). Registered prostitutes were called “meretrices” while the unregistered ones fell under the broad category “prostibulae”. Although unregistered prostitutes ran the risk of being discovered by the aediles and punished, for many women the benefits of being unregistered outweighed those of being registered. Unregistered prostitutes were not taxed, nor were they followed by a social stigma if they quit their job. They were able to marry whomever they wished, and their children and descendants were not punished for their occupation (Sanger 67). There were many more unregistered prostitutes than registered ones, and they can be placed into several different categories. The French Lorettes were highly priced due to their charm. The Doris were famous for their enchanting forms and, known a disdain for clothing, often paraded about in the nude. The Lupae were the “she-wolves”, choosing to troll gardens and parks while howling to attract customers. Noctilae walked the streets at night, and Forariae stood on country roads to attract travelers. The Bustuariae hung around burial grounds and were often hired as mourners. Copae were servant girls at inns, and the Gallinae were thieves as well as prostitutes. The three cheapest prostitutes were the Blitidae, named after a cheap drink served in the bars they frequented, the

Diobolares, who were priced at two obolis (similar to two cents), and the Quadrantariae, whose price was less than that of our penny (Henriques 112).

The Delicatae and Famosae were far above the level of common prostitutes. The

Delicatae were well-kept women, usually from higher-classed families. Famosae also came from well-off families, choosing to sell their bodies usually for extra money or to influence politics by means of using powerful men. They were not found working at brothels, inns, or taverns, nor were they seen walking about the shady spots of the city.

Many invited clients to their own homes. The Delicatae and Famosae did not dress like prostitutes, and were only distinguished from virtuous women by the superior elegantness of their dress and the swarm of admirers that followed them around. These women were often the mistresses of wealthy men. Little was written about them in historical texts, but their existence is evident in the works of Homer, Catullus, Propertius, Tibullus, and Ovid

(Sanger 77).

Brothels and Other Places of Prostitution We know from surviving architecture and the works of writers that brothels were usually small buildings that had small, dimly lit, scantily furnished rooms. Usually there was simply a bed or cushions and covers on the ground and a lamp, often shaped as a phallus with wings or a bowl-shaped vagina. Outside of the brothels hung flamboyant signs that indicated the kind of work that took place there. Brothels were often decorated with indecent statues or wall paintings (Sanger 70).

Prostitutes hung little tablets above the doors of their rooms. On one side was her name and the price she charged, and on the other side was the word “occupata”. She flipped the tablet over to indicate whether or not she was entertaining at the moment

(Sanger 70). Money was paid in advance. To entice customers, they sometimes stood or sat outside, often naked. Classier brothels often had an “ancillae ornatrices”, which was a woman whose job it was to make sure that all the prostitutes looked their best

(Henriques 127). Servants with the title of “aquarii” served wine and refreshments to guests. Both freedmen and slaves were permitted to visit brothels (Evans 138).

Pompeii was most likely the city with the most prostitutes. Twenty-two brothels have been unearthed in Pompeii. Those brothels were famous for their obscene wall paintings. The price of the prostitutes in Pompeii ranged from 2 asses to 18. This is consistent with the charges in many other places (Evans 137).

The brothels were not the only places that prostitutes sold their favors. Inns and taverns also served as places for prostitution. While aediles were constantly searching inns and taverns for unregistered prostitutes, there were too many places and too little aediles to significantly stop these practices. travelers often went to bed with the maids that served them. These women were called “asellars”, for they were paid with small coins named “asellae”. These women often had the price they charged scratched on the top or side of their doorframe. Tablets were not used as they would tip off an aedile that came to check for unregistered prostitutes. Tavern owners, “susceptores”, often were taken to court for using unregistered prostitutes, but the cases were seldom won due to lack of evidence (Henriques 126). Many inns and taverns were jointly managed by husbands and their wives, so it was not uncommon that, while the husband ran the establishment, the wife or her daughters slept with the customers (Evans 136).

Roman bathhouses were another place were prostitution was popular. Rome had many public baths. In one of his poems, Martial (40-104 AD) wrote, “the bath man admits you among the tomb-frequenting whores (referring to the Bustuariae) only when he extinguished his lamp” (Henriques 99). Hadrian (117-138 AD) and emperors after him tried to ban these types of bathhouses, but were unable to due to their great popularity.

Bawds and Slaves as Prostitutes

The profession of pimping was known as “lenocinium”; a male procurer was a

“leno”, a female procurer a “lena”. “Lupanars” were owners of brothels, “Adductores” were pimps, and “Conciliatrices” were women who negotiated with customers for prostitutes (Henriques 69). Lupanars can be divided into two groups. Some ran organized brothels where they used slaves as prostitutes, or they hired prostitutes. Other brothel owners let prostitutes rent the rooms of their house for an agreed-upon amount.

Recruitment to prostitution was often voluntary, but large amounts were slaves.

Laws permitted the use of slaves for sexual purposes. There are many references in the literature of the time that mentions this. For example, Plautus (186-205 AD) mentions in “The Persian” how female slaves had to stand naked in front of prospective buyers, who handled and inspected their bodies (Henriques 112). In “Poenulus”, Plautus even wrote that slaves were even sold in the temple of Venus.

Buying and reselling slaves was important to brothel owners who wanted to maintain variety in their houses. Slave girls were bought and sold by brothel-keepers at auctions. Auctioneers and brothel owners were not concerned about the background of the girls involved. While some were wartime captives, many more were kidnapped girls

(Bullough 50). Emperor Hadrian forbid the sale of male and female slaves to brothels (as well as gladiatorial schools) without a cause (Robinson 139). Emperors that came after him also tried to stop the slave trade of kidnapped girls, but with neither auctioneer or bawd caring and the small amounts of the aediles, this legislation had little effect

(Balsdon 226).

When a bawd purchased a slave that was a virgin, he decorated the door of his house with twigs of laurel, hung a large lamp out at night, and placed a tablet outside that said a virgin had been acquired. After a purchaser was found and entertained by the girl, he was crowned a crown of laurel was place on his head upon leaving her room by the other slaves of the house (Sanger 77).

Employment in the sex trade brought great profits to the owners of female slaves.

Even slaves who were not actively used as prostitutes could be used by their owners and the male slaves of his owner, only if the owner granted his permission (Pomeroy 192).

Even if a slave that used to be a prostitute was able to buy her freedom, she was not permitted by law from marrying Roman citizens. Slave prostitutes who gained their freedom were not granted citizenship (Bullough 55). Costumes of Prostitutes

Prostitutes were forbidden by law from wearing the stola, which was the usual dress of freeborn women. Shoes, purple robes, jewelry, and the vitta that Roman women used to tie back they hair were also forbidden. Prostitutes were required by law to wear togas like men, which were supposed to be floral patterned, and sandals. They were also supposed to dye their hair yellow, red, or blue (Sanger 74). But these rules were seldom enforced. Many prostitutes wore prohibited clothing. Others proudly wore their togas in green shades or other outrageously bright colors, while others wore nearly transparent robes of silk and gauze. Still others chose to wear no clothing and to sit outside of their brothel, waiting for customers (Sanger 76).

Floralian Games

Although prostitutes were not highly regarded by the rest of Roman society, they did have one day that celebrated them. The Floralian Games were held on April 28, and prostitutes regarded this as their own feast day. Supposedly in honor of the goddess

Flora, drunken people filled the streets and watched prostitutes do erotic dances on a stage while nude. There is a record of these games being suspended during the presence of Cato the Censor, who lived 234-149 BC, but the games were eventually resumed

(Sanger 65).

Venereal diseases

sexually transmitted diseases are a major concern of many people today, and especially a concern to prostitutes. No one really knows when or where venereal diseases appeared. There is evidence of it in fifteenth century Europe, but much circumstantial evidence supports that it has been around since the beginning of human history. However, it is not explicitly mentioned by Greek or Latin authors. One of Juvenile’s passages mentions something that resembles a venereal disease, and several of Martial’s epigrams hint at something similar. Celsus, a writer who lived around 175 AD, described several diseases that are similar with syphilis. However, none of the descriptions given by any of the above authors mentioned these diseases as being contracted by sexual intercourse. Still, there were women and prostitutes that suffered from ‘secret diseases’, and they were called “aucunnuentae”. Women with these diseases (morbus indecens) were refused treatment from Roman doctors, who considered it indecent not only to treat the diseases, but also to admit to having them. Women who were infected had no other hope but to pray to Juno and other goddesses and take herbs as medicine for the diseases

(Sanger 85).

Roman prostitutes lived a hard life, and many stigmas that followed them are similar to those which follow the prostitutes of today. Yet their lives were far more complex than I had imagined. I am glad that I chose to do my paper on this topic; it was really quite interesting for me and I think I now have a better idea of an aspect of Roman civilization.

Work Sited

History of Prostitution. Sanger, William W. Eugenics Publishing, New

York. 1937.

Prostitution and Society. Henriques, Fernando. Grove Press Inc, New

York. 1966.

Godesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves. Pomeroy, Sarah B. Schocken

books, New York. 1975

Roman Women: Their History and Habits. Balsdon, J.P.V.D. The John

Day Company, New York. 1963.

Women in Roman Law and Society. Gardner, Jane F. Indiana University

Press, Indianapolis. 1986.

Women and Prostitution. Bullough, Vern and Bonnie. Promethus Books,

New York. 1987.

War, Women, and Children in Ancient Rome. Evans, John K. Routledge,

New York. 1991.

Ancient Roman: City Planning and Administration. Robinson, O.F.

Routledge, New York. 1992. http://www.angelfire.com/grrl/malibu_selina/papers/prostitutes.html