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Sexual attitudes and behaviors in
ancient Rome
In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 B ...
are indicated by
art
Art is a diverse range of human activity, and resulting product, that involves creative or imaginative talent expressive of technical proficiency, beauty, emotional power, or conceptual ideas.
There is no generally agreed definition of wha ...
,
literature
Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...
, and
inscriptions, and to a lesser extent by
archaeological remains
An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology and ...
such as erotic artifacts and
architecture
Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing building ...
. It has sometimes been assumed that "unlimited sexual license" was characteristic of ancient Rome. Verstraete and Provençal opine that this perspective was simply a Christian interpretation: "The sexuality of the Romans has never had good press in the West ever since the rise of Christianity. In the popular imagination and culture, it is synonymous with sexual license and abuse."
Sexuality was not excluded as a concern of the ''
mos maiorum
The ''mos maiorum'' (; "ancestral custom" or "way of the ancestors," plural ''mores'', cf. English "mores"; ''maiorum'' is the genitive plural of "greater" or "elder") is the unwritten code from which the ancient Romans derived their social norms ...
'', the traditional
social norms
Social norms are shared standards of acceptable behavior by groups. Social norms can both be informal understandings that govern the behavior of members of a society, as well as be codified into rules and laws. Social normative influences or soci ...
that affected public, private, and military life. ''Pudor'', "shame, modesty", was a regulating factor in behavior, as were legal strictures on certain sexual transgressions in both the
Republican
Republican can refer to:
Political ideology
* An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law.
** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...
and
Imperial
Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor, or imperialism.
Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to:
Places
United States
* Imperial, California
* Imperial, Missouri
* Imperial, Nebraska
* Imperial, Pennsylvania
* Imperial, Texa ...
periods. The
censors
Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient". Censorship can be conducted by governments ...
—
public officials
An official is someone who holds an office (function or mandate, regardless whether it carries an actual working space with it) in an organization or government and participates in the exercise of authority, (either their own or that of their su ...
who determined the
social rank
A social class is a grouping of people into a set of hierarchical social categories, the most common being the upper, middle and lower classes. Membership in a social class can for example be dependent on education, wealth, occupation, incom ...
of individuals—had the power to remove
citizens
Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection".
Each state determines the conditions under which it will recognize persons as its citizens, and ...
from the
senatorial
A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the eld ...
or
equestrian order
The ''equites'' (; literally "horse-" or "cavalrymen", though sometimes referred to as "knights" in English) constituted the second of the property-based classes of ancient Rome, ranking below the senatorial class. A member of the equestrian o ...
for sexual misconduct, and on occasion did so. The mid-20th-century sexuality theorist
Michel Foucault
Paul-Michel Foucault (, ; ; 15 October 192625 June 1984) was a French philosopher, historian of ideas, writer, political activist, and literary critic. Foucault's theories primarily address the relationship between power and knowledge, and how ...
regarded sex throughout the
Greco-Roman world
The Greco-Roman civilization (; also Greco-Roman culture; spelled Graeco-Roman in the Commonwealth), as understood by modern scholars and writers, includes the geographical regions and countries that culturally—and so historically—were di ...
as governed by restraint and the art of managing sexual pleasure.
Roman society was
patriarchal
Patriarchy is a social system in which positions of Dominance hierarchy, dominance and Social privilege, privilege are primarily held by men. It is used, both as a technical Anthropology, anthropological term for families or clans controll ...
(see ''
paterfamilias
The ''pater familias'', also written as ''paterfamilias'' (plural ''patres familias''), was the head of a Roman family. The ''pater familias'' was the oldest living male in a household, and could legally exercise autocratic authority over his ext ...
''), and
masculinity
Masculinity (also called manhood or manliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles associated with men and boys. Masculinity can be theoretically understood as socially constructed, and there is also evidence that some behaviors con ...
was premised on a capacity for governing oneself and others of lower status, not only in war and politics, but also in sexual relations. ''
Virtus
''Virtus'' () was a specific virtue in Ancient Rome. It carries connotations of valor, manliness, excellence, courage, character, and worth, perceived as masculine strengths (from Latin ''vir'', "man"). It was thus a frequently stated virtue o ...
'', "virtue", was an active masculine ideal of self-discipline, related to the
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
word for "man", ''vir''. The corresponding ideal for a woman was ''
pudicitia
Pudicitia ("modesty" or "sexual virtue") was a central concept in ancient Roman sexual ethics. The word is derived from the more general ''pudor'', the sense of shame that regulated an individual's behavior as socially acceptable. ''Pudicitia' ...
'', often translated as chastity or modesty, but a more positive and even competitive personal quality that displayed both her attractiveness and self-control.
Roman women of the upper classes were expected to be well educated, strong of character, and active in maintaining their family's standing in society. But with extremely few exceptions, surviving Latin literature preserves the voices only of educated male Romans on the subject of sexuality. Visual art was created by those of lower social status and of a greater range of ethnicity, but was tailored to the taste and inclinations of those wealthy enough to afford it, including, in the
Imperial era
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterr ...
, former slaves.
Some sexual attitudes and behaviors in
ancient Roman culture
The culture of ancient Rome existed throughout the almost 1200-year history of the civilization of Ancient Rome. The term refers to the culture of the Roman Republic, later the Roman Empire, which at its peak covered an area from present-day Lo ...
differ markedly from those in later
Western societies
The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to the various nations and states in the regions of Europe, North America, and Oceania. .
Roman religion
Religion in ancient Rome consisted of varying imperial and provincial religious practices, which were followed both by the people of Rome as well as those who were brought under its rule.
The Romans thought of themselves as highly religious, ...
promoted sexuality as an aspect of prosperity for the state, and individuals might turn to private religious practice or "
magic
Magic or Magick most commonly refers to:
* Magic (supernatural), beliefs and actions employed to influence supernatural beings and forces
* Ceremonial magic, encompasses a wide variety of rituals of magic
* Magical thinking, the belief that unrela ...
" for improving their erotic lives or reproductive health.
Prostitution
Prostitution is the business or practice of engaging in Sex work, sexual activity in exchange for payment. The definition of "sexual activity" varies, and is often defined as an activity requiring physical contact (e.g., sexual intercourse, n ...
was legal, public, and widespread.
"Pornographic" paintings were featured among the art collections in respectable upperclass households. It was considered natural and unremarkable for men to be sexually attracted to teen-aged youths of both sexes, and
pederasty
Pederasty or paederasty ( or ) is a sexual relationship between an adult man and a pubescent or adolescent boy. The term ''pederasty'' is primarily used to refer to historical practices of certain cultures, particularly ancient Greece and anc ...
was condoned as long as the younger male partner was not a freeborn Roman. "
Homosexual
Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to peop ...
" and "
heterosexual
Heterosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction or sexual behavior between people of the opposite sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, heterosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to ...
" did not form the primary dichotomy of Roman thinking about sexuality, and no
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
words for these concepts exist. No moral censure was directed at the man who enjoyed sex acts with either women or males of inferior status, as long as his behaviors revealed no weaknesses or excesses, nor infringed on the rights and prerogatives of his masculine peers. While perceived
effeminacy
Effeminacy is the embodiment of traits and/or expressions in those who are not of the female sex (e.g. boys and men) that are often associated with what is generally perceived to be feminine behaviours, mannerisms, styles, or gender roles, rathe ...
was denounced, especially in political rhetoric, sex in moderation with male prostitutes or slaves was not regarded as improper or vitiating to masculinity, if the male citizen took the active and not the receptive role.
Hypersexuality
Hypersexuality is extremely frequent or suddenly increased libido. It is controversial whether it should be included as a clinical diagnosis used by mental healthcare professionals. Nymphomania and satyriasis were terms previously used for the c ...
, however, was condemned morally and medically in both men and women. Women were held to a stricter moral code,
[ and same-sex relations between women are poorly documented, but the sexuality of women is variously celebrated or reviled throughout Latin literature. In general the Romans had more fluid gender boundaries than the ]ancient Greeks
Ancient Greece ( el, Ἑλλάς, Hellás) was a northeastern Mediterranean civilization, existing from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of classical antiquity ( AD 600), that comprised a loose collection of cultu ...
.[ Hallett, p. 11.]
A late-20th-century paradigm analyzed Roman sexuality in terms of a "penetrator–penetrated" binary model, however this model has limitations, especially in regard to expressions of sexuality among individual Romans.[ Langlands, p. 13.] Even the relevance of the word "sexuality
Human sexuality is the way people experience and express themselves sexually. This involves biological, psychological, physical, erotic, emotional, social, or spiritual feelings and behaviors. Because it is a broad term, which has varied ...
" to ancient Roman culture has been disputed, but in the absence of any other label for "the cultural interpretation of erotic experience", the term continues to be used.
Erotic literature and art
Ancient literature pertaining to Roman sexuality falls mainly into four categories: legal texts; medical texts; poetry; and political discourse. Forms of expression with lower cultural cachet
In philately, a cachet is a printed or stamped design or inscription, other than a cancellation or pre-printed postage, on an envelope, postcard, or postal card to commemorate a postal or philatelic event. There are both official and private ( ...
in antiquity—such as comedy
Comedy is a genre of fiction that consists of discourses or works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. The term o ...
, satire
Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming ...
, invective
Invective (from Middle English ''invectif'', or Old French and Late Latin ''invectus'') is abusive, reproachful, or venomous language used to express blame or censure; or, a form of rude expression or discourse intended to offend or hurt; vituperat ...
, love poetry, graffiti, magic spells, inscriptions, and interior decoration—have more to say about sex than elevated
An elevated railway or elevated train (also known as an el train for short) is a rapid transit railway with the Track (rail transport), tracks above street level on a viaduct or other elevated structure (usually constructed from steel, cast i ...
genres, such as epic
Epic commonly refers to:
* Epic poetry, a long narrative poem celebrating heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation
* Epic film, a genre of film with heroic elements
Epic or EPIC may also refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and medi ...
and tragedy
Tragedy (from the grc-gre, τραγῳδία, ''tragōidia'', ''tragōidia'') is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful events that befall a main character. Traditionally, the intention of tragedy ...
. Information about the sex lives of the Romans is scattered in historiography
Historiography is the study of the methods of historians in developing history as an academic discipline, and by extension is any body of historical work on a particular subject. The historiography of a specific topic covers how historians ha ...
, oratory, philosophy, and writings on medicine
Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care pract ...
, agriculture
Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to ...
, and other technical topics. Legal texts point to behaviors Romans wanted to regulate or prohibit, without necessarily reflecting what people actually did or refrained from doing.
Major Latin authors whose works contribute significantly to an understanding of Roman sexuality include:
* the comic playwright Plautus
Titus Maccius Plautus (; c. 254 – 184 BC), commonly known as Plautus, was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest Latin literary works to have survived in their entirety. He wrote Palliata comoedia, the gen ...
(d. 184 BC), whose plots often revolve around sex comedy
Sex comedy, erotic comedy or more broadly sexual comedy is a genre in which comedy is motivated by sexual situations and love affairs. Although "sex comedy" is primarily a description of dramatic forms such as theatre and film, literary works such ...
and young lovers kept apart by circumstances;
* the statesman and moralist Cato the Elder
Marcus Porcius Cato (; 234–149 BC), also known as Cato the Censor ( la, Censorius), the Elder and the Wise, was a Roman soldier, senator, and historian known for his conservatism and opposition to Hellenization. He was the first to write histo ...
(d. 149 BC), who offers glimpses of sexuality at a time that later Romans regarded as having higher moral standards;
* the poet Lucretius
Titus Lucretius Carus ( , ; – ) was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the philosophical poem ''De rerum natura'', a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism, and which usually is translated into E ...
(d. c. 55 BC), who presents an extended treatment of Epicurean sexuality in his philosophical work ''De rerum natura
''De rerum natura'' (; ''On the Nature of Things'') is a first-century BC didactic poem by the Roman poet and philosopher Lucretius ( – c. 55 BC) with the goal of explaining Epicurean philosophy to a Roman audience. The poem, written in some 7 ...
'';
* Catullus
Gaius Valerius Catullus (; 84 - 54 BCE), often referred to simply as Catullus (, ), was a Latin poet of the late Roman Republic who wrote chiefly in the neoteric style of poetry, focusing on personal life rather than classical heroes. His s ...
('' fl.'' 50s BC), whose poems explore a range of erotic experience near the end of the Republic
A republic () is a "state in which power rests with the people or their representatives; specifically a state without a monarchy" and also a "government, or system of government, of such a state." Previously, especially in the 17th and 18th c ...
, from delicate romanticism to brutally obscene invective;
* Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the estab ...
(d. 43 BC), with courtroom speeches that often attack the opposition's sexual conduct and letters peppered with gossip about Rome's elite;
* the Augustan elegists Propertius
Sextus Propertius was a Latin elegiac poet of the Augustan age. He was born around 50–45 BC in Assisium and died shortly after 15 BC.
Propertius' surviving work comprises four books of ''Elegies'' ('). He was a friend of the poets Gallus a ...
and Tibullus
Albius Tibullus ( BC19 BC) was a Latin poet and writer of elegies. His first and second books of poetry are extant; many other texts attributed to him are of questionable origins.
Little is known about the life of Tibullus. There are only a fe ...
, who reveal social attitudes in describing love affairs with mistresses;
* Ovid
Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...
(d. 17 AD), especially his ''Amores
Amores may refer to:
* ''Amores'' (Ovid), the first book by the poet Ovid, published in 5 volumes in 16 BCE
* ''Amores'' (Lucian), a play by Lucian; also known as ''Erotes''
* Erotes (mythology), known as Amores by the Romans
* ''Amores'', a bo ...
'' ("Love Affairs") and ''Ars Amatoria
The ''Ars amatoria'' ( en, The Art of Love) is an instructional elegy series in three books by the ancient Roman poet Ovid. It was written in 2 AD.
Background
Book one of ''Ars amatoria'' was written to show a man how to find a woman. In book two ...
'' ("Art of Love"), which according to tradition contributed to Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pri ...
's decision to exile the poet, and his epic, the ''Metamorphoses
The ''Metamorphoses'' ( la, Metamorphōsēs, from grc, μεταμορφώσεις: "Transformations") is a Latin narrative poem from 8 CE by the Roman poet Ovid. It is considered his ''magnum opus''. The poem chronicles the history of the wo ...
'', which presents a range of sexuality, with an emphasis on rape, through the lens of mythology
Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narrat ...
;
* the epigram
An epigram is a brief, interesting, memorable, and sometimes surprising or satirical statement. The word is derived from the Greek "inscription" from "to write on, to inscribe", and the literary device has been employed for over two mille ...
matist Martial
Marcus Valerius Martialis (known in English as Martial ; March, between 38 and 41 AD – between 102 and 104 AD) was a Roman poet from Hispania (modern Spain) best known for his twelve books of ''Epigrams'', published in Rome between AD 86 and ...
(d. c. 102/4 AD), whose observations of society are braced by sexually explicit invective;
* the satirist Juvenal
Decimus Junius Juvenalis (), known in English as Juvenal ( ), was a Roman poet active in the late first and early second century CE. He is the author of the collection of satirical poems known as the ''Satires''. The details of Juvenal's life ...
(d. early 2nd century AD), who rails against the sexual mores
Sexual ethics (also known as sex ethics or sexual morality) is a branch of philosophy that considers the ethics or morality or otherwise in sexual behavior. Sexual ethics seeks to understand, evaluate and critique interpersonal relationships and ...
of his time.
Ovid lists a number of writers known for salacious material whose works are now lost. Greek sex manuals and "straightforward pornography" were published under the name of famous '' heterai'' (courtesans), and circulated in Rome. The robustly sexual ''Milesiaca'' of Aristides was translated by Sisenna Lucius Cornelius Sisenna (c. 120 – 67 BC) was a Roman soldier, historian, and annalist.
Life
Little is known of Sisenna's life or family. The first Cornelius Sisenna (perhaps Lucius' grandfather or great-grandfather) appears as urban prae ...
, one of the praetor
Praetor ( , ), also pretor, was the title granted by the government of Ancient Rome to a man acting in one of two official capacities: (i) the commander of an army, and (ii) as an elected '' magistratus'' (magistrate), assigned to discharge vario ...
s of 78 BC. Ovid calls the book a collection of misdeeds ''(crimina)'', and says the narrative was laced with dirty jokes. After the Battle of Carrhae
The Battle of Carrhae () was fought in 53 BC between the Roman Republic and the Parthian Empire near the ancient town of Carrhae (present-day Harran, Turkey). An invading force of seven legions of Roman heavy infantry under Marcus Licinius Cra ...
, the Parthians Parthian may be:
Historical
* A demonym "of Parthia", a region of north-eastern of Greater Iran
* Parthian Empire (247 BC – 224 AD)
* Parthian language, a now-extinct Middle Iranian language
* Parthian shot, an archery skill famously employed by ...
were reportedly shocked to find the ''Milesiaca'' in the baggage of Marcus Crassus
Marcus Licinius Crassus (; 115 – 53 BC) was a Roman general and statesman who played a key role in the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire. He is often called "the richest man in Rome." Wallechinsky, David & Wallace, I ...
's officers.
Erotic art, especially as preserved in Pompeii and Herculaneum, is a rich if not unambiguous source; some images contradict sexual preferences stressed in literary sources and may be intended to provoke laughter or challenge conventional attitudes. Everyday objects such as mirrors and serving vessels might be decorated with erotic scenes; on Arretine ware
Terra sigillata is a term with at least three distinct meanings: as a description of medieval medicinal earth; in archaeology, as a general term for some of the fine red Ancient Roman pottery with glossy surface Slip (ceramics), slips made in sp ...
, these range from "elegant amorous dalliance" to explicit views of the penis entering the vagina. Erotic paintings were found in the most respectable houses of the Roman nobility
The patricians (from la, patricius, Greek: πατρίκιος) were originally a group of ruling class families in ancient Rome. The distinction was highly significant in the Roman Kingdom, and the early Republic, but its relevance waned after ...
, as Ovid notes:
Just as venerable figures of men, painted by the hand of an artist, are resplendent in our houses, so too there is a small painting ''(tabella)''[The ''tabella'' was a small, portable painting, as distinguished from an architecturally permanent wall painting.] in some spot which depicts various couplings and sexual positions: just as Telamonian Ajax
Ajax () or Aias (; grc, Αἴας, Aíās , ''Aíantos''; archaic ) is a Greek mythological hero, the son of King Telamon and Periboea, and the half-brother of Teucer. He plays an important role, and is portrayed as a towering figure and ...
sits with an expression that declares his anger, and the barbarian mother ''(Medea
In Greek mythology, Medea (; grc, Μήδεια, ''Mēdeia'', perhaps implying "planner / schemer") is the daughter of King Aeëtes of Colchis, a niece of Circe and the granddaughter of the sun god Helios. Medea figures in the myth of Jason an ...
)'' has crime in her eyes, so too a wet Venus dries her dripping hair with her fingers and is viewed barely covered by the maternal waters.
The pornographic ''tabella'' and the erotically charged Venus appear among various images that a connoisseur of art might enjoy. A series of paintings from the Suburban Baths at Pompeii
Pompeii (, ) was an ancient city located in what is now the ''comune'' of Pompei near Naples in the Campania region of Italy. Pompeii, along with Herculaneum and many villas in the surrounding area (e.g. at Boscoreale, Stabiae), was buried ...
, discovered in 1986 and published in 1995, presents erotic scenarios that seem intended "to amuse the viewer with outrageous sexual spectacle," including a variety of positions, oral sex
Oral sex, sometimes referred to as oral intercourse, is sexual activity involving the stimulation of the genitalia of a person by another person using the mouth (including the lips, tongue, or teeth) and the throat. Cunnilingus is oral sex per ...
, and group sex
Group sex is sexual behavior involving more than two participants. Participants in group sex can be of any sexual orientation or gender. Any form of sexual activity can be adopted to involve more than two participants, but some forms have their ...
featuring male–female, male–male, and female–female relations.
The décor of a Roman bedroom could reflect quite literally its sexual use: the Augustan poet Horace
Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 – 27 November 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his ' ...
supposedly had a mirrored room for sex, so that when he hired a prostitute he could watch from all angles. The emperor Tiberius
Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus (; 16 November 42 BC – 16 March AD 37) was the second Roman emperor. He reigned from AD 14 until 37, succeeding his stepfather, the first Roman emperor Augustus. Tiberius was born in Rome in 42 BC. His father ...
had his bedrooms decorated with "the most lascivious" paintings and sculptures, and stocked with Greek sex manuals by Elephantis
Elephantis ( grc, Ἐλεφαντίς) (fl. late 1st century BC) was a Greek poet and physician apparently renowned in the classical world as the author of a notorious sex manual. Due to the popularity of courtesans taking animal names in classica ...
in case those employed in sex needed direction.[Suetonius, ''Life of Tiberius'' 44.2; ]Clarke
Clarke is a surname which means "clerk". The surname is of English and Irish origin and comes from the Latin . Variants include Clerk and Clark. Clarke is also uncommonly chosen as a given name.
Irish surname origin
Clarke is a popular surname i ...
, pp. 92–93.
In the 2nd century AD, "there is a boom in texts about sex in Greek and Latin," along with romance novels
A romance novel or romantic novel generally refers to a type of genre fiction novel which places its primary focus on the relationship and romantic love between two people, and usually has an "emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending." Pre ...
.[ Potter (2009), p. 329.] But frank sexuality all but disappears from literature thereafter, and sexual topics are reserved for medical writing or Christian theology. In the 3rd century, celibacy
Celibacy (from Latin ''caelibatus'') is the state of voluntarily being unmarried, sexually abstinent, or both, usually for religious reasons. It is often in association with the role of a religious official or devotee. In its narrow sense, the ...
had become an ideal among the growing number of Christians, and Church Fathers
The Church Fathers, Early Church Fathers, Christian Fathers, or Fathers of the Church were ancient and influential Christian theologians and writers who established the intellectual and doctrinal foundations of Christianity. The historical per ...
such as Tertullian
Tertullian (; la, Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus; 155 AD – 220 AD) was a prolific early Christian author from Carthage in the Roman province of Africa. He was the first Christian author to produce an extensive corpus of L ...
and Clement of Alexandria
Titus Flavius Clemens, also known as Clement of Alexandria ( grc , Κλήμης ὁ Ἀλεξανδρεύς; – ), was a Christian theologian and philosopher who taught at the Catechetical School of Alexandria. Among his pupils were Origen and ...
debated whether even marital sex
Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognized union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children, and between t ...
should be permitted for procreation. The sexuality of martyrology
A martyrology is a catalogue or list of martyrs and other saints and beati arranged in the calendar order of their anniversaries or feasts. Local martyrologies record exclusively the custom of a particular Church. Local lists were enriched by na ...
focuses on tests against the Christian's chastity and sexual torture; Christian women are more often than men subjected to sexual mutilation, in particular of the breasts.[For example, ]Agatha of Sicily
Agatha of Sicily () is a Christian saint. Her feast is on 5 February. Agatha was born in Catania, part of the Roman Province of Sicily, and was martyred . She is one of several virgin martyrs who are commemorated by name in the Canon of the Mas ...
and Febronia of Nisibis
Phebronia of Nisibis, also known as Phebronia of Sebapte, was a nun at Nisibis (modern-day Nusaybin, Turkey). She suffered persecution under Diocletian, who offered her freedom if she renounced her faith and married his nephew, Lysimachus, who had ...
; Sebastian P. Brock and Susan Ashbrook Harvey, introduction to ''Holy Women of the Syrian Orient'' (University of California Press, 1987), pp. 24–25; Harvey, "Women in Early Byzantine Hagiography: Reversing the Story," in ''That Gentle Strength: Historical Perspectives on Women in Christianity'' (University Press of Virginia, 1990), pp. 48–50. The accounts of breast mutilation occur in Christian sources and iconography, not in Roman art and literature. The obscene humor of Martial was briefly revived in 4th-century Bordeaux by the Gallo-Roman
Gallo-Roman culture was a consequence of the Romanization of Gauls under the rule of the Roman Empire. It was characterized by the Gaulish adoption or adaptation of Roman culture, language, morals and way of life in a uniquely Gaulish context ...
scholar-poet Ausonius
Decimius Magnus Ausonius (; – c. 395) was a Roman poet and teacher of rhetoric from Burdigala in Aquitaine, modern Bordeaux, France. For a time he was tutor to the future emperor Gratian, who afterwards bestowed the consulship on him. H ...
, although he shunned Martial's predilection for pederasty and was at least nominally a Christian.[ Potter (2009), p. 330. Although there is little question that Ausonius was a Christian, his works contain many indications that he remained at least interested in, if not a practitioner of, traditional Roman and Celtic religions.]
Sex, religion and the state
Like other aspects of Roman life, sexuality was supported and regulated by religious traditions
Religion is usually defined as a social-cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatural, tra ...
, both the public cult of the state and private religious practices and magic. Sexuality was an important category of Roman religious thought. The complement of male and female was vital to the Roman concept of deity. The ''Dii Consentes
The ''Dii Consentes'', also known as ''Di'' or ''Dei Consentes'' (once ''Dii Complices''), is an ancient list of twelve major deities, six gods and six goddesses, in the pantheon of Ancient Rome. Their gilt statues stood in the Roman Forum, a ...
'' were a council of deities in male–female pairs, to some extent Rome's equivalent to the Twelve Olympians
upright=1.8, Fragment of a relief (1st century BC1st century AD) depicting the twelve Olympians carrying their attributes in procession; from left to right: Hestia (scepter), Hermes (winged cap and staff), Aphrodite (veiled), Ares (helmet and s ...
of the Greeks. At least two state priesthoods were held jointly by a married couple.[See ]Flamen Dialis
In ancient Roman religion, the was the high priest of Jupiter. The term ''Dialis'' is related to ''Diespiter'', an Old Latin form of the name ''Jupiter''. There were 15 '' flamines'', of whom three were ''flamines maiores'', serving the thre ...
and ''rex sacrorum
In ancient Roman religion, the ''rex sacrorum'' ("king of the sacred things", also sometimes ''rex sacrificulus'') was a senatorial priesthood reserved for patricians. Although in the historical era, the '' pontifex maximus'' was the head of Rom ...
''. The Vestal Virgins
In ancient Rome, the Vestal Virgins or Vestals ( la, Vestālēs, singular ) were priestesses of Vesta, virgin goddess of Rome's sacred hearth and its flame.
The Vestals were unlike any other public priesthood. They were chosen before puberty ...
, the one state priesthood reserved for women, took a vow of chastity that granted them relative independence from male control; among the religious objects in their keeping was a sacred phallus
A phallus is a penis (especially when erect), an object that resembles a penis, or a mimetic image of an erect penis. In art history a figure with an erect penis is described as ithyphallic.
Any object that symbolically—or, more precisel ...
: " Vesta's fire ... evoked the idea of sexual purity in the female" and "represented the procreative power of the male". The men who served in the various colleges
A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offerin ...
of priests
A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deity, deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in p ...
were expected to marry and have families. Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the estab ...
held that the desire ''(libido
Libido (; colloquial: sex drive) is a person's overall sexual drive or desire for sexual activity. Libido is influenced by biological, psychological, and social factors. Biologically, the sex hormones and associated neurotransmitters that act up ...
)'' to procreate was "the seedbed of the republic", as it was the cause for the first form of social institution, marriage
Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognized union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children, and between ...
. Marriage produced children and in turn a "house" ''(domus
In Ancient Rome, the ''domus'' (plural ''domūs'', genitive ''domūs'' or ''domī'') was the type of town house occupied by the upper classes and some wealthy freedmen during the Republican and Imperial eras. It was found in almost all the ma ...
)'' for family unity that was the building block of urban life.
Many Roman religious festivals had an element of sexuality. The February Lupercalia
Lupercalia was a pastoral festival of Ancient Rome observed annually on February 15 to purify the city, promoting health and fertility. Lupercalia was also known as ''dies Februatus'', after the purification instruments called ''februa'', the b ...
, celebrated as late as the 5th century of the Christian era
The terms (AD) and before Christ (BC) are used to label or number years in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. The term is Medieval Latin and means 'in the year of the Lord', but is often presented using "our Lord" instead of "the Lord", ...
, included an archaic fertility rite. The Floralia
The Floralia was a festival in ancient Roman religious practice in honor of the goddess Flora, held April 27 during the Republican era, or April 28 in the Julian calendar. The festival included ''Ludi Florae'', the "Games of Flora", which lasted ...
featured nude dancing. At certain religious festivals throughout April, prostitutes participated or were officially recognized.[See also " Roman prostitution and religion".]
The connections among human reproduction, general prosperity, and the wellbeing of the state are embodied by the Roman cult
In modern English, ''cult'' is usually a pejorative term for a social group that is defined by its unusual religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs and rituals, or its common interest in a particular personality, object, or goal. This ...
of Venus
Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is sometimes called Earth's "sister" or "twin" planet as it is almost as large and has a similar composition. As an interior planet to Earth, Venus (like Mercury) appears in Earth's sky never fa ...
, who differs from her Greek counterpart Aphrodite
Aphrodite ( ; grc-gre, Ἀφροδίτη, Aphrodítē; , , ) is an ancient Greek goddess associated with love, lust, beauty, pleasure, passion, and procreation. She was syncretized with the Roman goddess . Aphrodite's major symbols include ...
in her role as a mother of the Roman people through her half-mortal son Aeneas
In Greco-Roman mythology, Aeneas (, ; from ) was a Trojan hero, the son of the Trojan prince Anchises and the Greek goddess Aphrodite (equivalent to the Roman Venus). His father was a first cousin of King Priam of Troy (both being grandsons ...
. During the civil wars of the 80s BC, Sulla
Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix (; 138–78 BC), commonly known as Sulla, was a Roman general and statesman. He won the first large-scale civil war in Roman history and became the first man of the Republic to seize power through force.
Sulla had ...
, about to invade his own country with the legions under his command, issued a coin depicting a crowned Venus as his personal patron deity
A tutelary () (also tutelar) is a deity or a spirit who is a guardian, patron, or protector of a particular place, geographic feature, person, lineage, nation, culture, or occupation. The etymology of "tutelary" expresses the concept of safety and ...
, with Cupid
In classical mythology, Cupid (Latin Cupīdō , meaning "passionate desire") is the god of desire, lust, erotic love, attraction and affection. He is often portrayed as the son of the love goddess Venus (mythology), Venus and the god of war Mar ...
holding a palm branch
The palm branch is a symbol of victory, triumph, peace, and eternal life originating in the ancient Near East and Mediterranean world. The palm ''(Phoenix)'' was sacred in Mesopotamian religions, and in ancient Egypt represented immortality. In ...
of victory; on the reverse military trophies flank symbols of the augur
An augur was a priest and official in the classical Roman world. His main role was the practice of augury, the interpretation of the will of the gods by studying the flight of birds. Determinations were based upon whether they were flying i ...
s, the state priests who read the will of the gods. The iconography links deities of love and desire with military success and religious authority; Sulla adopted the title ''Epaphroditus'', "Aphrodite's own", before he became a ''dictator
A dictator is a political leader who possesses absolute power. A dictatorship is a state ruled by one dictator or by a small clique. The word originated as the title of a Roman dictator elected by the Roman Senate to rule the republic in times ...
.'' The ''fascinum
In ancient Roman religion and magic, the ''fascinus'' or ''fascinum'' was the embodiment of the divine phallus. The word can refer to phallus effigies and amulets, and to the spells used to invoke his divine protection. Pliny calls it a ''medicu ...
'', a phallic charm, was ubiquitous in Roman culture, appearing on everything from jewelry to bells and wind chime
Wind chimes are a type of percussion instrument constructed from suspended tubes, rods, bells or other objects that are often made of metal or wood. The tubes or rods are suspended along with some type of weight or surface which the tubes or rods ...
s to lamps, including as an amulet
An amulet, also known as a good luck charm or phylactery, is an object believed to confer protection upon its possessor. The word "amulet" comes from the Latin word amuletum, which Pliny's ''Natural History'' describes as "an object that protects ...
to protect children and triumphing generals.
Cupid inspired desire; the imported god Priapus
In Greek mythology, Priapus (; grc, Πρίαπος, ) is a minor rustic fertility god, protector of livestock, fruit plants, gardens and male genitalia. Priapus is marked by his oversized, permanent erection, which gave rise to the medical term ...
represented gross or humorous lust; Mutunus Tutunus
In Religion in ancient Rome, ancient Roman religion, Mutunus Tutunus or Mutinus Titinus was a phallus, phallic marriage deity, in some respects equated with Priapus. His shrine was located on the Velian Hill, supposedly since the founding of Rome, ...
promoted marital sex
Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognized union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children, and between t ...
. The god Liber
In ancient Roman religion and mythology, Liber ( , ; "the free one"), also known as Liber Pater ("the free Father"), was a god of viticulture and wine, male fertility and freedom. He was a patron deity of Rome's plebeians and was part of the ...
(understood as the "Free One") oversaw physiological responses during sexual intercourse. When a male assumed the ''toga virilis
The toga (, ), a distinctive garment of ancient Rome, was a roughly semicircular cloth, between in length, draped over the shoulders and around the body. It was usually woven from white wool, and was worn over a tunic. In Roman historical tra ...
'', "toga of manhood," Liber became his patron
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings, popes, and the wealthy have provided to artists su ...
; according to the love poets, he left behind the innocent modesty ''(pudor)'' of childhood and acquired the sexual freedom ''(libertas)'' to begin his course of love. A host of deities
A deity or god is a supernatural being who is considered divine or sacred. The ''Oxford Dictionary of English'' defines deity as a god or goddess, or anything revered as divine. C. Scott Littleton defines a deity as "a being with powers greate ...
oversaw every aspect of intercourse, conception, and childbirth.
Classical myths often deal with sexual themes such as gender identity
Gender identity is the personal sense of one's own gender. Gender identity can correlate with a person's assigned sex or can differ from it. In most individuals, the various biological determinants of sex are congruent, and consistent with the i ...
, adultery
Adultery (from Latin ''adulterium'') is extramarital sex that is considered objectionable on social, religious, moral, or legal grounds. Although the sexual activities that constitute adultery vary, as well as the social, religious, and legal ...
, incest
Incest ( ) is human sexual activity between family members or close relatives. This typically includes sexual activity between people in consanguinity (blood relations), and sometimes those related by affinity (marriage or stepfamily), adoption ...
, and rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without their consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or ag ...
. Roman art and literature continued the Hellenistic
In Classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Mediterranean history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the emergence of the Roman Empire, as signified by the Battle of Actium in ...
treatment of mythological figures having sex as humanly erotic and at times humorous, often removed from the religious dimension.
Moral and legal concepts
''Castitas''
The Latin word ''castitas'', from which the English "chastity
Chastity, also known as purity, is a virtue related to temperance. Someone who is ''chaste'' refrains either from sexual activity considered immoral or any sexual activity, according to their state of life. In some contexts, for example when mak ...
" derives, is an abstract noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, d ...
denoting "a moral and physical purity usually in a specifically religious context", sometimes but not always referring to sexual chastity.[ Langlands, p. 30.] The related adjective ''castus
Castus is a Latin word meaning clean and pure.
*Lucius Artorius Castus, Roman general
* Castus and Emilius, Roman martyrs and saints
*Castus (rebel), Roman rebel gladiator in the Third Servile War
See also
*Vitex agnus-castus
''Vitex agnus-cas ...
'' (feminine
Femininity (also called womanliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles generally associated with women and girls. Femininity can be understood as socially constructed, and there is also some evidence that some behaviors considered fe ...
''casta'', neuter ''castum''), "pure", can be used of places and objects as well as people; the adjective ''pudicus'' ("chaste, modest") describes more specifically a person who is sexually moral. The goddess Ceres
In ancient Roman religion, Ceres ( , ) was a goddess of agriculture, grain crops, fertility and motherly relationships.Room, Adrian, ''Who's Who in Classical Mythology'', p. 89-90. NTC Publishing 1990. . She was originally the central deity in ...
was concerned with both ritual and sexual ''castitas'', and the torch carried in her honor as part of the Roman wedding procession was associated with the bride's purity; Ceres also embodied motherhood. The goddess Vesta was the primary deity of the Roman pantheon associated with ''castitas'', and a virgin goddess herself; her priestesses the Vestals were virgins who took a vow to remain celibate.
''Incestum''
''Incestum'' (that which is "not ''castum''") is an act that violates religious purity, perhaps synonymous with that which is ''nefas
The vocabulary of ancient Roman religion was highly specialized. Its study affords important information about the religion, traditions and beliefs of the ancient Romans. This legacy is conspicuous in European cultural history in its influence on ...
'', religiously impermissible. The violation of a Vestal's vow of chastity was ''incestum'', a legal charge brought against her and the man who rendered her impure through sexual relations, whether consensually or by force. A Vestal's loss of ''castitas'' ruptured Rome's treaty with the gods ''(pax deorum
The vocabulary of ancient Roman religion was highly specialized. Its study affords important information about the religion, traditions and beliefs of the ancient Romans. This legacy is conspicuous in European cultural history in its influence o ...
)'', and was typically accompanied by the observation of bad omens ''( prodigia)''. Prosecutions for ''incestum'' involving a Vestal often coincide with political unrest, and some charges of ''incestum'' seem politically motivated; for example, Marcus Crassus
Marcus Licinius Crassus (; 115 – 53 BC) was a Roman general and statesman who played a key role in the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire. He is often called "the richest man in Rome." Wallechinsky, David & Wallace, I ...
was acquitted of ''incestum'' with a Vestal who shared his family name, and in 113 BC there was a trial
In law, a trial is a coming together of Party (law), parties to a :wikt:dispute, dispute, to present information (in the form of evidence (law), evidence) in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to Adjudication, adjudicate claims or d ...
involving three vestal virgins and a network of Roman elite.[Crassus's '' nomen'' was ]Licinius
Valerius Licinianus Licinius (c. 265 – 325) was Roman emperor from 308 to 324. For most of his reign he was the colleague and rival of Constantine I, with whom he co-authored the Edict of Milan, AD 313, that granted official toleration to C ...
; the Vestal's name was Licinia (see Roman naming conventions
Over the course of some fourteen centuries, the Romans and other peoples of Italy employed a system of nomenclature that differed from that used by other cultures of Europe and the Mediterranean Sea, consisting of a combination of personal and fami ...
). His reputation for greed and sharp business dealings helped save him; he objected that he had spent time with Licinia to obtain some real estate she owned. For sources, see Michael C. Alexander, ''Trials in the Late Roman Republic, 149 BC to 50 BC'' (University of Toronto Press, 1990), p. 84. The most likely year was 73 BC; Plutarch, ''Life of Crassus'
1.2
implies that the prosecution was motivated by political utility. One or more Vestals were also brought before the College of Pontiffs
The College of Pontiffs ( la, Collegium Pontificum; see ''collegium'') was a body of the ancient Roman state whose members were the highest-ranking priests of the state religion. The college consisted of the '' pontifex maximus'' and the other '' ...
for ''incestum'' in connection with the Catiline Conspiracy
The Catilinarian conspiracy (sometimes Second Catilinarian conspiracy) was an attempted coup d'état by Lucius Sergius Catilina (Catiline) to overthrow the Roman consuls of 63 BC – Marcus Tullius Cicero and Gaius Antonius Hybrida – an ...
(Alexander, ''Trials'', p. 83). Although the English word "incest
Incest ( ) is human sexual activity between family members or close relatives. This typically includes sexual activity between people in consanguinity (blood relations), and sometimes those related by affinity (marriage or stepfamily), adoption ...
" derives from the Latin, incestuous relations are only one form of Roman ''incestum'', sometimes translated as "sacrilege
Sacrilege is the violation or injurious treatment of a sacred object, site or person. This can take the form of irreverence to sacred persons, places, and things. When the sacrilegious offence is verbal, it is called blasphemy, and when physical ...
". When Clodius Pulcher
Publius Clodius Pulcher (93–52 BC) was a populist Roman politician and street agitator during the time of the First Triumvirate. One of the most colourful personalities of his era, Clodius was descended from the aristocratic Claudia gens, one ...
dressed as a woman and intruded on the all-female rites of the Bona Dea
Bona Dea (; 'Good Goddess') was a List of Roman deities, goddess in Religion in ancient Rome, ancient Roman religion. She was associated with chastity and fertility in Women in ancient Rome, Roman women, healing, and the protection of the SPQR, st ...
, he was charged with ''incestum''.
''Stuprum''
In Latin legal
A number of Latin terms are used in law, legal terminology and legal maxims. This is a partial list of these terms, which are wholly or substantially drawn from Latin.
__TOC__
Common law
Civil law
Ecclesiastical law
See als ...
and moral discourse, ''stuprum'' is illicit sexual intercourse, translatable as "criminal debauchery" or "sex crime
Sex and the law deals with the regulation by law of human sexual activity. Sex laws vary from one place or jurisdiction to another, and have varied over time. Unlawful sexual acts are called sex crimes.
Some laws regarding sexual activity are ...
". ''Stuprum'' encompasses diverse sexual offenses including ''incestum'', rape ("unlawful sex by force"), and adultery
Adultery (from Latin ''adulterium'') is extramarital sex that is considered objectionable on social, religious, moral, or legal grounds. Although the sexual activities that constitute adultery vary, as well as the social, religious, and legal ...
. In early Rome, ''stuprum'' was a disgraceful act in general, or any public disgrace, including but not limited to illicit sex.[For instance, in the mid-3rd century BC, Naevius uses the word ''stuprum'' in his ''Bellum Punicum'' for the military disgrace of desertion or cowardice; Fantham, p. 117.] By the time of the comic playwright Plautus
Titus Maccius Plautus (; c. 254 – 184 BC), commonly known as Plautus, was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest Latin literary works to have survived in their entirety. He wrote Palliata comoedia, the gen ...
(''ca.'' 254–184 BC) it had acquired its more restricted sexual meaning.[ Fantham, p. 118.] ''Stuprum'' can occur only among citizens; protection from sexual misconduct was among the legal rights that distinguished the citizen from the non-citizen. Although the noun ''stuprum'' may be translated into English as fornication
Fornication is generally consensual sexual intercourse between two people not married to each other. When one or more of the partners having consensual sexual intercourse is married to another person, it is called adultery. Nonetheless, John ...
, the intransitive verb
In grammar, an intransitive verb is a verb whose context does not entail a direct object. That lack of transitivity distinguishes intransitive verbs from transitive verbs, which entail one or more objects. Additionally, intransitive verbs are ...
"to fornicate" (itself derived from the Latin ''fornicarium'', which originally meant "a vaulted room"; the small vaulted rooms in which some prostitutes plied their trade led to the verb ''fornicare'') is an inadequate translation of the Latin ''stuprare'', which is a transitive verb
A transitive verb is a verb that accepts one or more objects, for example, 'cleaned' in ''Donald cleaned the window''. This contrasts with intransitive verbs, which do not have objects, for example, 'panicked' in ''Donald panicked''.
Transitiv ...
requiring a direct object
In linguistics, an object is any of several types of arguments. In subject-prominent, nominative-accusative languages such as English, a transitive verb typically distinguishes between its subject and any of its objects, which can include but ...
(the person who is the target of the misconduct) and a male agent (the ''stuprator'').
''Raptus''
The English word "rape" derives ultimately from the Latin verb ''rapio, rapere, raptus'', "to snatch, carry away, abduct" (the words ''rapt'', ''rapture'', and ''raptor'' still have the same meaning). In Roman law, ''raptus'' or ''raptio'' meant primarily kidnapping or abduction; the mythological rape of the Sabine women
The Rape of the Sabine Women ( ), also known as the Abduction of the Sabine Women or the Kidnapping of the Sabine Women, was an incident in Roman mythology in which the men of Rome committed a mass abduction of young women from the other citi ...
is a form of bride abduction
Bride kidnapping, also known as marriage by abduction or marriage by capture, is a practice in which a man abducts the woman he wishes to marry.
Bride kidnapping (hence the portmanteau bridenapping) has been practiced around the world and ...
in which sexual violation is a secondary issue. (Before the word "rape" acquired its modern strictly sexual meaning, the verb meant simply to seize something or someone by force; this usage persisted at least into the early 19th century.) The abduction of an unmarried girl from her father's household in some circumstances was a matter of the couple eloping without her father's permission to marry. Rape in the English sense was more often expressed as ''stuprum'' committed through violence or coercion (''cum vi'' or ''per vim''). As laws pertaining to violence were codified toward the end of the Republic, ''raptus ad stuprum'', "abduction for the purpose of committing a sex crime", emerged as a legal distinction. (See further discussion of rape under "The rape of men" and "Rape and the law" below.)
Healing and magic
Divine aid might be sought in private religious rituals along with medical treatments to enhance or block fertility, or to cure diseases of the reproductive organs. Votive offerings
A votive offering or votive deposit is one or more objects displayed or deposited, without the intention of recovery or use, in a sacred place for religious purposes. Such items are a feature of modern and ancient societies and are generally ...
''(vota
VOTA (formerly known as Casting Pearls) is a Christian rock band from Lincoln, Nebraska, featuring Bryan Olesen, a former guitarist with Christian rock band Newsboys. Several of the band's songs have been featured on rotation with national radio ...
''; compare ex-voto
An ex-voto is a votive offering to a saint or to a divinity; the term is usually restricted to Christian examples. It is given in fulfillment of a vow (hence the Latin term, short for ''ex voto suscepto'', "from the vow made") or in gratitude o ...
) in the form of breasts and penises have been found at healing sanctuaries.
A private ritual under some circumstances might be considered "magic", an indistinct category in antiquity. An ''amatorium'' (Greek ''philtron'') was a love charm or potion; binding spells ''(defixiones)'' were supposed to "fix" a person's sexual affection. The Greek Magical Papyri
The Greek Magical Papyri (Latin: ''Papyri Graecae Magicae'', abbreviated ''PGM'') is the name given by scholars to a body of papyri from Graeco-Roman Egypt, written mostly in ancient Greek (but also in Old Coptic, Demotic, etc.), which each cont ...
, a collection of syncretic magic texts, contain many love spells that indicate "there was a very lively market in erotic magic in the Roman period", catered by freelance priests who at times claimed to derive their authority from the Egyptian religious tradition. Canidia, a witch described by Horace, performs a spell using a female effigy to dominate a smaller male doll.
Aphrodisiac
An aphrodisiac is a substance that increases sexual desire, sexual attraction, sexual pleasure, or sexual behavior. Substances range from a variety of plants, spices, foods, and synthetic chemicals. Natural aphrodisiacs like cannabis or cocain ...
s, anaphrodisiac
An anaphrodisiac (also antaphrodisiac or antiaphrodisiac) is a substance that quells or blunts the libido. It is the opposite of an aphrodisiac, something that enhances sexual appetite. The word ''anaphrodisiac'' comes from the Greek privative p ...
s, contraceptives
Birth control, also known as contraception, anticonception, and fertility control, is the use of methods or devices to prevent unwanted pregnancy. Birth control has been used since ancient times, but effective and safe methods of birth contr ...
, and abortifacient
An abortifacient ("that which will cause a miscarriage" from Latin: ''abortus'' "miscarriage" and '' faciens'' "making") is a substance that induces abortion. This is a nonspecific term which may refer to any number of substances or medications, ...
s are preserved by both medical handbooks and magic texts; potions can be difficult to distinguish from pharmacology. In his Book 33 ''De medicamentis'', Marcellus of Bordeaux, a contemporary of Ausonius, collected more than 70 sexually related treatments—for growths and lesions on the testicles and penis, undescended testicles
Cryptorchidism, also known as undescended testis, is the failure of one or both testes to descend into the scrotum. The word is from Greek () 'hidden' and () 'testicle'. It is the most common birth defect of the male genital tract. About 3% of ...
, erectile dysfunction
Erectile dysfunction (ED), also called impotence, is the type of sexual dysfunction in which the penis fails to become or stay erect during sexual activity. It is the most common sexual problem in men.Cunningham GR, Rosen RC. Overview of male ...
, hydrocele
A hydrocele is an accumulation of serous fluid in a body cavity. A hydrocele testis, the most common form of hydrocele, is the accumulation of fluids around a testicle. It is often caused by fluid collecting within a layer wrapped around the testi ...
, "creating a eunuch
A eunuch ( ) is a male who has been castrated. Throughout history, castration often served a specific social function.
The earliest records for intentional castration to produce eunuchs are from the Sumerian city of Lagash in the 2nd millennium ...
without surgery", ensuring a woman's fidelity, and compelling or diminishing a man's desire—some of which involve ritual procedures:
If you’ve had a woman, and you don't want another man ever to get inside her, do this: Cut off the tail of a live green lizard with your left hand and release it while it’s still alive. Keep the tail closed up in the palm of the same hand until it dies and touch the woman and her private parts when you have intercourse with her.
There is an herb called ''nymphaea
''Nymphaea'' () is a genus of hardy and tender aquatic plants in the family Nymphaeaceae. The genus has a cosmopolitan distribution. Many species are cultivated as ornamental plants, and many cultivars have been bred. Some taxa occur as introduc ...
'' in Greek, 'Hercules’ club' in Latin, and ''baditis'' in Gaulish
Gaulish was an ancient Celtic languages, Celtic language spoken in parts of Continental Europe before and during the period of the Roman Empire. In the narrow sense, Gaulish was the language of the Celts of Gaul (now France, Luxembourg, Belgium ...
. Its root, pounded to a paste and drunk in vinegar for ten consecutive days, has the astonishing effect of turning a boy into a eunuch.
If the spermatic veins of an immature boy should become enlarged,[Referring to ]varicocele
varicocele is an abnormal enlargement of the pampiniform venous plexus in the scrotum. This plexus of veins drains blood from the testicles back to the heart. The vessels originate in the abdomen and course down through the inguinal canal as part ...
. split a young cherry-tree down the middle to its roots while leaving it standing, in such a way that the boy can be passed through the cleft. Then join the sapling together again and seal it with cow manure and other dressings, so that the parts that were split may intermingle within themselves more easily. The speed with which the sapling grows together and its scar forms will determine how quickly the swollen veins of the boy will return to health.
Marcellus also records which herbs could be used to induce menstruation
Menstruation (also known as a period, among other colloquial terms) is the regular discharge of blood and mucosal tissue from the inner lining of the uterus through the vagina. The menstrual cycle is characterized by the rise and fall of hor ...
, or to purge the womb after childbirth or abortion; these herbs include potential abortifacients and may have been used as such. Other sources advise remedies such as coating the penis with a mixture of honey and pepper to get an erection, or boiling an ass's genitals in oil as an ointment.
Theories of sexuality
Ancient theories of sexuality were produced by and for an educated elite. The extent to which theorizing about sex actually affected behavior is debatable, even among those who were attentive to the philosophical and medical writings that presented such views. This elite discourse, while often deliberately critical of common or typical behaviors, at the same time cannot be assumed to exclude values broadly held within the society.
Epicurean sexuality
The fourth book of Lucretius
Titus Lucretius Carus ( , ; – ) was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the philosophical poem ''De rerum natura'', a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism, and which usually is translated into E ...
' ''De rerum natura
''De rerum natura'' (; ''On the Nature of Things'') is a first-century BC didactic poem by the Roman poet and philosopher Lucretius ( – c. 55 BC) with the goal of explaining Epicurean philosophy to a Roman audience. The poem, written in some 7 ...
'' provides one of the most extended passages on human sexuality in Latin literature. Yeats
William Butler Yeats (13 June 186528 January 1939) was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival and became a pillar of the Irish litera ...
, describing the translation by Dryden
''
John Dryden (; – ) was an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who in 1668 was appointed England's first Poet Laureate.
He is seen as dominating the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the peri ...
, called it "the finest description of sexual intercourse ever written." Lucretius was the contemporary of Catullus
Gaius Valerius Catullus (; 84 - 54 BCE), often referred to simply as Catullus (, ), was a Latin poet of the late Roman Republic who wrote chiefly in the neoteric style of poetry, focusing on personal life rather than classical heroes. His s ...
and Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the estab ...
in the mid-1st century BC. His didactic poem
Didacticism is a philosophy that emphasizes instructional and informative qualities in literature, art, and design. In art, design, architecture, and landscape, didacticism is an emerging conceptual approach that is driven by the urgent need to ...
''De rerum natura'' is a presentation of Epicurean philosophy
Epicureanism is a system of philosophy founded around 307 BC based upon the teachings of the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus. Epicureanism was originally a challenge to Platonism. Later its main opponent became Stoicism.
Few writings by Epi ...
within the Ennian tradition of Latin poetry. Epicureanism is both materialist
Materialism is a form of philosophical monism which holds matter to be the fundamental substance in nature, and all things, including mental states and consciousness, are results of material interactions. According to philosophical materialis ...
and hedonic
Hedonism refers to a family of theories, all of which have in common that pleasure plays a central role in them. ''Psychological'' or ''motivational hedonism'' claims that human behavior is determined by desires to increase pleasure and to decre ...
. The highest good
''Summum bonum'' is a Latin expression meaning the highest or ultimate good, which was introduced by the Roman philosopher Cicero to denote the fundamental principle on which some system of ethics is based — that is, the aim of actions, which, ...
is pleasure, defined as the absence of physical pain and emotional distress. The Epicurean seeks to gratify his desires with the least expenditure of passion and effort. Desires are ranked as those that are both natural and necessary, such as hunger and thirst; those that are natural but unnecessary, such as sex; and those that are neither natural nor necessary, including the desire to rule over others and glorify oneself. It is within this context that Lucretius presents his analysis of love and sexual desire, which counters the erotic ethos of Catullus and influenced the love poets of the Augustan period.
Lucretius treats male desire, female sexual pleasure, heredity, and infertility as aspects of sexual physiology. In the Epicurean view, sexuality arises from impersonal physical causes without divine or supernatural influence. The onset of physical maturity generates semen, and wet dreams
A nocturnal emission, informally known as a wet dream, sex dream, nightfall or sleep orgasm, is a spontaneous orgasm during sleep that includes ejaculation for a male, or vaginal wetness or an orgasm (or both) for a female. Nocturnal emissions ...
occur as the sexual instinct develops. Sense perception, specifically the sight of a beautiful body, provokes the movement of semen into the genitals and toward the object of desire. The engorgement of the genitals creates an urge to ejaculate, coupled with the anticipation of pleasure. The body's response to physical attractiveness is automatic, and neither the character of the person desired nor one's own choice is a factor. With a combination of scientific detachment and ironic humor, Lucretius treats the human sex drive as ''muta cupido'', "dumb desire", comparing the physiological response of ejaculation to the blood spurting from a wound. Love ''(amor)'' is merely an elaborate cultural posturing that obscures a glandular condition; love taints sexual pleasure just as life is tainted by the fear of death. Lucretius is writing primarily for a male audience, and assumes that love is a male passion, directed at either boys or women. Male desire is viewed as pathological, frustrating, and violent.Brown
Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing or painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors orange and black. In the RGB color model used ...
, pp. 65–66.
Lucretius thus expresses an Epicurean ambivalence toward sexuality, which threatens one's peace of mind with agitation if desire becomes a form of bondage and torment,Brown
Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing or painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors orange and black. In the RGB color model used ...
, p. 67. but his view of female sexuality is less negative. While men are driven by unnatural expectations to engage in onesided and desperate sex, women act on a purely animal instinct toward affection, which leads to mutual satisfaction.Brown
Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing or painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors orange and black. In the RGB color model used ...
, p. 66. The comparison with female animals in heat is meant not as an insult, though there are a few traces of conventional misogyny in the work, but to indicate that desire is natural and should not be experienced as torture.
Having analyzed the sex act, Lucretius then considers conception and what in modern terms would be called genetics. Both man and woman, he says, produce genital fluids that mingle in a successful procreative act. The characteristics of the child are formed by the relative proportions of the mother's "seed" to the father's. A child who most resembles its mother is born when the female seed dominates the male's, and vice versa; when neither the male nor female seed dominates, the child will have traits of both mother and father evenly.[The sex of the child, however, is not determined by the gender of the parent whose traits dominate.] Infertility occurs when the two partners fail to make a satisfactory match of their seed after several attempts; the explanation for infertility is physiological and rational, and has nothing to do with the gods. The transfer of genital "seed" ''(semina)'' is consonant with Epicurean physics
Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...
and the theme of the work as a whole: the invisible ''semina rerum'', "seeds of things," continually dissolve and recombine in universal flux. The vocabulary of biological procreation underlies Lucretius's presentation of how matter is formed from atoms.
Lucretius' purpose is to correct ignorance and to give the knowledge necessary for managing one's sex life rationally.Brown
Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing or painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors orange and black. In the RGB color model used ...
, p. 68. He distinguishes between pleasure and conception as goals of copulation; both are legitimate, but require different approaches. He recommends casual sex as a way of releasing sexual tension without becoming obsessed with a single object of desire; a "streetwalking Venus"—a common prostitute—should be used as a surrogate. Sex without passionate attachment produces a superior form of pleasure free of uncertainty, frenzy, and mental disturbance. Lucretius calls this form of sexual pleasure ''venus'', in contrast to ''amor'', passionate love. The best sex is that of happy animals, or of gods. Lucretius combines an Epicurean wariness of sex as a threat to peace of mind with the Roman cultural value placed on sexuality as an aspect of marriage and family life, pictured as an Epicurean man in a tranquil and friendly marriage with a good but homely woman, beauty being a disquieting prompt to excessive desire. Lucretius reacts against the Roman tendency to display sex ostentatiously, as in erotic art, and rejects the aggressive, "Priapic
In Greek mythology, Priapus (; grc, Πρίαπος, ) is a minor rustic fertility god, protector of livestock, fruit plants, gardens and male genitalia. Priapus is marked by his oversized, permanent erection, which gave rise to the medical term ...
" model of sexuality spurred by visual stimulus.
Stoic sexual morality
In early Stoicism
Stoicism is a school of Hellenistic philosophy founded by Zeno of Citium in Athens in the early 3rd century Common Era, BCE. It is a philosophy of personal virtue ethics informed by its system of logic and its views on the natural world, asser ...
among the Greeks
The Greeks or Hellenes (; el, Έλληνες, ''Éllines'' ) are an ethnic group and nation indigenous to the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea regions, namely Greece, Cyprus, Albania, Italy, Turkey, Egypt, and, to a lesser extent, oth ...
, sex was regarded as a good, if enjoyed between people who maintained the principles of respect and friendship; in the ideal society, sex should be enjoyed freely, without bonds of marriage that treated the partner as property. Some Greek Stoics privileged same-sex relations between a man and a younger male partner (see "Pederasty in ancient Greece
Pederasty in ancient Greece was a socially acknowledged romantic relationship between an older male (the ''erastes'') and a younger male (the ''eromenos'') usually in his teens. It was characteristic of the Archaic Greece, Archaic and Classical G ...
"). However, stoics in the Roman Imperial era departed from the view of human beings as "communally sexual animals" and emphasized sex within marriage, which as an institution helped sustain social order. Although they distrusted strong passions, including sexual desire, sexual vitality was necessary for procreation.
Roman-era Stoics such as Seneca
Seneca may refer to:
People and language
* Seneca (name), a list of people with either the given name or surname
* Seneca people, one of the six Iroquois tribes of North America
** Seneca language, the language of the Seneca people
Places Extrat ...
and Musonius Rufus
Gaius Musonius Rufus (; grc-gre, Μουσώνιος Ῥοῦφος) was a Roman Stoic philosopher of the 1st century AD. He taught philosophy in Rome during the reign of Nero and so was sent into exile in 65 AD, returning to Rome only under Galba ...
, both active about 100 years after Lucretius, emphasized "sex unity" over the polarity of the sexes. Although Musonius is predominately a Stoic, his philosophy also partakes of Platonism
Platonism is the philosophy of Plato and philosophical systems closely derived from it, though contemporary platonists do not necessarily accept all of the doctrines of Plato. Platonism had a profound effect on Western thought. Platonism at le ...
and Pythagoreanism
Pythagoreanism originated in the 6th century BC, based on and around the teachings and beliefs held by Pythagoras and his followers, the Pythagoreans. Pythagoras established the first Pythagorean community in the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek col ...
. He rejected the Aristotelian tradition, which portrayed sexual dimorphism
Sexual dimorphism is the condition where the sexes of the same animal and/or plant species exhibit different morphological characteristics, particularly characteristics not directly involved in reproduction. The condition occurs in most ani ...
as expressing a proper relation of those ruling (male) and those being ruled (female), and distinguished men from women as biologically lacking. Dimorphism exists, according to Musonius, simply to create difference, and difference in turn creates the desire for a complementary relationship, that is, a couple who will bond for life for the sake of each other and for their children.[ The Roman ideal of marriage was a partnership of companions who work together to produce and rear children, manage everyday affairs, lead exemplary lives, and enjoy affection; Musonius drew on this ideal to promote the Stoic view that the capacity for virtue and self-mastery was not gender-specific.
]
Both Musonius and Seneca criticized the double standard
A double standard is the application of different sets of principles for situations that are, in principle, the same. It is often used to describe treatment whereby one group is given more latitude than another. A double standard arises when two ...
, cultural and legal, that granted Roman men greater sexual freedom than women.[ Men, Musonius argues, are excused by society for resorting to prostitutes and slaves to satisfy their sexual appetites, while such behavior from a woman would not be tolerated; therefore, if men presume to exercise authority over women because they believe themselves to have greater self-control, they ought to be able to manage their sex drive. The argument, then, is not that sexual freedom is a human good, but that men as well as women should exercise sexual restraint.][ A man visiting a prostitute does harm to himself by lacking self-discipline; disrespect for his wife and her expectations of fidelity would not be at issue. Similarly, a man should not be so self-indulgent as to exploit a female slave sexually; however, her right not to be used is not a motive for his restraint. Musonius maintained that even within marriage, sex should be undertaken as an expression of affection and for procreation, and not for "bare pleasure".
]
Musonius disapproved of same-sex relations because they lacked a procreative purpose.[ Nussbaum, pp. 299–300] Seneca and Epictetus
Epictetus (; grc-gre, Ἐπίκτητος, ''Epíktētos''; 50 135 AD) was a Greek Stoic philosopher. He was born into slavery at Hierapolis, Phrygia (present-day Pamukkale, in western Turkey) and lived in Rome until his banishment, when ...
also thought that procreation privileged male–female sexual pairing within marriage, and Seneca strongly opposed adultery, finding it particularly offensive by women.
Although Seneca is known primarily as a Stoic philosopher, he draws on Neopythagoreanism
Neopythagoreanism (or neo-Pythagoreanism) was a school of Hellenistic philosophy which revived Pythagorean doctrines. Neopythagoreanism was influenced by middle Platonism and in turn influenced Neoplatonism. It originated in the 1st century BC ...
for his views on sexual austerity.Gaca
up Abdulaziz Al-Duailej in November 2022
The General Authority of Civil Aviation of Saudi Arabia (GACA; ar, الهيئة العامة للطيران المدني) It is responsible for regulation of air transport services and the implementation ...
, p. 111. Neopythagoreans characterized sexuality outside marriage as disordered and undesirable; celibacy was not an ideal, but chastity within marriage was. To Seneca, sexual desire for pleasure ''(libido)'' is a "destructive force ''(exitium)'' insidiously fixed in the innards"; unregulated, it becomes ''cupiditas'', lust. The only justification for sex is reproduction within marriage. Although other Stoics see potential in beauty to be an ethical stimulus, a way to attract and develop affection and friendship within sexual relations, Seneca distrusts the love of physical beauty as destroying reason to the point of insanity. A man should have no sexual partner other than his wife, and the wise man (''sapiens'', Greek ''sophos'') will make love to his wife by exercising good judgment ''(iudicium)'', not emotion ''(affectus)''.Gaca
up Abdulaziz Al-Duailej in November 2022
The General Authority of Civil Aviation of Saudi Arabia (GACA; ar, الهيئة العامة للطيران المدني) It is responsible for regulation of air transport services and the implementation ...
, p. 112. This is a far stricter view than that of other Stoics who advocate sex as a means of promoting mutual affection within marriage.
The philosophical view of the body as a corpse that carries around the soul could result in outright contempt for sexuality: the emperor and Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (Latin: áːɾkus̠ auɾέːli.us̠ antɔ́ːni.us̠ English: ; 26 April 121 – 17 March 180) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 AD and a Stoic philosopher. He was the last of the rulers known as the Five Good ...
writes, "as for sexual intercourse, it is the friction of a piece of gut and, following a sort of convulsion, the expulsion of some mucus". Seneca rails "at great length" against the perversity of one Hostius Quadra, who surrounded himself with the equivalent of curved mirror, funhouse mirrors so he could view sex party (group sex), sex parties from distorted angles and penises would look bigger.
Sexual severity opened the Roman Stoics to charges of hypocrisy: Juvenal
Decimus Junius Juvenalis (), known in English as Juvenal ( ), was a Roman poet active in the late first and early second century CE. He is the author of the collection of satirical poems known as the ''Satires''. The details of Juvenal's life ...
satirizes those who affect a rough and manly Stoic façade but privately indulge. It was routinely joked that not only were Stoics inclined toward pederasty, they liked young men who were acquiring beards, contrary to Greek love#Ancient Rome, Roman sexual custom. Martial
Marcus Valerius Martialis (known in English as Martial ; March, between 38 and 41 AD – between 102 and 104 AD) was a Roman poet from Hispania (modern Spain) best known for his twelve books of ''Epigrams'', published in Rome between AD 86 and ...
repeatedly makes insinuations about those who were outwardly Stoic but privately enjoyed the passive homosexual role.
Stoic sexual ethics are grounded in Stoic physics, their physics and cosmology. The 5th-century writer Macrobius preserves a Stoic interpretation of the myth of the birth of Venus
Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is sometimes called Earth's "sister" or "twin" planet as it is almost as large and has a similar composition. As an interior planet to Earth, Venus (like Mercury) appears in Earth's sky never fa ...
as a result of the primal castration of the deity Heaven (Latin Caelus).["... Cronus, Kronos is the same as Chronos, Khronos: for as much as the mythographers offer different versions of Saturn (mythology), Saturn [= Kronos] in their tales, the History of physics#Early history, physical scientists restore him to a certain likeness to the truth. They say that he cut off the genitals of his father, Caelus, Heaven, and that when these were cast into the sea Venus was engendered, taking the name ]Aphrodite
Aphrodite ( ; grc-gre, Ἀφροδίτη, Aphrodítē; , , ) is an ancient Greek goddess associated with love, lust, beauty, pleasure, passion, and procreation. She was syncretized with the Roman goddess . Aphrodite's major symbols include ...
from the foam [Greek ''aphros''] from which she formed. They interpret this to mean that when Chaos (cosmogony), chaos existed, time did not, since time is a fixed measurement computed from the rotation of the heavens. Hence Kronos, who as I said is Khronos, is thought to have been born from heaven itself. Because the seeds for engendering all things ''(semina rerum omnium)'' after heaven flowed down from heaven, and because all the elements that fill the world took their start from those seeds, when the world was complete in all its parts and members, the process of bringing forth seeds from heaven for the creation of the elements came to an end at a fixed moment in time, since a full complement of elements had by then been created. The capacity for engendering living things in an unbroken sequence of reproduction was transferred from water to Venus, so that all things would thenceforth come into being through the intercourse of male and female": Macrobius, ''Saturnalia'' 1.8.6–8, Loeb Classical Library translation by Robert A. Kaster. The myth, Macrobius indicates, could be understood as an allegory of the Stoic physics, doctrine of seminal reason. The elements derive from the ''semina'', "seeds," that are generated by heaven; "love" brings together the elements in the act of creation, like the sexual union of male and female. Cicero suggests that in Stoic allegory the severing of reproductive organs signifies, "...that the highest heavenly aether, that seed-fire which generates all things, did not require the equivalent of human genitals to proceed in its generative work".
Aphrodite Anadyomene from Pompeii cropped.jpg, Venus Anadyomene, Venus rising from the sea, a wall painting from Pompeii
Pompeii (, ) was an ancient city located in what is now the ''comune'' of Pompei near Naples in the Campania region of Italy. Pompeii, along with Herculaneum and many villas in the surrounding area (e.g. at Boscoreale, Stabiae), was buried ...
Male sexuality
During the Republic, a Roman citizen's political liberty ''(libertas)'' was defined in part by the right to preserve his body from physical compulsion, including both corporal punishment and sexual abuse. ''Virtus (virtue), Virtus'', "valor" as that which made a man most fully a man ''(vir)'', was among the active virtues. Roman ideals of masculinity were thus premised on taking an active role that was also, as #Williams, Williams has noted, "the prime directive of masculine sexual behavior for Romans." The impetus toward action might express itself most intensely in an ideal of dominance that reflects the hierarchy of Roman patriarchal society.[#Williams, Williams, p. 18.] The "conquest mentality" was part of a "cult of virility" that particularly shaped Roman homosexual practices.[ In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, an emphasis on domination has led scholars to view expressions of Roman male sexuality in terms of a "penetrator-penetrated" binary model; that is, the proper way for a Roman male to seek sexual gratification was to insert his penis in his partner.] Allowing himself to be penetrated threatened his liberty as a free citizen as well as his sexual integrity.[See further discussion of how sexual activity defines the free, respectable citizen from the slave or "un-free" person below under #Master-slave relations, Master-slave relations and #Pleasure and infamy, Pleasure and infamy.]
It was expected and socially acceptable for a freeborn Roman man to want sex with both female and male partners, as long as he took the dominating role. Acceptable objects of desire were women of any social or legal status, male prostitutes, or male slaves, but sexual behaviors outside marriage were to be confined to slaves and prostitutes, or less often a concubine or "kept woman." Lack of self-control, including in managing one's sex life, indicated that a man was incapable of governing others; the enjoyment of "low sensual pleasure" threatened to erode the elite male's identity as a cultured person.[ Hallett, p. 68.] It was a point of pride for Gaius Gracchus to claim that during his term as a Roman governor, provincial governor he kept no slave-boys chosen for their good looks, no female prostitutes visited his house, and he never accosted other men's slave-boys.
In the Imperial era, anxieties about the loss of political liberty and the subordination of the citizen to the emperor were expressed by a perceived increase in passive homosexual behavior among free men, accompanied by a documentable increase in the execution and corporal punishment of citizens. The dissolution of Republican ideals of physical integrity in relation to ''libertas'' contributes to and is reflected by the sexual license and decadence associated with the Empire.
Male nudity
The poet Ennius (''ca.'' 239–169 BC) declared that "exposing naked bodies among citizens is the beginning of public disgrace ''(flagitium)''," a sentiment echoed by Cicero that again links the self-containment of the body with citizenship. Roman attitudes toward nudity differed from those of the Greeks, whose ideal of masculine excellence was expressed by the nude male body in art and in such real-life venues as athletic contests. The toga, by contrast, distinguished the body of the sexually privileged adult Roman male.[#Habinek, Habinek, p. 39.] Even when stripping down for exercises, Roman men kept their genitals and buttocks covered, an Italic peoples, Italic custom shared also with the Etruscans, whose art mostly shows them wearing a loincloth, a skirt-like garment, or the earliest form of "shorts" for athletics. Romans who competed in the Ancient Olympic Games, Olympic Games presumably followed the Greek custom of nudity, but athletic nudity at Rome has been dated variously, possibly as early as the introduction of Greek-style games in the 2nd century BC but perhaps not regularly till the time of Nero around 60 AD.
Public nudity might be offensive or distasteful even in traditional settings; Cicero derides Mark Antony as undignified for appearing near-naked as a participant in the Lupercalia
Lupercalia was a pastoral festival of Ancient Rome observed annually on February 15 to purify the city, promoting health and fertility. Lupercalia was also known as ''dies Februatus'', after the purification instruments called ''februa'', the b ...
, even though it was ritually required. Nudity is one of the themes of this religious festival that most consumes Ovid's attention in the ''Fasti (Ovid), Fasti'', his long-form poem on the Roman calendar. Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pri ...
, during his program of religious revivalism, attempted to reform the Lupercalia, in part by suppressing the use of nudity despite its fertility aspect.
Negative connotations of nudity include defeat in war, since captives were stripped, and slavery, since slaves for sale were often displayed naked. The disapproval of nudity was thus less a matter of trying to suppress inappropriate sexual desire than of dignifying and marking the citizen's body as free.[#Williams, Williams, pp. 69–70.]
The influence of Greek art, however, led to Heroic nudity, "heroic" nude portrayals of Roman men and gods, a practice that began in the 2nd century BC. When statues of Roman generals nude in the manner of Hellenistic ruler cult, Hellenistic kings first began to be displayed, they were shocking not simply because they exposed the male figure, but because they evoked concepts of royalty and Imperial cult (ancient Rome)#Intermediate forms, divinity that were contrary to Republican ideals of citizenship as embodied by the toga. The god Mars (mythology)#Iconography, Mars is presented as a mature, bearded man in the attire of a Roman general when he is conceived of as the dignified father of the Roman people, while depictions of Mars as youthful, beardless, and nude show the influence of the Greek Ares. In art produced under Augustus, the programmatic adoption of Hellenistic art, Hellenistic and Neo-Attic, Neo-Attic style led to more complex signification of the male body shown nude, partially nude, or costumed in a muscle cuirass.
One exception to public nudity was thermae, the baths, though attitudes toward nude bathing also changed over time. In the 2nd century BC, Cato the Elder, Cato preferred not to bathe in the presence of his son, and Plutarch implies that for Romans of these earlier times it was considered shameful for mature men to expose their bodies to younger males.[Plutarch, ''Life of Cato'' 20.5] Later, however, men and women might even bathe together.[Until the late Republic, a bath house probably offered women a separate wing or facility, or had a schedule that allowed women and men to bathe at different times. From the late Republic until the rise of Christian dominance in the later Empire, there is clear evidence of mixed bathing. Some scholars have thought that only lower-class women bathed with men, or those such as entertainers or prostitutes who were ''#Pleasure and infamy, infames'', but ]Clement of Alexandria
Titus Flavius Clemens, also known as Clement of Alexandria ( grc , Κλήμης ὁ Ἀλεξανδρεύς; – ), was a Christian theologian and philosopher who taught at the Catechetical School of Alexandria. Among his pupils were Origen and ...
observed that women of the highest social classes could be seen naked at the baths. Hadrian prohibited mixed bathing, but the ban seems not to have endured. In short, customs varied not only by time and place, but by facility; see Garrett G. Fagan, ''Bathing in Public in the Roman World'' (University of Michigan Press, 1999, 2002), pp. 26–27.
Phallic sexuality
Roman sexuality as framed by Latin literature has been described as phallocentric. The phallus was supposed to have powers to ward off the evil eye and other malevolent supernatural forces. It was used as an amulet
An amulet, also known as a good luck charm or phylactery, is an object believed to confer protection upon its possessor. The word "amulet" comes from the Latin word amuletum, which Pliny's ''Natural History'' describes as "an object that protects ...
''(fascinum)'', many examples of which survive, particularly in the form of wind chime
Wind chimes are a type of percussion instrument constructed from suspended tubes, rods, bells or other objects that are often made of metal or wood. The tubes or rods are suspended along with some type of weight or surface which the tubes or rods ...
s ''(tintinnabulum (Ancient Rome), tintinnabula)''. Some scholars have even interpreted the plan of the Forum Augustum as phallic architecture, phallic, "with its two semi-circular galleries or ''exedrae'' as the testicles and its long projecting forecourt as the shaft".
The outsized phallus
A phallus is a penis (especially when erect), an object that resembles a penis, or a mimetic image of an erect penis. In art history a figure with an erect penis is described as ithyphallic.
Any object that symbolically—or, more precisel ...
of Roman art was associated with the god Priapus
In Greek mythology, Priapus (; grc, Πρίαπος, ) is a minor rustic fertility god, protector of livestock, fruit plants, gardens and male genitalia. Priapus is marked by his oversized, permanent erection, which gave rise to the medical term ...
, among others. It was laughter-provoking, grotesque, or used for magical purposes. Originating in the Greek town of Lampsacus, Priapus was a fertility deity whose statue was placed in gardens to ward off thieves. The poetry collection called the ''Priapea'' deals with phallic sexuality, including poems spoken in the person of Priapus. In one, for instance, Priapus threatens anal rape against any potential thief. The wrath of Priapus might cause impotence, or a state of perpetual arousal with no means of release: one curse of Priapus upon a thief was that he might lack women or boys to relieve him of his erection, and burst.
There are approximately 120 recorded Latin terms and metaphors for the penis, with the largest category treating the male member as an instrument of aggression, a weapon. This metaphorical tendency is exemplified by actual Sling (weapon)#Ammunition, lead sling-bullets, which are sometimes inscribed with the image of a phallus, or messages that liken the target to a sexual conquest—for instance "I seek Octavian's asshole." The most common obscenity for the penis is ''mentula'', which Martial argues for in place of polite terms: his privileging of the word as time-honored Latin from the era of Numa Pompilius, Numa may be compared to the unvarnished integrity of "Four-letter word, four letter Anglo-Saxon words".[#Adams, Adams, p. 9.] Cicero does not use the word even when discussing the nature of obscene language in a letter to his friend Titus Pomponius Atticus, Atticus;[ Catullus famously uses it as a pseudonym for the disreputable Mamurra, Julius Caesar's friend ("Dick" or "Peter" might be English equivalents). ''Mentula'' appears frequently in graffiti and the ''Priapea'', but while obscene the word was not inherently abusive or vituperative. ''Verpa'', by contrast, was "an emotive and highly offensive word" for the penis with its foreskin drawn back, as the result of an erection, excessive sexual activity, or #Castration and circumcision, circumcision.] ''Virga'', as well as other words for "branch, rod, stake, beam", is a common metaphor, as is ''vomer'', "plough".
The penis might also be referred to as the "vein" ''(vena)'', "tail" (''penis'' or ''cauda''), or "tendon" ''(nervus)''. The English word "penis" derives from ''penis'', which originally meant "tail" but in Classical Latin was used regularly as a risqué colloquialism for the male organ. Later, ''penis'' becomes the standard word in polite Latin, as used for example by the scholiast to Juvenal and by Arnobius, but did not pass into usage among the Romance languages. It was not a term used by medical writers, except for Marcellus of Bordeaux. In medieval Latin, a vogue for scholarly obscenity led to a perception of the dactyl (poetry), dactyl, a metrical unit of verse represented as an image of the penis, with the long syllable ''(longum)'' the shaft and the two short syllables ''(breves)'' the testicles.
The apparent connection between Latin ''testes'', "testicles," and ''testis'', plural ''testes'', "witness" (the origin of English "testify" and "testimony") may lie in archaic ritual. Some ancient Mediterranean cultures swore binding oaths upon the male genitalia, symbolizing that "the bearing of false witness brings a curse upon not only oneself, but one's house and future line". Latin writers make frequent puns and jokes based on the two meanings of ''testis'':[Katz, "''Testimonia Ritus Italicus''," p. 189.] it took balls to become a legally functioning male citizen. The English word "testicle" derives from the diminutive ''testiculum''. The obscene word for "testicle" was ''coleus''.
Castration and circumcision
To Romans and Greeks, castration and circumcision were linked as barbaric mutilations of the male genitalia. When the cult of Cybele was imported to Rome at the end of the 3rd century BC, its traditional eunuch
A eunuch ( ) is a male who has been castrated. Throughout history, castration often served a specific social function.
The earliest records for intentional castration to produce eunuchs are from the Sumerian city of Lagash in the 2nd millennium ...
ism was confined to foreign priests (the ''Galli)'', while Roman citizens formed Glossary of ancient Roman religion#sodalitas, sodalities to perform honors in keeping with their own customs. It has been argued that among the reasons for the Paul the Apostle, Apostle Paul's exhortation of the Epistle to the Galatians, Galatians Circumcision controversy in early Christianity, not to undergo circumcision, the practice at the time should be understood not only in the context of Brit milah, Jewish circumcision, but also of the ritual castration associated with Cybele, whose cult was centered in Galatia. Among Jews, circumcision was a marker of the Abrahamic covenant; Jewish diaspora, diaspora Jews circumcised their male slaves and Conversion to Judaism, adult male converts, in addition to Jewish male infants. Although Greco-Roman writers view circumcision as an identifying characteristic of Jews, they believed the practice to have originated in Ancient Egypt, Egypt, and recorded it among peoples they identified as Pre-Islamic Arabia, Arab, Syria (Roman province), Syrian, Phoenicians, Phoenician, Colchis, Colchian, and History of Ethiopia#Antiquity, Ethiopian. The Neoplatonic philosopher Sallustius (Neoplatonist), Sallustius associates circumcision with the strange familial–sexual customs of the Massagetae who "eat their fathers" and of the Persian people#Ancient history and origin, Persians who "preserve their nobility by begetting children on their mothers".
During the Roman Republic, Republican period, a Roman law, Lex Cornelia prohibited various kinds of mutilation, including castration. (Two millennia later, in 1640, the poet Salvator Rosa, Salvatore Rosa would write in ''La Musica'', “Fine Cornelia law, where hast thou gone / Now that the whole of Norcia seems not enough / For the castration of boys?”) Despite these prohibitions, some Romans kept beautiful male slaves as ''deliciae'' or ''delicati'' ("toys, delights") who were sometimes castrated in an effort to preserve the androgynous looks of their youth. The emperor Nero had his freedman Sporus castrated, and married him in a public ceremony.
By the end of the 1st century AD, bans against castration had been enacted by the emperors Domitian and Nerva in the face of a burgeoning trade in eunuch slaves. Sometime between 128 and 132 AD, Hadrian seems to have temporarily banned circumcision, on pain of death. Antoninus Pius exempted Jews from the ban, as well as Egyptian priests, and Origen says that in his time only Jews were permitted to practice circumcision. Legislation under Constantine I, Constantine, the first Christian emperor, freed any slave who was subjected to circumcision; in 339 AD, circumcising a slave became punishable by death.
A medical procedure known as Foreskin restoration#History, epispasm, which consisted of both surgical and non-surgical methods, existed in ancient Rome and Greece to restore the foreskin and cover the glans penis, glans "for the sake of decorum". Both were described in detail by the Greek physician Aulus Cornelius Celsus in his comprehensive encyclopedic work ''De Medicina'', written during the reign of Tiberius
Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus (; 16 November 42 BC – 16 March AD 37) was the second Roman emperor. He reigned from AD 14 until 37, succeeding his stepfather, the first Roman emperor Augustus. Tiberius was born in Rome in 42 BC. His father ...
(14-37 CE). The surgical method involved freeing the skin covering the penis by dissection, and then pulling it forward over the glans; he also described a simpler surgical technique used on men whose Aposthia, prepuce is naturally insufficient to cover their glans. The second approach was non-surgical: a restoration device which consisted of a special weight made of bronze, copper, or leather, was affixed to the penis, pulling its skin downward. Overtime a new foreskin was generated, or a short prepuce was lengthened, by means of Tissue expansion#Foreskin restoration, tissue expansion; Martial
Marcus Valerius Martialis (known in English as Martial ; March, between 38 and 41 AD – between 102 and 104 AD) was a Roman poet from Hispania (modern Spain) best known for his twelve books of ''Epigrams'', published in Rome between AD 86 and ...
also mentioned the restoration device in ''Epigrammaton'' (Book 7:35). Hellenized or Romanized Jews resorted to epispasm to better integrate into the Greco-Roman society, and also to make themselves less conspicuous at the baths or during athletics. Of these, some had themselves circumcised again later.
Regulating semen
Too-frequent ejaculation was thought to weaken men. Ancient Greek medicine, Greek medical theories based on the classical elements and humorism, humors recommended limiting the production of semen by means of cooling, drying, and astringent therapies, including cold baths and the avoidance of flatulence-causing foods. In the 2nd century AD, the medical writer Galen explains semen as a concoction of blood (conceived of as a humor) and ''pneuma'' (the "vital air (classical element), air" required by organs to function) formed within the man's coiled spermatic vessels, with the humor turning white through heat as it enters into the testicles. In his treatise ''On Semen'', Galen warns that immoderate sexual activity results in a loss of ''pneuma'' and hence vitality:
It is not at all surprising that those who are less moderate sexually turn out to be weaker, since the whole body loses the purest part of both substances, and there is besides an accession of pleasure, which by itself is enough to dissolve the vital tone, so that before now some persons have died from excess of pleasure.
The uncontrolled dispersing of ''pneuma'' in semen could lead to loss of physical vigor, mental acuity, masculinity, and a strong manly voice, a complaint registered also in the ''Priapea''. Sexual activity was thought particularly to affect the voice: singers and actors might be Kynodesme, infibulated to preserve their voices. Quintilian advises that the orator who wished to cultivate a deep masculine voice for court should abstain from sexual relations. This concern was felt intensely by Catullus
Gaius Valerius Catullus (; 84 - 54 BCE), often referred to simply as Catullus (, ), was a Latin poet of the late Roman Republic who wrote chiefly in the neoteric style of poetry, focusing on personal life rather than classical heroes. His s ...
's friend Licinius Macer Calvus, Calvus, the 1st-century BC Neoteric, avant-garde poet and orator, who slept with lead plates over his kidneys to control wet dreams. Pliny the Elder, Pliny reports that:
When plates of lead are bound to the area of the loins and kidneys, it is used, owing to its rather cooling nature, to check the attacks of sexual desire and sexual dreams in one's sleep that cause spontaneous eruptions to the point of becoming a sort of disease. With these plates the orator Calvus is reported to have restrained himself and to have preserved his body's strength for the labor of his studies.
Lead plates, cupping therapy, and hair removal were prescribed for three sexual disorders thought to be related to nocturnal emissions: satyriasis, or hypersexuality; priapism, a chronic erection without an accompanying desire for sex; and the involuntary discharge of semen (''seminis lapsus'' or ''seminis effusio'').
Effeminacy and transvestism
Effeminacy was a favorite accusation in Roman political invective, and was aimed particularly at ''populares'', the politicians of the faction who represented themselves as champions of the people, sometimes called Rome's "democratic" party in contrast to the ''optimates'', a conservative elite of nobiles, nobles. In the last years of the Republic, the popularists Julius Caesar, Marcus Antonius (Mark Antony), and Clodius Pulcher, as well as the Catiline Conspiracy, Catilinarian conspirators, were all derided as effeminate, overly-groomed, too-good-looking men who might be on the receiving end of sex from other males; at the same time, they were supposed to be womanizers or possessed of devastating sex appeal.
Perhaps the most notorious incident of cross-dressing in ancient Rome occurred in 62 BC, when Clodius Pulcher intruded on annual rites of the Bona Dea
Bona Dea (; 'Good Goddess') was a List of Roman deities, goddess in Religion in ancient Rome, ancient Roman religion. She was associated with chastity and fertility in Women in ancient Rome, Roman women, healing, and the protection of the SPQR, st ...
that were restricted to women only. The rites were held at a Executive Magistrates of the Roman Republic, senior magistrate's home, in this year that of Julius Caesar, nearing the end of his term as praetor
Praetor ( , ), also pretor, was the title granted by the government of Ancient Rome to a man acting in one of two official capacities: (i) the commander of an army, and (ii) as an elected '' magistratus'' (magistrate), assigned to discharge vario ...
and only recently invested as Pontifex Maximus. Clodius disguised himself as a female musician to gain entrance, as described in a "verbal striptease" by Cicero, who prosecuted him for sacrilege ''(incestum)'':
Take away his saffron dress, his tiara, his girly shoes and purple laces, his bra, his Psaltery, Greek harp, take away his shameless behavior and his sex crime, and Clodius is suddenly revealed as a democrat.
The actions of Clodius, who had just been elected quaestor and was probably about to turn thirty, are often regarded as a last juvenile prank. The all-female nature of these nocturnal rites attracted much prurient speculation from men; they were fantasized as drunken lesbian orgies that might be fun to watch.[#Williams, Williams] Clodius is supposed to have intended to seduce Caesar's wife, but his masculine voice gave him away before he got a chance. The scandal prompted Caesar to seek an immediate divorce to control the damage to his own reputation, giving rise to the famous line "Caesar's wife must be above suspicion". The incident "summed up the disorder of the final years of the republic".
In addition to political invective, cross-dressing appears in Roman literature and art as a mythological trope (as in the story of Hercules and Omphale exchanging roles and attire), religious investiture, and rarely or ambiguously as transvestic fetishism. A section of the ''Digest'' by Ulpian categorizes Clothing in ancient Rome, Roman clothing on the basis of who may appropriately wear it; a man who wore women's clothes, Ulpian notes, would risk making himself the object of scorn. A fragment from the playwright Lucius Accius, Accius (170–86 BC) seems to refer to a father who secretly wore "virgin's finery". An instance of transvestism is noted in a legal case, in which "a certain senator accustomed to wear women's evening clothes" was disposing of the garments in his will. In a "mock trial" exercise presented by Seneca the Elder, the elder Seneca, a young man ''(adulescens)'' is gang-raped while wearing women's clothes in public, but his attire is explained as his acting on a dare by his friends, not as a choice based on gender identity or the pursuit of erotic pleasure.[Seneca the Elder, ''Controversia'' 5.6][#Richlin1993, Richlin (1993), p. 564.]
Gender ambiguity was a characteristic of the priests of the goddess Cybele known as ''Galli'', whose ritual attire included items of women's clothing. They are sometimes considered a transgender priesthood, since they were required to be castrated in imitation of Attis. The complexities of gender identity in the religion of Cybele and the Attis myth are explored by Catullus in one of his longest poems, ''Carmen'' 63.
Male–male sex
Roman men were free to have sex with males of lower status without a perceived loss of masculinity, or even as an enhancement of it. However, those who took the receiving role in sex acts, sometimes referred to as the "passive" or "submissive" role, were disparaged as weak and effeminate, regardless of the sex of their partner (see the section below on Sexuality in ancient Rome#Cunnilingus and fellatio, cunnilungus and fellatio), while having sex with males in the active position was proof of one's masculinity. Mastery of one's own body was an aspect of the citizen's ''libertas'', political liberty, while the use of one's body to give pleasure to others, whether in homosexual or heterosexual relations, was servile. Laws such as the poorly understood ''Lex Scantinia'' and various pieces of Lex Iulia, Augustan moral legislation were meant to restrict same-sex activity among freeborn males, viewed as threatening a man's status and independence as a citizen.
Latin had such a wealth of words for men outside the masculine norm that some scholars argue for the existence of a homosexual subculture at Rome; that is, although the noun "homosexual" has no straightforward equivalent in Latin, literary sources reveal a pattern of behaviors among a minority of free men that indicate same-sex preference or orientation. Some terms, such as ''exoletus'', specifically refer to an adult; Romans who were socially marked as "masculine" did not confine their same-sex penetration of male prostitutes or slaves to those who were "boys" under the age of 20. The ''Satyricon'', for example, includes many descriptions of adult, free men showing sexual interest in one another. And some older men may have at times preferred the passive role with a same age or younger partner, though this was socially frowned upon.
Homoerotic Latin literature includes the "Juventius" poems of Catullus
Gaius Valerius Catullus (; 84 - 54 BCE), often referred to simply as Catullus (, ), was a Latin poet of the late Roman Republic who wrote chiefly in the neoteric style of poetry, focusing on personal life rather than classical heroes. His s ...
, elegies by Tibullus
Albius Tibullus ( BC19 BC) was a Latin poet and writer of elegies. His first and second books of poetry are extant; many other texts attributed to him are of questionable origins.
Little is known about the life of Tibullus. There are only a fe ...
and Propertius
Sextus Propertius was a Latin elegiac poet of the Augustan age. He was born around 50–45 BC in Assisium and died shortly after 15 BC.
Propertius' surviving work comprises four books of ''Elegies'' ('). He was a friend of the poets Gallus a ...
, the second ''Eclogues, Eclogue'' of Vergil, and several poems by Horace
Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 – 27 November 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his ' ...
. #Epicurean sexuality, Lucretius addresses the love of boys in ''De rerum natura'' (4.1052–1056). The poet Martial
Marcus Valerius Martialis (known in English as Martial ; March, between 38 and 41 AD – between 102 and 104 AD) was a Roman poet from Hispania (modern Spain) best known for his twelve books of ''Epigrams'', published in Rome between AD 86 and ...
, despite being married to a woman, often derides women as sexual partners, and celebrates the charms of ''pueri'' (boys). The ''Satyricon'' of Petronius is so permeated with the culture of male–male sexuality that in 18th-century European literary circles, his name became "a byword for homosexuality". Although Ovid
Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...
includes mythological treatments of homoeroticism in the ''Metamorphoses
The ''Metamorphoses'' ( la, Metamorphōsēs, from grc, μεταμορφώσεις: "Transformations") is a Latin narrative poem from 8 CE by the Roman poet Ovid. It is considered his ''magnum opus''. The poem chronicles the history of the wo ...
'', he is unusual among Latin love poets, and indeed among Romans in general, for his aggressively heterosexual stance, though even he did not claim exclusive heterosexuality.[ Hallett. p. 55.]
Although Roman law did not recognize marriage between men, in the early Imperial period some male couples were celebrating Marriage in ancient Rome, traditional marriage rites. Same-sex weddings are reported by sources that mock them; the feelings of the participants are not recorded.
Apart from measures to protect the liberty of citizens, the prosecution of homosexuality as a general crime began in the 3rd century when male prostitution was banned by Philip the Arab, a sympathizer of the Christianity, Christian faith. By the end of the 4th century, passive homosexuality under the Constantine the Great and Christianity, Christian Empire was Death by burning, punishable by burning. "Death by sword" was the punishment for a "man coupling like a woman" under the Theodosian Code. Under Justinian, all same-sex acts, passive or active, no matter who the partners, were declared contrary to nature and punishable by death. Homosexual behaviors were pointed to as causes for Divine retribution, God's wrath following a series of disasters around 542 and 559. Justinian also demanded the penalty of death for anyone who enslaved a castrated Roman, although he permitted the buying and selling of foreign-born eunuchs as long as they were castrated outside the boundaries of the Roman Empire (''Codex Justinianus,'' 4.42.2).
The rape of men
Men who had been raped were exempt from the loss of legal or social standing ''(infamia)'' suffered by males who prostituted themselves or willingly took the receiving role in sex. According to the jurist Sextus Pomponius, Pomponius, "whatever man has been raped by the force of robbers or the enemy in wartime ''(vi praedonum vel hostium)''" ought to bear no stigma. Fears of mass rape following a military defeat extended equally to male and female potential victims.
Roman law addressed the rape of a male citizen as early as the 2nd century BC, when a ruling was issued in a case that may have involved a male of same-sex orientation. Although a man who had worked as a prostitute could not be raped as a matter of law, it was ruled that even a man who was "disreputable ''(famosus)'' and questionable ''(suspiciosus)''" had the same right as other free men not to have his body subjected to forced sex. In a book on rhetoric from the early 1st century BC, the rape of a freeborn male ''(ingenui, ingenuus)'' is equated with that of a ''materfamilias'' as a capital crime.[#Richlin1993, Richlin (1993), p. 562.] The ''Lex Julia de vi publica'', recorded in the early 3rd century AD but "probably dating from the Roman dictator, dictatorship of Julius Caesar", defined rape as forced sex against "boy, woman, or anyone"; the rapist was subject to execution, a rare penalty in Roman law. It was a capital crime for a man to abduct a free-born boy for sexual purposes, or to bribe the boy's chaperone ''(comes)'' for the opportunity. Negligent chaperones could be prosecuted under various laws, placing the blame on those who failed in their responsibilities as guardians rather than on the victim.[#Richlin1993, Richlin (1993), p. 563.] Although the law recognized the victim's blamelessness, rhetoric used by the defense indicates that attitudes of blame among jurors could be exploited.
In his collection of twelve anecdotes dealing with assaults on chastity, the historian Valerius Maximus features male victims in equal number to female. In the "mock trial" case described by Seneca the Elder, the elder Seneca, an ''adulescens'' (a man young enough not to have begun his formal career) was gang-raped by ten of his peers; although the case is imaginary, Seneca assumes that the law permitted the successful prosecution of the rapists. Another hypothetical case imagines the extremity to which a rape victim could be driven: the free-born male who was raped commits suicide. The rape of an ''ingenuus'' is among the worst crimes that could be committed in Rome, along with parricide, the rape of a female virgin, and robbing a temple. Rape was nevertheless one of the traditional punishments inflicted on a male adulterer by the wronged husband, though perhaps more in revenge fantasy than in practice. The threat of one man to subject another to anal or oral rape ''(irrumatio)'' is a theme of invective poetry, most notably in Catullus's notorious Catullus 16, ''Carmen'' 16, and was a form of masculine braggadocio.
Sex in the military
The Roman soldier, like any free and respectable Roman male of status, was expected to show self-discipline in matters of sex. Soldiers convicted of adultery were given a dishonorable discharge; convicted adulterers were barred from enlisting. Strict commanders might ban prostitutes and pimps from camp,[#McGinn1998, McGinn (1998), p. 40.] though in general the Roman army, whether on the march or at a permanent fort ''(castra, castrum)'', was attended by a number of camp followers who might include prostitutes. Their presence seems to have been taken for granted, and mentioned mainly when it became a problem; for instance, when Scipio Aemilianus was setting out for Siege of Numantia, Numantia in 133 BC, he dismissed the camp followers as one of his measures for restoring discipline.
Perhaps most peculiar is the prohibition against marriage in the Imperial army. In the early period, Rome had an army of citizens who left their families and took up arms as the need arose. During the Roman Republic#Mid-Republic (274 BC–148 BC), expansionism of the Middle Republic, Rome began acquiring vast territories to be defended as provinces, and during the time of Gaius Marius (d. 86 BC), the army had been professionalized. The ban on marriage began under Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pri ...
(ruled 27 BC–14 AD), perhaps to discourage families from following the army and impairing its mobility. The marriage ban applied to all ranks up to the centurionate; men of the governing classes were exempt. By the 2nd century AD, the Pax Romana, stability of the Empire kept most units in permanent forts, where attachments with local women often developed. Although legally these unions could not be formalized as marriages, their value in providing emotional support for the soldiers was recognized. After a soldier was discharged, the couple were granted the right of legal marriage as citizens ''(Marriage in ancient Rome, conubium)'', and any children they already had were considered to have been born to citizens. Septimius Severus rescinded the ban in 197 AD.
Other forms of sexual gratification available to soldiers were the #Master-slave relations, use of male slaves, war rape, and same-sex relations. Homosexual behavior among soldiers was subject to harsh penalties, including death, as a violation of military discipline. Polybius (2nd century BC) reports that same-sex activity in the military was punishable by the ''fustuarium'', clubbing to death. Sex among fellow soldiers violated the Roman decorum against intercourse with another freeborn male. A soldier maintained his masculinity by not allowing his body to be used for sexual purposes. This physical integrity stood in contrast to the limits placed on his actions as a free man within the military hierarchy; most strikingly, Roman soldiers were the only citizens regularly subjected to corporal punishment, reserved in the civilian world mainly for slaves. Sexual integrity helped distinguish the status of the soldier, who otherwise sacrificed a great deal of his civilian autonomy, from that of the slave. In warfare, rape signified defeat, another motive for the soldier not to compromise his body sexually.
An incident related by Plutarch in his biography of Marius illustrates the soldier's right to maintain his sexual integrity. A good-looking young recruit named Trebonius had been sexual harassment, sexually harassed over a period of time by his superior officer, who happened to be Marius's nephew, Gaius Luscius. One night, having fended off unwanted advances on numerous occasions, Trebonius was summoned to Luscius's tent. Unable to disobey the command of his superior, he found himself the object of a sexual assault and drew his sword, killing Luscius. A conviction for killing an officer typically resulted in execution. When brought to trial, he was able to produce witnesses to show that he had repeatedly had to fend off Luscius, and "had never prostituted his body to anyone, despite offers of expensive gifts". Marius not only acquitted Trebonius in the killing of his kinsman, but gave him a Roman military decorations and punishments#Crowns, crown for bravery. Roman historians record other cautionary tales of officers who abuse their authority to coerce sex from their soldiers, and then suffer dire consequences. The youngest officers, who still might retain some of the adolescent attraction that Romans favored in male–male relations, were advised to beef up their masculine qualities, such as not wearing perfume, nor trimming nostril and underarm hair.
During wartime, the violent use of war captives for sex was not considered criminal rape. War rape, Mass rape was one of the acts of punitive violence during the sack of a city, but if the siege had ended through diplomatic negotiations rather than storming the walls, ius gentium, by custom the inhabitants were neither enslaved nor subjected to personal violence. Mass rape occurred in some circumstances, and is likely to be underreported in the surviving sources, but was not a deliberate or pervasive strategy for controlling a population. An ethical ideal of sexual self-control among enlisted men was vital to preserving peace once hostilities ceased. In territories and Roman province, provinces brought under treaty with Rome, soldiers who committed rape against the local people might be subjected to harsher punishments than civilians. Sertorius, the long-time Roman governor, governor of Roman Spain whose policies emphasized respect and cooperation with provincials, executed an entire Cohort (military unit), cohort when a single soldier had attempted to rape a local woman. Mass rape seems to have been more common as a punitive measure during Roman civil wars than abroad.
Female sexuality
Because of the Roman emphasis on family, female sexuality was regarded as one of the bases for social order and prosperity. Female citizens were expected to exercise their sexuality within marriage, and were honored for their sexual integrity ''(pudicitia
Pudicitia ("modesty" or "sexual virtue") was a central concept in ancient Roman sexual ethics. The word is derived from the more general ''pudor'', the sense of shame that regulated an individual's behavior as socially acceptable. ''Pudicitia' ...
)'' and fecundity: Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pri ...
granted special honors and privileges to women who had given birth to three children (see ''"Ius trium liberorum"''). Control of female sexuality was regarded as necessary for the stability of the state, as embodied most conspicuously in the absolute virginity of the Vestals. A Vestal who violated her vow was entombed alive in a ritual that mimicked some aspects of a Roman funerals and burial, Roman funeral; her lover was executed. Female sexuality, either disorderly or exemplary, often impacts state religion in times of crisis for the Republic. The moral legislation of Augustus focused on harnessing the sexuality of women.
As was the case for men, free women who displayed themselves sexually, such as prostitutes and performers, or who made themselves available indiscriminately were excluded from legal protections and social respectability.
Many Roman literary sources approve of respectable women exercising sexual passion within marriage. While ancient literature overwhelmingly takes a male-centered view of sexuality, the Augustan poet Ovid
Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...
expresses an explicit and virtually unique interest in how women experience intercourse.
The female body
Roman attitudes toward female nudity differed from but were influenced by those of the Greeks, who idealized the male body in the nude while portraying respectable women clothed. Partial nudity of goddesses in Roman Imperial art, however, can highlight the breasts as dignified but pleasurable images of nurturing, abundance, and peacefulness.[ Erotic art indicates that women with small breasts and wide hips had the ideal Female body shape, body type. By the 1st century AD, Roman art shows a broad interest in the female nude engaged in varied activities, including sex. Pornographic art that depicts women presumed to be prostitutes performing sex acts may show the breasts covered by a ''strophium'' even when the rest of the body is naked.
In the real world as described in literature, prostitutes sometimes displayed themselves naked at the entrance to their brothel cubicles, or wore see-through silk garments; slaves for sale were often displayed naked to allow buyers to inspect them for defects, and to symbolize that they lacked the right to control their own body. As Seneca the Elder described a woman for sale:
]
Naked she stood on the shore, at the pleasure of the purchaser; every part of her body was examined and felt. Would you hear the result of the sale? The pirate sold; the pimp bought, that he might employ her as a prostitute.
The display of the female body made it vulnerable. Varro said sight was the greatest of the senses, because while the others were limited by proximity, sight could penetrate even to the stars; he thought the Latin word for "sight, gaze", ''visus'', was etymologically related to ''vis'', "force, power". But the connection between ''visus'' and ''vis'', he said, also implied the The male gaze, potential for violation, just as Actaeon gazing on the naked Diana (mythology), Diana violated the goddess.
The completely nude female body as portrayed in sculpture was thought to embody a universal concept of Venus, whose counterpart Aphrodite is the goddess most often depicted as a nude in Greek art.
Female genitals
The "basic obscenity" for the female genitalia is ''cunnus'', "cunt", though perhaps not as strongly offensive as the English. Martial uses the word more than thirty times, Catullus once, and Horace
Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 – 27 November 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his ' ...
thrice only in his early work; it also appears in the ''Priapea'' and graffiti. One of the slang words women used for their genitals was ''porcus'', "pig", particularly when mature women spoke of girls. Varro connects this usage of the word to the sacrifice of a pig to the goddess Ceres in preliminary wedding rites. Metaphors of fields, gardens, and meadows are common, as is the image of the masculine "plough" in the feminine "furrow". Other metaphors include cave, ditch, pit, bag, vessel, door, hearth, oven, and altar.
Although women's genitals appear often in invective and satiric verse as objects of disgust, they are rarely referred to in Latin love elegy. Ovid, the most heterosexual of the classic love poets, is the only one to refer to giving a woman pleasure through genital stimulation. Martial writes of female genitalia only insultingly, describing one woman's vagina as "loose ... as the foul gullet of a pelican". The vagina is often compared to a boy's anus as a receptacle for the phallus.
The function of the clitoris ''(landica)'' was "well understood".[#Adams, Adams, p. 97.] In classical Latin, ''landica'' was a highly indecorous obscenity found in graffiti and the ''Priapea''; the clitoris was usually referred to with a metaphor, such as Juvenal's ''crista'' ("crest"). Cicero records that a hapless speaker of Roman consul, consular rank broke up the Roman senate, senate just by saying something that sounded like ''landica'': ''hanc culpam maiorem an il-''lam dicam''?'' ("Shall I call this fault greater or that one?" heard as "this greater fault or a clitoris?"). "Could he have been more obscene?" Cicero exclaims, observing at the same time that ''cum nos'', "when we", sounds like ''cunnus''. A lead sling-bullet uncovered through archaeology was inscribed "I aim for Fulvia's clit" ''(Fulviae landicam peto)'', Fulvia being the wife of Mark Antony who commanded troops during the civil wars of the 40s and 30s.
Latin lacked a standard word for labia;[#Adams, Adams, p. 99.] two terms found in medical writers are ''orae'', "edges" or "shores", and ''pinnacula'', "little wings". The first recorded instance of the word ''vulva'' occurs in Varro's work on agriculture (1st century BC), where it refers to the membrane that surrounds a fetus. In the early Empire, ''vulva'' came into usage for "womb", the usual word for which had been ''uterus'' in the Republic, or sometimes more vaguely ''venter'' or ''alvus'', both words for "belly". ''Vulva'' seems originally to have referred to the womb of animals, but is "extremely common" in Pliny's ''Natural History (Pliny), Natural History'' for a human uterus. In the Imperial era, ''vulva'' can mean "female reproductive organs" collectively or vaguely, or sometimes refers to the vagina alone. Early Bible translations into Latin, Latin Bible translators used ''vulva'' as the correct and proper word for the womb. At some point during the Imperial era, ''matrix'' became the common word for "uterus", particularly in the Women in Ancient Rome#Gynecology and medicine, gynecological writers of late antiquity, who also employ a specialized vocabulary for parts of the reproductive organs.
Both women and men often removed their pubic hair, but grooming may have varied over time and by individual preference. A fragment from the early satirist Gaius Lucilius, Lucilius refers to penetrating a "hairy bag", and a graffito from Pompeii declares that "a hairy cunt is fucked much better than one which is smooth; it's steamy and wants cock".
At the entrance to a ''caldarium'' in the thermae, bath complex of the House of Menander at Pompeii, an unusual graphic device appears on a mosaic: a phallic oil can is surrounded by strigils in the shape of female genitalia, juxtaposed with an "Ethiopian" water-bearer who has an "unusually large and comically detailed" penis.
Breasts
Latin words for "breasts" include ''mammae'' (cf. English "mammary"), ''papillae'' (more specifically for "nipples"), and ''ubera'', breasts in their capacity to provide nourishment, including the teats or udder of an animal.[Breasts are never ''ubera'' in Ovid's '']Amores
Amores may refer to:
* ''Amores'' (Ovid), the first book by the poet Ovid, published in 5 volumes in 16 BCE
* ''Amores'' (Lucian), a play by Lucian; also known as ''Erotes''
* Erotes (mythology), known as Amores by the Romans
* ''Amores'', a bo ...
'', but are ''ubera'' throughout the ''Metamorphoses'': at 3.31 (metaphorically); 4.324; 10.392; 9.358 (''materna ... ubera'', "motherly breasts"); 7.321 and 6.342 ''(lactantia ubera'', "milk-producing breasts"); 15.117 and 472. ''Uber'' (singular) or ''ubera'' is used for animals by Ovid, ''Ars Amatoria'' 1.350 (the udder of a cow) and 2.375 (the teats of lactating dogs); by Horace, ''Sermones'' 1.1.110, ''Odes'' 2.19.10, 4.4.14 and 4.15.5, and elsewhere; by Tibullus, for sheep in 1.3.45; by Propertius, 2.34b. ''Papillae'' is the preferred word when Catullus and the Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Augustan poets take note of breasts in an erotic context.
The breasts of a beautiful woman were supposed to be "unobtrusive." Idealized breasts in the tradition of Hellenistic poetry were compared to apples; Martial makes fun of large breasts. Old women who were stereotypically ugly and undesirable in every way had "pendulous" breasts. On the Theatre of ancient Rome, Roman stage, exaggerated breasts were part of the costuming for comically unattractive female characters, since in Roman comedy, classic Roman comedy women's roles were played by male actors drag (clothing), in drag.
While Greek epigrams describe ideal breasts, Latin poets take limited interest in them, at least as compared to the modern focus on admiring and fondling a woman's breasts. They are observed mainly as aspects of a woman's beauty or perfection of form, though Ovid finds them inviting to touch. In one poem celebrating a wedding, Catullus remarks on the bride's "tender nipples" ''(teneris ... papillis)'', which would keep a good husband sleeping with her; erotic appeal supports fidelity within marriage and leads to children and a long life together.
Because all infants were breastfed in antiquity, the breast was viewed primarily as an emblem of nurturing and of motherhood. ''Mastos, Mastoi'', breast-shaped drinking cups, and representations of breasts are among the votive offerings ''(vota
VOTA (formerly known as Casting Pearls) is a Christian rock band from Lincoln, Nebraska, featuring Bryan Olesen, a former guitarist with Christian rock band Newsboys. Several of the band's songs have been featured on rotation with national radio ...
)'' found at sanctuaries of deities such as Diana (mythology), Diana and Hercules, sometimes having been dedicated by wet nurses. The breast-shaped cup may have a religious significance; the drinking of breast milk by an adult who is elderly or about to die symbolized potential rebirth in the afterlife. In the Etruscan mythology, Etruscan tradition, the goddess Juno (mythology), Juno ''(Uni (mythology), Uni)'' offers her breast to Hercules as a sign that he may enter the ranks of the immortals.[#Younger, Younger, p. 35] The religious meaning may underlie the story of how Pero offered breast milk to her elderly father when he was imprisoned and sentenced to death by starvation (see Roman Charity). The scene is among the moral paintings in a Pompeiian bedroom that belonged to a child, along with the legend "in sadness is the meeting of modesty and piety". Pliny the Elder, Pliny records medicinal uses of breast milk, and ranks it as one of the most useful remedies, especially for ailments of the eyes and ears. Wrapping one's head in a bra was said to cure a headache.
Baring the breasts is one of the gestures made by women, particularly mothers or nurses, to express mourning or as an appeal for mercy. The baring and beating of breasts ritually in grief was interpreted by Maurus Servius Honoratus, Servius as producing milk to feed the dead. In Greek and Latin literature, mythological mothers sometimes expose their breasts in moments of extreme emotional duress to demand that their nurturing role be respected. Breasts exposed with such intensity held Apotropaic magic, apotropaic power.[ Julius Caesar indicates that the gesture had a similar significance in Celts, Celtic culture: during the siege of Avaricum, the female heads of household ''(matres familiae)'' expose their breasts and extend their hands to ask that the women and children be spared. Tacitus notes Germanic peoples, Germanic women who exhorted their reluctant men to valorous battle by aggressively baring their breasts. Although in general "the gesture is meant to arouse pity rather than sexual desire", the beauty of the breasts so exposed is sometimes in evidence and remarked upon.
Because women were normally portrayed clothed in art, bared breasts can signify vulnerability or erotic availability by choice, accident, or force. Baring a single breast was a visual motif of Classical Greek sculpture, where among other situations, including seductions, it often represented impending physical violence or rape. Some scholars have attempted to find a "code" in which exposing the right breast had an erotic significance, while the left breast signified nurturing. Although art produced by the Romans may imitate or directly draw on Greek conventions, during the Classical Greece, Classical period of Greek art images of women nursing were treated as animalistic or barbaric; by contrast, the coexisting Italic peoples, Italic tradition emphasized the breast as a focus of the mother–child relationship and as a source of female power.
The erogenous power of the breast was not utterly neglected: in comparing sex with a woman to sex with a boy, a ancient Greek novel, Greek novel of the Roman Imperial era notes that "her breast when it is caressed provides its own particular pleasure". ]Propertius
Sextus Propertius was a Latin elegiac poet of the Augustan age. He was born around 50–45 BC in Assisium and died shortly after 15 BC.
Propertius' surviving work comprises four books of ''Elegies'' ('). He was a friend of the poets Gallus a ...
connects breast development with girls reaching an age to "ludus (ancient Rome), play". Tibullus
Albius Tibullus ( BC19 BC) was a Latin poet and writer of elegies. His first and second books of poetry are extant; many other texts attributed to him are of questionable origins.
Little is known about the life of Tibullus. There are only a fe ...
observes that a woman just might wear loose clothing so that her breasts "exhibitionism, flash" when she reclines at dinner. An Hellenistic astrology, astrological tradition held that mammary intercourse was enjoyed by men born under the Conjunction (astronomy and astrology), conjunction of Venus, Mercury, and Saturn. Even in the most sexually explicit Roman paintings, however, the breasts are sometimes kept covered by the ''strophium'' (breast band). The women so depicted may be prostitutes, but it can be difficult to discern why an artist decides in a given scenario to portray the breasts covered or exposed.
Female–female sex
Greek words for a woman who prefers sex with another woman include ''hetairistria'' (compare ''hetaira'', "courtesan" or "companion"), ''tribas'' (plural ''tribades''), and ''Lesbia''; Latin words include the loanword ''tribas'', ''fricatrix'' ("she who rubs"), and ''virago''. References to sex between women are infrequent in the Roman literature of the Republic and early Principate. Ovid, who advocates generally for a heterosexual lifestyle, finds it "a desire known to no one, freakish, novel ... among all animals no female is seized by desire for female".
During the Roman Imperial era, which many Roman writers perceived as more decadent than the Republican period, sources for same-sex relations among women are more abundant, in the form of love spells, medical writing, texts on astrology and the interpretation of dreams, and other sources. A graffito from Pompeii expresses the desire of one woman for another:
I wish I could hold to my neck and embrace the little arms, and bear kisses on the tender lips. Go on, doll, and trust your joys to the winds; believe me, light is the nature of men.
An early reference to same-sex relations among women as "lesbianism" is found in Lucian (2nd century AD): "They say there are women like that in Lesbos, masculine-looking, but they don't want to give it up for men. Instead, they consort with women, just like men."
Since Romans thought a sex act required an active or dominant partner who was "phallic" (see #Phallic sexuality, "Phallic sexuality" above), male writers imagined that in lesbian sex one of the women would use a dildo or have an exceptionally large clitoris for penetration, and that she would be the one experiencing pleasure. Martial describes lesbians as having outsized sexual appetites and performing penetrative sex on both women and boys. Imperial portrayals of women who sodomize boys, drink and eat like men, and engage in vigorous physical regimens, may reflect cultural anxieties about the growing independence of Roman women.
Rape
The mythology of rape
The rape of women is a pervasive theme in the Roman mythology, myths and legends of early Rome. The legendary founders Romulus and Remus were born from the rape of the Vestal Rhea Silvia by the god Mars (mythology), Mars. Romulus and his "band of freebooters" can transform their all-male settlement into a city only by The Rape of the Sabine Women, the "rape" of the Sabine women, that is, by forcibly bride abduction, abducting the daughters of their Sabines, Sabine neighbors to take as wives. The overthrow of the Kings of Rome, Roman monarchy and the establishment of the Republic was precipitated by the rape of the much-admired Lucretia by Sextus Tarquinius, the king's son. The legend crystallizes the Roman view of unchecked ''libido'' as a form of tyranny.
The Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Augustan Roman historiography, historian Livy seems "embarrassed" by the rape motif of early Roman history, and emphasizes the redeeming political dimension of these events. #Epicurean sexuality, Lucretius condemns rape as a primitive behavior outside the bounds of an advanced civilization, describing it as "a man's use of violent force and imposition of sexual impulse".
Rape and the law
Roman law recognized rape as a crime: the rape victim was not guilty of anything. Intercourse by force or compulsion ''(vis)'', even if it took place under circumstances that were otherwise unlawful for a woman (see #Moral and legal concepts, "Moral and legal concepts" above), left the woman legally without blame. The official position under Diocletian (reigned 284–305 AD) held that:[#Gardner, Gardner, p. 120.]
The laws punish the foul wickedness of those who prostitute their modesty to the lusts of others, but they do not attach blame to those who are compelled to ''stuprum'' by force, since it has, moreover, been quite properly decided that their reputations are unharmed and that they are not prohibited from marriage to others.
Although literary sources from the Republican era make it clear that rape was wrong and severely penalized, the statutes under which it might be charged as a crime are unknown until passage of the ''Lex Julia, Lex Iulia de vi publica'', dating probably to the dictatorship of Julius Caesar in the 40s BC.[#Gardner, Gardner, p. 118.] Rome had no state prosecutors; cases could be prosecuted by any citizen with the legal expertise and speaking ability to do so. Since emancipated women were allowed to bring criminal prosecutions in the Republic, it is conceivable that a rape victim could have brought charges against her rapist herself. Otherwise, the case could be prosecuted by her father or husband, or by anyone who saw fit to do so. There was no statute of limitations for rape; by contrast adultery
Adultery (from Latin ''adulterium'') is extramarital sex that is considered objectionable on social, religious, moral, or legal grounds. Although the sexual activities that constitute adultery vary, as well as the social, religious, and legal ...
, which was criminalized under Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pri ...
, had to be prosecuted within five years. Rape was a capital crime.
As a matter of law, rape could be committed only against a citizen in good standing. A woman who worked as a prostitute or entertainer lost her social standing and became ''#Pleasure and infamy, infamis''; by making her body publicly available, she had in effect surrendered her right to be protected from sexual abuse or physical violence.[#Gardner, Gardner, p. 119][#McGinn1998, McGinn (1998), p. 326.] Cicero defended a client whose misdeeds included the gang rape of an actress on the grounds that young men took customary license with entertainers. The rape of a slave could be prosecuted only as damage to her owner's property, under the ''Lex Aquilia''.[#McGinn1998, McGinn (1998), p. 314][ Consent would have been an issue in rape cases only rarely; if the accused argued that the woman had consented, he could still be charged with committing the more general sex crime of ''stuprum'' against a citizen, since male sexual freedom was limited to prostitutes or slaves. If rape against a married woman could not be proven, the Augustan legislation criminalizing adultery would make the man liable to a charge of ''adulterium'', criminal adultery, though a charge of either adultery or ''stuprum'' without force would implicate the woman as well.][#Gardner, Gardner, pp. 120–121.] An acquittal for rape, as with any other crime, would open the prosecutor to a retaliatory charge of ''calumnia (Roman law), calumnia'', malicious prosecution. The prosecution of rape might also be hindered by psychological and social pressures, such as embarrassment or a reluctance to expose one's private life.
Attitudes toward rape changed when the Empire became Christianized. Augustine of Hippo, St. Augustine interpreted Lucretia's suicide as a possible admission that she had secretly encouraged the rapist,[#Staples, Staples, p. 164, citing Norman Bryson, "Two Narratives of Rape in the Visual Arts: Lucretia and the Sabine Women," in ''Rape'' (Blackwell, 1986), p. 199. Augustine's interpretation of the rape of Lucretia (in ''City of God'' 1.19) has generated a substantial body of criticism, starting with Machiavelli's satire. In ''Augustine of Hippo: A Biography'' (Faber, 1967), Peter Brown (historian), Peter Brown characterized this section of Augustine's work as his most vituperative attack on Roman ideals of virtue. See also Carol J. Adams and Marie M. Fortune, ''Violence against Women and Children: A Christian Theological Sourcebook'' (Continuum, 1995), p. 219ff.; Melissa M. Matthes, ''The Rape of Lucretia and the Founding of Republics'' (Pennsylvania State University Press, 2000), p. 68ff. (also on Machiavelli); Virginia Burrus, ''Saving Shame: Martyrs, Saints, and Other Abject Subjects'' (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008), p. 125ff.; Amy Greenstadt, ''Rape and the Rise of the Author: Gendering Intention in Early Modern England'' (Ashgate, 2009), p. 71; Melissa E. Sanchez, ''Erotic Subjects: The Sexuality of Politics in Early Modern English Literature'' (Oxford University Press, 2011), p. 93ff. Augustine defines sexual integrity ''(pudicitia)'' as a purely spiritual quality that physical defilement cannot taint; as indicated throughout this article, the Romans viewed rape and other forms of ''stuprum'' within a political context as crimes against the citizen's liberty.] and Christian apologists regarded her as having committed the sin of involuntary sexual pleasure. The first Christian emperor Constantine the Great, Constantine redefined rape as a public offense rather than as a private wrong. Earlier Roman law had blurred the line between abduction and elopement, since in either case it was the right of the ''paterfamilias'' to give or withhold his consent to his daughter's marriage that had been violated. The word ''raptus'' thus could refer to a successful seduction as well as abduction or rape. If the girl consented, Constantine ordered that she be punished along with the male "abductor" by being burnt alive. If she had not consented, she was still considered an accomplice, "on the grounds that she could have saved herself by screaming for help". As a participant to the rape, she was punished under law by being disinherited, regardless of the wishes of her family. Even if she and her family consented to a marriage as the result of an elopement, the marriage was legally void. In the Republic and the pre-Christian Empire, the consequences of an abduction or an elopement had been up to the couple and their families.
Sexuality and children
Both male and female freeborn children wore the ''toga praetexta'', a purple-bordered garment that marked its wearer as having "inviolable" status. An oath could be sworn upon the "sacred ''praetexta''", a marker of how "we make sacred and venerable the weakness of childhood". It was religiously impermissible ''(nefas
The vocabulary of ancient Roman religion was highly specialized. Its study affords important information about the religion, traditions and beliefs of the ancient Romans. This legacy is conspicuous in European cultural history in its influence on ...
)'' to use obscene language in front of those wearing the ''praetexta'', and Cato the Elder, Cato claimed that in front of his son he tried to speak as though Vestal Virgin, Vestal Virgins were present.
Freeborn Roman boys also wore an apotropaic amulet called the ''Bulla (amulet), bulla'' which incorporated a phallic talisman ''(fascinum
In ancient Roman religion and magic, the ''fascinus'' or ''fascinum'' was the embodiment of the divine phallus. The word can refer to phallus effigies and amulets, and to the spells used to invoke his divine protection. Pliny calls it a ''medicu ...
)'' inside a locket of gold, silver, or bronze, or in a leather pouch. In addition to its magical function, the ''bulla'' would have been a visible warning that the boy was sexually off-limits. The equivalent for the girl was the ''Lunula (amulet), lunula'', a crescent moon amulet.
There were laws protecting freeborn children from sexual predators, and the #The rape of men, rape of a freeborn boy was a capital crime; this severity was directed at protecting the integrity of the young citizen. Fictional license was not a defense; Valerius Maximus reports that a poetic boast of seducing a ''puer praetextatus'' ("praetextate boy") and a freeborn virgin ''(ingenua virgo)'' was used in court to impugn a prosecutor's moral authority. In denouncing the debaucheries of Quintus Apronius, Cicero builds to the worst offence: Apronius danced naked at a banquet in front of a boy still of an age to wear the ''praetexta''. Although children were taken to dinner parties ''(Symposium, convivia)'' to accustom them to proper adult social behavior, Quintilian scolds parents of his day for being poor role models: they parade their mistresses and male concubines and behave indiscreetly even when their children are present, and think it's cute when their children say things that are age-inappropriate. Quintilian regards this misbehavior as a sign of general moral decline. At weddings, however, boys were by ancient custom given license to speak obscenely, peppering the new couple with dirty jokes, as humor and laughter were thought to promote fertility.
Protections applied only to freeborn children, not those born to slaves, sold into slavery, or taken captive in war. The social acceptance of Greek love#Ancient Rome, pederasty among the Romans was focused on the exploitation of young male slaves or prostitutes by men of the upper classes.
Rites of passage
Adolescents in ritual preparation to transition to adult status wore the ''tunica recta'', the "upright tunic", so called because it was woven ritually on the type of upright loom that was the earliest used by Romans.[Sebesta, "Women's Costume," p. 533.] The tunic, worn by both youths and maidens, may have had the purple band of inviolability, though this is unclear from the evidence. Girls wove their own ''tunica recta''.[Sebesta, "Women's Costume," p. 534.]
The puberty ritual for the young male involved shaving his first beard and taking off his ''Bulla (amulet), bulla'', which he dedicated to the household gods, the Lares. He assumed the ''toga virilis
The toga (, ), a distinctive garment of ancient Rome, was a roughly semicircular cloth, between in length, draped over the shoulders and around the body. It was usually woven from white wool, and was worn over a tunic. In Roman historical tra ...
'' ("toga of manhood"), was enrolled as a citizen on the census, and soon began his military service. Traditionally, the ceremony was held on the Liberalia, the festival in honor of the god Liber
In ancient Roman religion and mythology, Liber ( , ; "the free one"), also known as Liber Pater ("the free Father"), was a god of viticulture and wine, male fertility and freedom. He was a patron deity of Rome's plebeians and was part of the ...
, who embodied both political and sexual liberty. Following his rite of passage, the young male citizen was permitted the avenues of sexual activity that were generally acceptable for Roman men of his social rank. Often a young man would be introduced to heterosexual intercourse by an experienced female prostitute.
Roman women were expected to remain virgins until marriage; the higher a girl's social rank, the earlier she was likely to become betrothal, betrothed and married. The usual age of betrothal for upper classes girls was 14, but for Patrician (ancient Rome), patricians as early as 12. Weddings were often postponed until the girl was considered mature enough. The wedding ceremony was in part a rite of passage for the bride, as Rome lacked the elaborate female puberty rituals of ancient Greece. On the night before the wedding, the bride bound up her hair with a yellow hairnet she had woven. The confining of her hair signified the harnessing of her sexuality within marriage. Her weaving of the ''tunica recta'' and the hairnet demonstrated her skill and her capacity for acting in the traditional matron's role as ''custos domi'', "guardian of the house". On her wedding day, she belted her tunic with the ''cingulum'', made of ewe wool to symbolize fertility, and tied with the "Hercules knot, knot of Hercules", which was supposed to be difficult to untie. The knot symbolized wifely chastity, in that it was to be untied only by her husband, but the ''cingulum'' also symbolized that the groom was bound to his wife. The bride's hair was ritually styled in "six tresses" ''(seni crines)'', and she was veiled until uncovered by her husband at the end of the ceremony, a ritual of surrendering her virginity to him.
Sex, marriage, and society
Marital sex
Because men could enjoy sexual relations outside marriage with relative impunity, it has sometimes been assumed that satisfying sex was not an expectation of Roman marriage. The jurist Ulpian noted that "it is not sexual intercourse that makes a marriage but rather marital affection", but the warnings by moralists and philosophers against a preoccupation with sex within marriage recognize the potential for marital passion.
Sexual intimacy between a married couple was a private matter, and not usually the subject of literature.[ Potter (2009), p. 350.] An exception was the epithalamium, a genre of poetry that celebrated a wedding. A wedding hymn by Catullus, for instance, praises the love goddess Venus because "nothing is possible without you". Ovid, whose love poetry early in his career was directed at fictional mistresses, wrote elegies during his exile in which he longed for his wife.[Dixon, ''The Roman Family'', p. 87.] Among the Epistulae (Pliny), collected letters of Pliny the Younger, Pliny ''Minor'' is one he writes about his feelings for his wife:
I am seized by an unbelievable longing for you. The reason is above all my love, but secondarily the fact that we are not used to being apart. This is why I spend the greater part of the night haunted by your image; this is why from time to time my feet lead me (the right expression!) of their own accord to your room at the times I was accustomed to frequent you; this is why, in short, I retreat, morbid and disconsolate, like an paraklausithyron, excluded lover from an unwelcoming doorway.
Pliny adopts the rhetoric of love poetry, conventionally directed at an illicit or hard-to-attain lover, as appropriate for expressing his wedded desire.
Although it was a point of pride for a woman to be ''univira'', married only once, there was no stigma attached to divorce. Speedy remarriage after divorce or the death of a spouse was common and even expected among the Roman elite, since marriage was considered right and natural for adults. Although widows were usually expected to wait ten months before remarrying, even a pregnant woman was not barred from taking a new husband, as long as the paternity of her child was not in doubt for legal purposes. If a first marriage ended, women seem to have had more say in arranging subsequent marriages. While having children was a primary goal of marriage, other social and familial bonds were enhanced, not excluding personal companionship and sexual pleasure between husband and wife, as indicated by marriages involving women past their childbearing years.
The Troy, Trojan royal couple Hector and Andromache became a mythological Trope (literature), trope of wedded sex. Latin love elegy focuses on their sex life rather than the tragic end of their marriage with Hector's death at the hands of Achilles. They were known for the "woman on top" position, with a verb suggesting that the woman "rides" the man like a horse. In general, Hector was portrayed as markedly heterosexual and an exemplary husband.
The wedding night
An epithalamium by Catullus paints the wedding night as a time of ripe eroticism, spiced with Fescennine Verses, humorous and bawdy songs from the guests. "Look inside," the poet advises the bride, who burns with an "intimate flame", "where your man lies on the richly arrayed bed, completely available to you". The husband is reminded that "good Venus" has blessed him, since he can now desire openly what he desires, and need not conceal a "good love". The couple is encouraged to enjoy themselves as they please ''(ludite ut lubet)''; the goal is to produce children soon.
A pair of paintings in a bedroom of the Casa della Farnesina has been interpreted as "a narrative of the modest bride becoming the immodest lover—perhaps fulfilling a ribald male fantasy".
Fidelity and adultery
Some literary passages suggest that a newlywed might break off his outside sexual relations for a time and focus on bonding with his wife in the hope of starting a family. Some Stoics maintained that marital fidelity was as much a virtue for men as for women (see #Stoic sexual morality, "Stoic sexual morality" above). Legally, however, a Roman husband did not commit adultery when he had sex outside marriage as long as his partner was considered sexually available; sexual misconduct ''(stuprum)'' was adultery depending on the status of a female partner. A character in a play by Plautus
Titus Maccius Plautus (; c. 254 – 184 BC), commonly known as Plautus, was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest Latin literary works to have survived in their entirety. He wrote Palliata comoedia, the gen ...
expresses a man's sexual freedom in comic terms:
No one prohibits anyone from going down the public way ''(publica via)''; as long as you do not make a path through trespass to land, posted land, as long as you hold off from brides, single women, maidens, the youth and free boys, love whatever you want.
A married or marriageable woman and young male citizens are off-limits, just as if they were the property of someone else, and in fact adultery as a crime was committed contrary to the rights of the ''paterfamilias'' to control his household. For a man, adultery was a sexual offense committed with a woman who was neither his wife nor a permissible partner such as a Prostitution in ancient Rome, prostitute or Slavery in ancient Rome, slave, in effect when his female partner was another man's wife or his unmarried daughter. The later jurists emphasize that ''adulterium'' in the strict sense was committed with a married woman.
For a married woman, no infidelity was acceptable, and first-time brides were expected to be virgins. According to Cato the Elder, Cato (2nd century BC), a husband had an ancient right ''(ius)'' to kill his wife if he caught her in the act of adultery, but if this "right" existed, it was a matter of custom and not statute law. In the Republic, adultery was normally considered a private matter for families to deal with, not a serious criminal offense requiring the attention of the courts. No source records the justified killing of a woman for adultery by either a father or husband during the Republican era, though adultery was grounds for divorce.
Following the Crisis of the Roman Republic, collapse of the Republic, moral legislation became part of the new political order under Rome's first emperor, Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pri ...
. Laws pertaining to adultery passed in 18 BC were part of his program to restore the ''mos maiorum
The ''mos maiorum'' (; "ancestral custom" or "way of the ancestors," plural ''mores'', cf. English "mores"; ''maiorum'' is the genitive plural of "greater" or "elder") is the unwritten code from which the ancient Romans derived their social norms ...
'', traditional social norms
Social norms are shared standards of acceptable behavior by groups. Social norms can both be informal understandings that govern the behavior of members of a society, as well as be codified into rules and laws. Social normative influences or soci ...
, while consolidating his political authority and codifying a more rigid social class in ancient Rome, social hierarchy in the wake of the recent Roman civil wars, civil wars. The appeal to old-fashioned values cloaked the radical overthrow of the Republic's participatory political institutions by top-down, one-man rule. The ''Lex Iulia#Moral legislation of Augustus, Lex Iulia de adulteriis'' ("Julian Law concerning acts of adultery") was directed at punishing married women who engaged in extra-marital affairs. Scholars have often assumed that the ''Lex Iulia'' was meant to address a virulent outbreak of adultery in the Late Republic. An androcentric perspective in the early 20th century held that the ''Lex Iulia'' had been "a very necessary check upon the growing independence and recklessness of women". A more sympathetic view in the late 20th to early 21st century saw love affairs as a way for the intelligent, independent women of the elite to form emotionally meaningful relationships outside marriages arranged for political purposes. It is possible, however, that no such epidemic of adultery even existed; the law should perhaps be understood not as addressing a real problem that threatened society, but as one of the instruments of social control exercised by Augustus that cast the state, and by extension himself, in the role of ''paterfamilias
The ''pater familias'', also written as ''paterfamilias'' (plural ''patres familias''), was the head of a Roman family. The ''pater familias'' was the oldest living male in a household, and could legally exercise autocratic authority over his ext ...
'' to all Rome.
Personal anxieties about infidelity, within marriage or not, are reflected in magic spells intended to "fix" ''(defixiones)'' or bind the other person's erotic attachment. Spells were also available for interrogating the beloved about fidelity. One Greek Magical Papyri, magical papyrus from Roman Egypt recommends placing the heart of a hoopoe#Relationship with humans, hoopoe on a sleeping woman's #Female genitals, genitals to induce truthful answers; another says that the tongue of a hen placed on her lips or breast will cause her to reveal the name of the man she loves.
Literature of the Late Republic and Principate, particularly the satires of Horace
Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 – 27 November 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his ' ...
and Juvenal
Decimus Junius Juvenalis (), known in English as Juvenal ( ), was a Roman poet active in the late first and early second century CE. He is the author of the collection of satirical poems known as the ''Satires''. The details of Juvenal's life ...
, offer various depictions, or perhaps fantasies, of how a wronged husband might subject his wife's lover to humiliation and punishment. In these literary treatments, the adulterer is castrated, beaten, raped by the husband himself or his slaves, or penetrated anally with a Red mullet, mullet, a type of prized fish cultivated by elite Romans as a leisure activity ''(otium)''. References to such acts do not appear in the letters of Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the estab ...
nor the histories of Tacitus, and may be fictional exaggerations. Ovid
Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...
makes fun of the jealous husband as lacking in sophistication: "The man who's excessively wounded by his wife's adulterous affairs is a hick." Ovid's predecessor Catullus
Gaius Valerius Catullus (; 84 - 54 BCE), often referred to simply as Catullus (, ), was a Latin poet of the late Roman Republic who wrote chiefly in the neoteric style of poetry, focusing on personal life rather than classical heroes. His s ...
wrote poetry celebrating his adulterous affair with "Lesbia", his social class in ancient Rome, social superior, traditionally identified as Clodia (wife of Metellus), Clodia. The cultivation of a laissez-faire attitude as a sign of urbanity may have prompted the provision of Augustus's adultery law that required a husband to divorce his wife and bring formal legal charges against her, or face charges himself for procuring (prostitution), pimping ''(lenocinium)''.
Master-slave relations
Sexuality was a "core feature" of ancient Roman slavery. Because slaves were regarded as property under Roman law, an owner could use them for sex or hire them out to service other people. Some scholars propose that content in Cicero's letters indicate he had a long-term homosexual relationship with his slave Tiro. As Eva Cantarella stated bluntly, "the Roman ''paterfamilias'' was an absolute master, ... he exercised a power outside any control of society and the state. In this situation why on earth should he refrain from sodomy, sodomising his houseboys?"[Martial (6.39) observed that the power of the ''paterfamilias'' was so absolute that having sex with his own son was technically not a transgression ''(]nefas
The vocabulary of ancient Roman religion was highly specialized. Its study affords important information about the religion, traditions and beliefs of the ancient Romans. This legacy is conspicuous in European cultural history in its influence on ...
)'', as noted by John Boswell, ''Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality: Gay People in Western Europe from the Beginning of the Christian Era to the Fourteenth Century'' (University of Chicago Press, 1980), p. 67. But this form of sexual release thus held little erotic cachet
In philately, a cachet is a printed or stamped design or inscription, other than a cancellation or pre-printed postage, on an envelope, postcard, or postal card to commemorate a postal or philatelic event. There are both official and private ( ...
: to use one's own slaves was "one step up from #Masturbation, masturbation". In describing the ideal partner in pederasty, Martial prefers a slave boy who "acts more like a free man than his master", that is, one who can frame the affair as a stimulating game of courtship.[Hubbard, Thomas K. (2003) ''Homosexuality in Greece and Rome: A Sourcebook of Basic Documents''. University of California Press. p. 13. .] When figures identifiable as slaves appear in erotic art, they are performing routine tasks in the background, not taking part in sex acts. In his Oneirocritica, work on the interpretation of dreams (''c.'' 170 AD), Artemidorus takes a symbolic view of the sexual value of slaves: to dream of having sex with one's own female slave was a good thing, "for slaves are the dreamer's possession; therefore taking pleasure in them signifies the dreamer's being pleased with his own possessions".
A Roman could exploit his own slaves for sex, but was not entitled to compel any enslaved person he chose to have sex, since the owner had the right to control his own property. In the pursuit of sex with a slave who belonged to someone else, persuasion or threats might be employed.[ A charge of rape could not be brought against a free man who forced a slave to have sex, since a slave lacked the legal standing that protected a citizen's body, but the owner could prosecute the rapist under the ''Lex Aquilia'', a law pertaining to property damage.]
A slave's sexuality was closely controlled. Slaves had no right to legal marriage ''(Marriage in ancient Rome, conubium)'', though they could live together as husband and wife ''(Contubernium, contubernales)''. An owner usually restricted the heterosexual activities of his male slaves to females he also owned; any children born from these unions added to his wealth. Cato the Elder, Cato, at a time when Rome's large-scale slave economy was still in early development, thought it good practice to monitor his slaves' sex lives, and required male slaves to pay a fee for access to their female fellow slaves.
If an owner found that his male slave was having a sexual relationship with a free woman, the law required that he warn the couple three times to break it off. If the affair continued, he had the right to take ownership of the woman.[#Cantarella, Cantarella, p. 103.] References to women from respectable families having sex with a male slave are infrequent, indicating that male writers were not preoccupied with the risk of it. Cicero offers no examples in either the gossipy parts of his letters or in court cases where he attacks the reputation of a woman: he accuses Clodia (wife of Metellus), Clodia of incest and of running her house like a brothel, but not of sleeping with slaves. Not even Messalina or Sallust's Sempronia is accused in the hostile sources of having sex with a slave. Sex with a slave was among the trumped-up charges against Claudia Octavia, the wife of Nero, when Poppaea Sabina campaigned to take her place, but mostly it was a matter for innuendo or insult against a husband who failed to prevent it.
Despite the external controls and restrictions placed on a slave's sexuality, Roman art and literature perversely often portray slaves as lascivious, voyeuristic, and even sexually knowing. One of the themes of Roman comedy that distinguishes it from its Greek models is the depiction of master-slave relations.
Freeborn Romans who fell into slavery were supposed to be protected from sexual exploitation, as indicated by two different stories recorded by ancient historians. Before the abolition of debt bondage in the 4th century BC, free Romans were sometimes driven to sell themselves or their children into slavery when they were overwhelmed by debt. According to Livy, debt slavery (''nexum'') was abolished as a direct result of the attempted sexual abuse of a freeborn youth who served as surety for his father's debt with the usurer Lucius Papirius. The boy, Gaius Publilius, was notably beautiful, and Papirius insisted that as a bond slave he was required to provide sexual services. When Publilius refused, Papirius had him stripped and whipped. The youth then took to the streets to display his injuries, and an outcry among the people led the Roman consul, consuls to convene the Roman Senate, senate. The political process eventually led to the ''Lex Poetelia Papiria'', which prohibited holding debtors in bondage for their debt and required instead that the debtor's property be used as collateral. The law thus established that the integrity of a Roman citizen's body was fundamental to the concept of ''libertas'', political liberty, in contrast to the uses to which a slave's body was subject.[The abolition of debt bondage was facilitated by the spread of chattel slavery for agricultural labor; thus during the period of Roman conquest and expansionism on the Italian peninsula, the distinction arises between a Roman citizen with rights and an "Italian" who might be enslaved; see John W. Rich, "Tiberius Gracchus, Land and Manpower," in ''Crises and the Roman Empire. Proceedings of the Seventh Workshop of the International Network Impact of Empire (Nijmegen, June 20–24, 2006)'' (Brill, 2007), p. 160.] In this and a similar incident reported by Valerius Maximus, corporal punishment and sexual abuse are seen as similar violations of the citizen's freedom from physical compulsion, in contrast to the slave's physical vulnerability.[In the similar story from Valerius Maximus, a young man named Titus Veturius, whose father was a bankrupt Roman magistrate, had placed himself in slavery with Publius Plotius, who had attempted to seduce him ''(#Stuprum, stuprare)''. When Veturius refused, Plotius whipped him. Veturius then complained to the Roman consul, consuls, who took the complaint to the Roman senate, senate. Plotius was jailed. See #Cantarella, Cantarella, pp. 104–105]
Some sexual protections could be extended to slaves. The conduct of slaves reflected generally on the respectability of the household, and the ''materfamilias'' in particular was judged by her female slaves' sexual behavior, which was expected to be moral or at least discreet. This decorum may have limited the exploitation of female slaves that were part of the ''familia''. Seneca
Seneca may refer to:
People and language
* Seneca (name), a list of people with either the given name or surname
* Seneca people, one of the six Iroquois tribes of North America
** Seneca language, the language of the Seneca people
Places Extrat ...
expressed Stoic indignation that a male slave should be groomed effeminately and used sexually, because a slave's human dignity should not be debased. The burgeoning trade in eunuch slaves during the early Empire prompted legislation under the emperor Hadrian that prohibited the castration of a slave against his will "for lust or gain". Legal agreements on the sale of a slave might include a ''ne serva prostituatur'' covenant (law), covenant that prohibited the employment of the slave as a prostitute. Although concern for the slave's welfare may have been a factor in individual cases, this legal restriction seems also to have been intended to shield the male citizen owner from the shame or ''#Pleasure and infamy, infamia'' associated with pimping and prostitution. The ''ne serva'' covenant remained in force for subsequent sales, even if the buyer was initially unaware of it, and if it was violated, the illegally prostituted slave was granted freedom.
Prostitution
Prostitution was legal throughout the Roman Empire in all periods. Most prostitutes were Slavery in ancient Rome, slaves or freedwomen. Prostitutes in Rome had to register with the aediles. Despite what might seem to be a clear distinction as a matter of law, the jurist Ulpian opined that an openly promiscuous woman brought the status of prostitute upon herself, even if she accepted no money. The Augustan moral legislation that criminalized adultery exempted prostitutes, who could legally have sex with a married man. Encouraged to think of adultery as a matter of law rather than morality, a few socially prominent women even chose to avoid prosecution for adultery by registering themselves as prostitutes.
Confused status frequently results in plot complications in the Roman comedy, comedies of Plautus
Titus Maccius Plautus (; c. 254 – 184 BC), commonly known as Plautus, was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest Latin literary works to have survived in their entirety. He wrote Palliata comoedia, the gen ...
and Terence. Obstacles to love arise when a young man falls in love with, and wishes to marry, a non-citizen prostitute, and are overcome when the young woman's true status as a freeborn virgin is revealed. The well-brought-up freeborn virgin is marriageable, and the non-citizen prostitute is not. The relation of these comic situations to real life is problematic: Plautus and Terence drew on Greek models which are often little known, and so the extent to which they incorporated Roman social behaviors and attitudes is hard to determine. Elaine Fantham has observed that prolonged military campaigning in Greece and Asia Minor had introduced Roman men to a more sophisticated standard of luxury and pleasure, perhaps reflected by comedy: the young man acts out his infatuation with an expensive courtesan instead of a family slave or common prostitute.
Prostitutes appear in erotic art in Pompeii and Herculaneum, including wall paintings from buildings identified as brothels, in which they are often nude except for a strapless bra ''(strophium)''. The paintings illustrate various sexual positions that contradict some scholarly claims about the preferences of Roman men in heterosexual acts. Literary sources record that prostitutes wore distinctive clothing, often gaudy dresses of see-through silk. They were the only Roman women who wore the toga, the distinctive dress of a free Roman male. This crossing of gender boundaries has been interpreted variously.[ Hallett, p. 81.]
Pleasure and infamy
Prostitutes were among those persons in Rome categorized as ''infames'', enjoying few legal protections even if they were technically not slaves. ''Infamia'' as a legal status once entered into could not be escaped: a prostitute was "not only a woman who practices prostitution, but also one who has formerly done so, even though she has ceased to act in this manner; for the disgrace is not removed even if the practice is subsequently discontinued".
In the Roman moral tradition, pleasure ''(voluptas)'' was a dubious pursuit. The Stoic moralist Seneca contrasts pleasure with virtue ''(virtus)'':
Virtue you will find in the Roman temple, temple, in the forum (Roman), forum, in the Roman senate, senate house, standing before the city walls, dusty and sunburnt, her hands rough; pleasure you will most often find lurking around the thermae, baths and sweating rooms, and places that fear the aedile, police, in search of darkness, soft, effete, reeking of wine and perfume, pallid or else painted and made up with cosmetics like a corpse.
Roman ambivalence toward physical pleasure is expressed by the ''infamia'' of those whose bodies provided it publicly. In a technical sense, ''infamia'' was an official loss of legal standing for a freeborn person as a result of misconduct, including sexual misconduct, but the word could be used for ill repute in general. ''Infamia'' was an "inescapable consequence" of certain professions, including not only prostitutes and pimps but performers such as Theatre of ancient Rome, actors, dancers, and gladiators: "These figures were the objects of other people's desires. They served the pleasure of others. They were tarnished by exposure to the public gaze."
Those labeled ''infames'' (singular ''infamis'') were liable to corporal punishment, usually reserved for slaves. Under the Republic and early Empire, one of the ways in which the citizen's liberty was defined was through the freedom of his body from physical coercion or punishment such as flogging by authorities. Citizens who chose to become public performers, however, and to use their bodies to offer public pleasure, were excluded from these physical protections, and could be beaten or otherwise subjected to violence. Any free man who became a gladiator took an oath to suffer branding, bondage, and beating, as well as potential death by the sword. Both glamorized and despised, the Gladiator#Religion, ethics and sentiment, gladiator was supposed to exert a compelling sexual allure over women.
Actors were sexually ambiguous, in part because they could imitate women, and were attractive to both men and women. The ''dictator
A dictator is a political leader who possesses absolute power. A dictatorship is a state ruled by one dictator or by a small clique. The word originated as the title of a Roman dictator elected by the Roman Senate to rule the republic in times ...
'' Sulla
Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix (; 138–78 BC), commonly known as Sulla, was a Roman general and statesman. He won the first large-scale civil war in Roman history and became the first man of the Republic to seize power through force.
Sulla had ...
had a long-term affair with an actor; Maecenas, the arts patron and advisor to Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pri ...
, was in love with an actor named Bathyllus; and women of the Imperial family are alleged to have had affairs with actors. Actresses were assumed to be prostitutes.
A man who enjoyed receiving anal sex or providing oral sex, often characterized as a ''cinaedus'', might also be stigmatized as ''infamis'', though if he was a citizen he could retain his legal standing.
Private sex clubs
Archaeological evidence, primarily from Pompeii and Herculaneum, and literary sources seem to indicate the existence of private "sex clubs" in some Roman homes ''(domus, domūs)''. Most Romans lived in apartments ''(insulae)''; the ''domus'' was a large, independent dwelling owned by a family of considerable means, and in Rome was central to the family's social identity. A few of these residences have rooms decorated with pornographic art not differing from that found in identified brothels; in some cases, an erotically decorated room has its own exterior door to admit visitors who would normally enter the home through the main doors leading to the atrium, where the family displayed Roman funerals and burial#Funerary art, ancestral images and other trophies of respectability.
It has been suggested that these rooms were meant to evoke the ambience of a brothel for the hosting of exclusive sex parties, such as the one described by the historian Valerius Maximus as occurring in 52 BC with a Roman consul, consul and the tribune, tribunes of the ''plebs'' in attendance:
Just as notorious was that party arranged for Metellus Scipio when he was consul and for the people's tribunes—by Gemellus, their tribunicial errand boy. He was a free man by birth, but twisted by his business to play the servant's role. Society gave a collective blush: he established a whorehouse in his own house, and pimped out Mucia gens, Mucia and Flavia gens, Flavia, each of them notable for her father and husband, along with the aristocratic boy Saturninus. Bodies in shameless submission, ready to come for a game of drunken sex! A banquet not for honoring consul and tribunes, but indicting them!
The existence of sex clubs may provide background for Late Republican political smears about public figures whose party guests included prostitutes, and for the notorious Imperial whorehouse Caligula established on the Palatine Hill, Palatine, where he prostituted married women and freeborn youths.
Sex acts and positions
Around 90 positions for intercourse are recorded in the ancient world. Both Roman erotic art and Latin literature, most famously a passage from Ovid's ''Ars Amatoria, Art of Love'', depict various forms of copulation ''(concubitus varii)'' and sexual positions ''(figurae veneris)''. The Latin terms are Ovid's, from his description of how the most aristocratic households displayed erotic paintings among their art collections. According to Suetonius, Tiberius
Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus (; 16 November 42 BC – 16 March AD 37) was the second Roman emperor. He reigned from AD 14 until 37, succeeding his stepfather, the first Roman emperor Augustus. Tiberius was born in Rome in 42 BC. His father ...
had a vast collection of sex manuals and erotic art, including a painting of the mythological huntress Atalanta performing oral sex on Meleager, a work that the emperor regarded as worth more than a million sesterces. Sexual variety fascinated Romans. Astrology was thought to influence one's preferences and pursuits: people born when the sun, moon, and planets were in certain astrological signs[Capricorn (astrology), Capricorn, Aquarius (astrology), Aquarius, Taurus (astrology), Taurus or Cancer (astrology), Cancer.] were supposed to be inclined toward secret vice or "unnatural" forms of intercourse, or to becoming ''Homosexuality in ancient Rome#Pathicus, pathici''.
#Epicurean sexuality, Lucretius observes that sex acts may have different purposes. Prostitutes employ certain movements aimed at giving their customers pleasure and at avoiding pregnancy. Wives wishing to conceive are advised against moving vigorously during intercourse, since such movements "knock the ploughshare from the furrow and misdirect the sowing of the seed". Lucretius recommends "doggy style" (''a tergo'') for couples trying to conceive, because it mimics the natural procreative sex of animals.
Male–female sex
The basic obscene verb for a man having sex with a woman is ''futuo'', "I fuck." Although not found in polite literature, ''futuo'' was not necessarily insulting or aggressive; it was used transactionally for sex between a prostitute and her client, and in a passionate or loving setting may have been spoken as an arousing intimacy. A fragment from a play by Plautus suggests that acquiring an erotic vocabulary was part of a woman's introduction to sexuality within marriage: a virgin explains that she has not yet learned the words suitable for the wedding night ''(nupta verba)''. The easy use of the word by a woman in other settings indicates her independence of social norms, and corresponding lack of status. "Either fuck me or let's fight it out," the formidable Fulvia is quoted as challenging the future Augustus. In graffiti at Pompeii written by both men and women, forms of ''futuo'' are used to announce prowess, satisfaction, or availability.
Thomas Habinek has claimed that "Ovid
Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō (; 20 March 43 BC – 17/18 AD), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is often ranked as one of the th ...
invents the category of the heterosexual male", since, he says, it was considered normal for a Roman man to have same-sex relations. Ovid radically rejects the Roman tradition of pederasty, and says he takes more pleasure ''(voluptas)'' in making love with a woman as his equal. Sexual pleasure between man and woman, he emphasizes, should be mutual; Ovid instructs his male pupils to make love to a woman slowly, as he advises men not to conclude the sex act without Female orgasm, enabling their female partners to achieve orgasm. In one passage, he seems to be recommending simultaneous orgasm:
But don't you fail your lady, hoisting bigger sails, and don't let her get ahead of you on the track either; race to the finish together: that's when pleasure is full, when man and woman lie there, equally vanquished.
''Mulier equitans''
"Riding" is a common metaphor for the sex act, particularly used of the Woman on top (sex position), woman-on-top position. The ''mulier equitans'' ("woman riding") does not appear in Pottery of ancient Greece, Greek vase painting but is popular in Roman art. Ovid recommends it for the petite woman, as a tall woman may not wish to seem too towering in relation to the man. Supposedly favored by the mythological couple #Marital sex, Hector and Andromache, even though she was of legendary height, it was jokingly called "the Hector horse". One relief from Roman Gaul showing the ''mulier equitans'' plays on the metaphor by picturing a galloping horse within a frame in the background (see first image in gallery below).
In art, the ''mulier equitans'' convention has the woman posed frontally to expose her body in full to the viewer, often emphasizing her depilated pubic area. The significance of this position in Roman culture has been interpreted variously. Kenneth Dover thought it might represent the relative sexual emancipation of Roman women. From a woman's perspective, the position would grant an independence of movement for her own pleasure. Paul Veyne, however, thought it emphasized that the woman had to do the work of servicing the man, who lies there and receives pleasure without effort. The position may have been favored for art because it pleased both male and female viewers: for men, it offered an unobstructed view of the woman's body, as recommended by Ovid, and of the penis entering the vagina; women saw the visually dominant female figure playing the active role.
The position is also called ''Venus pendula conversa'', "perpendicular Venus with the woman facing toward (the man)"; for its Reverse cowgirl (sex position), reverse (''Venus pendula aversa'', "perpendicular Venus with the woman facing away"), the man lies down with the woman on top, but she turns her back and faces his feet. This version is rarely mentioned or depicted, but is found in Roman art set in wikt:Nilotic, Nilotic Egypt.
File:Clarke Ars Erotica 106.jpg, Relief with inscription
File:Roman oil lamp with an erotic theme Römisch Germanisches Museum Cologne.jpg, Sexual scene on an oil lamp
File:Pompeii - Casa del Ristorante 3.jpg, Sexual scene. Casa del Ristorante in Pompeii
File:Pompeii - Casa del Ristorante 1.jpg, Sexual scene. Casa del Ristorante in Pompeii
File:Pompeii - Casa del Ristorante 4.jpg, Sexual scene. Casa del Ristorante in Pompeii
File:Pompeii - Casa del Centenario - Cubiculum - Love scene from north wall.jpg, ''Venus pendula aversa''
File:Sexual scene on pompeian mural 4.jpg, Sexual scene. Wall painting from the House of the Vettii, Pompeii
Pompeii-wall painting.jpg, Sexual scene. Wall painting from the House of the Vettii, Pompeii
File:Pompei, lupanare, affreschi erotici 06.jpg, Sexual scene. Wall painting from the Lupanar, Pompeii
File:Pompeii Lupanar 07.jpg, Sexual scene. Wall painting from the Lupanar, Pompeii
File:Pompeii Lupanar 2.jpg, Sexual scene. Wall painting from the Lupanar, Pompeii
An equestrian metaphor is also found for the ''#Male–male sex, cinaedus'' "riding" on top in anal sex, and at least once of lesbians who "take turns riding and move with the Luna (mythology), Moon as witness".
Anal sex
The Latin verb for "anal sex, to penetrate anally, bugger" is ''pedicare''. The object was usually but not always male. ''Pedicare'' was a blunt and non-euphemistic word, and can be used in a threatening manner, as notoriously by Catullus in Catullus 16, ''Carmen'' 16, or in general to mean "Fuck#Modern usage, fuck you".[ The etymology of ''pedicare'' is unclear, but some have thought it derived from Greek Pederasty in ancient Greece#Terminology, ''paidika'', having to do with pederasty. The basic word for "anus" was ''culus''. Common metaphors are Dusios#Agricultural associations, ''ficus'', "fig", and ''anus'', "ring," which was considered a decorous term and was standard in medical texts.
Men were said to "take it like a woman" (''muliebria pati'', "to undergo womanly things") when they were anally penetrated, but when a man performed anal sex on a woman, she was thought of as playing the boy's role. Martial, for instance, is emphatic that anal sex is better with boys than with women; when his wife objects that she provides him with anal sex in an effort to preserve his fidelity, he taunts her with the inferiority of her anus compared with a boy's.
The ''figura veneris'' in which the woman crouches to lift her buttocks, called "the lioness", may be intended for anal penetration, since boys in Greek art can be portrayed in the same position; with a female partner, it may be difficult to distinguish in art from ''a tergo'' (rear entry). ''Culibonia'' ("good anal") was a humorous term for a prostitute with this speciality. Avoiding pregnancy may have been one motive for female prostitutes to offer anal intercourse.
]
''Os impurum''
''Os impurum'', "filthy mouth" or "impure mouth", was a term of abuse especially for those who provided oral sex. "Oral turpitude"[Woman, ''Abusive Mouths'', p. 322.] was a favorite form of invective
Invective (from Middle English ''invectif'', or Old French and Late Latin ''invectus'') is abusive, reproachful, or venomous language used to express blame or censure; or, a form of rude expression or discourse intended to offend or hurt; vituperat ...
for Catullus, Horace, and Martial. An accusation of having an ''os impurum'' is an "extreme obscenity", so vile that Cicero reserved it for men of lower standing than himself, only implying that their debasement tainted their more powerful Patronage in ancient Rome, patrons who were his real targets.
It was a convention of obscenely comic verse that oral sex caused bad breath that was nearly toxic.[#Richlin1983, Richlin (1983), p. 27] "Whores of the alleyways" are contaminated from giving oral sex; Catullus refers to "the foul saliva of a pissed-over whore". The urinary function of the penis makes oral sex particularly repulsive to Catullus, who elsewhere reviles a Celtiberians, Celtiberian for brushing his teeth in urine. Martial jokes that a fine perfume turned to ''garum'', fish sauce, when it was sniffed by a man whose breath was putrid from oral sex. In another of Martial's epigrams, a ''fellator'' breathes on a hot cake to cool it down and turns it to excrement. The bad breath and rotten teeth that are attributed to performing oral sex represent moral decay and a general corruption of the mouth's positive functions as the organ of a citizen's persuasive speech.
Cunnilingus and fellatio
Because of the stigma attached to providing physical pleasure, a man who performed oral sex on a woman was subject to mockery. Cunnilingus typically appears in Roman art only as part of a reciprocal act, with the woman fellatio, fellating her male partner in some variation of the 69 (sex position), "69" position. A wall painting from Pompeii, however, represents a virtually unique role reversal in the giving of oral sex. The woman who receives cunnilingus is tall and shapely, well-groomed, and brazenly nude except for jewelry. The male figure is relatively small, crouching subserviently, and fully clothed; he has an anxious or furtive look. The situation is so extreme that it was probably meant to be humorous as well as titillating; other paintings in this group show a series of sex acts, at least some of which could be seen as transgressive or parody, parodic.
There is some evidence that women could hire male prostitutes to provide cunnilingus. Graffiti at Pompeii
Pompeii (, ) was an ancient city located in what is now the ''comune'' of Pompei near Naples in the Campania region of Italy. Pompeii, along with Herculaneum and many villas in the surrounding area (e.g. at Boscoreale, Stabiae), was buried ...
advertise the prices male prostitutes charged for cunnilingus, in the same price range as females performing fellatio; however, the graffiti could be intended as insults to the men named, and not as actual advertisements. One graffito is perhaps intended as political invective: "Vote Isidore for aedile; he's the best at licking cunt!"
The Latin verb ''fellare'' is usually used for a woman performing oral sex on a man.[ Accusing a man of fellating another man was possibly the worst insult in all Roman invective. It was an act that might be requested from women who were ''#Pleasure and infamy, infames'',][ and not something a husband in a respectable household would have expected from his wife.][#Fredrick, Fredrick, p. 161.] Fellatio was seen as a "somewhat laughable" preference for older men who have trouble maintaining an erection,[ but graffiti show that the skills of a good ''fellatrix'' were enthusiastically utilized. Fellatio was a fairly uncommon subject in Roman art.]
''Irrumatio''
''Irrumatio'' is a forced form of fellatio, almost always against another man. Forcing someone to be a receptacle for oral sex was proof of virility, something to boast about, as indicated by the ''Priapeia'' and the poems of Catullus and Martial. It was also threatened as a punishment, particularly for adulterers.[ Martial urges a wronged husband who has already cut off the adulterous man's ears and nose to complete the humiliation by befouling his mouth with oral rape.][
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Group sex
Group sex appears in literary sources, graffiti, and art. Suetonius says that the emperor Tiberius
Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus (; 16 November 42 BC – 16 March AD 37) was the second Roman emperor. He reigned from AD 14 until 37, succeeding his stepfather, the first Roman emperor Augustus. Tiberius was born in Rome in 42 BC. His father ...
enjoyed watching group sex, and described "chains" arranged of girls and boys:
In his retreat at Capri, he put together a bedroom that was the theater of his secret debauches. There he assembled from all over companies of male and female prostitutes, and inventors of monstrous couplings (which he called ''spintriae''), so that, intertwining themselves and forming a triple chain ''(triplici serie connexi)'', they mutually prostituted themselves in front of him to fire up his flagging desires.
Most threesomes depict two men penetrating a woman. A medallion from Gallo-Roman culture, Roman Gaul shows two men reclining on a bed, one on the right and one on the left, with their legs extended under a woman between them. Another shows a woman "riding" a man who reclines, while a man standing behind her parts her legs to enter. A far less common variation has one man entering a woman from the rear while he in turn receives anal sex from a man standing behind him, a scenario found in Catullus, ''Carmen'' 56 as well as art. Catullus makes it clear that this concatenation was considered humorous, possibly because the man in the center could be a ''cinaedus'', a male who liked to receive anal sex but who was also considered seductive to women.
Foursome (group sex), Foursomes also appear in Roman art, typically with two women and two men, sometimes in same-sex pairings. One example of a foursome from the Suburban Baths (Pompeii), Suburban Baths at Pompeii demonstrates what Romans saw as the superior role. A woman on the far right kneels beside a bed to perform cunnilingus on a woman lying on it; this woman in turn fellates a man who kneels above her. The man is himself receiving anal sex from a fourth figure, who is represented as the "victor": he acts only to fulfill his own sexual gratification without providing it to others, and looks directly at the viewer with a triumphant wave of the hand.
A Latin epigram
An epigram is a brief, interesting, memorable, and sometimes surprising or satirical statement. The word is derived from the Greek "inscription" from "to write on, to inscribe", and the literary device has been employed for over two mille ...
by the Gallo-Roman culture, Gallo-Roman poet Ausonius
Decimius Magnus Ausonius (; – c. 395) was a Roman poet and teacher of rhetoric from Burdigala in Aquitaine, modern Bordeaux, France. For a time he was tutor to the future emperor Gratian, who afterwards bestowed the consulship on him. H ...
(4th century AD) is a riddle that depends on familiarity with the configurations of group sex:
"Three men in bed together: two are committing debauchery ''(stuprum)'', two are being debauched."
"Doesn't that make four men?"
"You're mistaken: the man on either end each counts as a single offense, but the one in the middle both acts and is acted on."
Masturbation
Masturbation is little noted in the sources for Roman sexuality. The Romans evidently preferred the left hand for masturbation. Martial
Marcus Valerius Martialis (known in English as Martial ; March, between 38 and 41 AD – between 102 and 104 AD) was a Roman poet from Hispania (modern Spain) best known for his twelve books of ''Epigrams'', published in Rome between AD 86 and ...
has a few mentions in his poems, but considers it an inferior form of sexual release resorted to by slaves, though he admits to masturbating when a beautiful slave-boy is too expensive to obtain: "my hand relieved me as a substitute for Ganymede (mythology), Ganymede". It was a longstanding if infrequent theme in Latin satire; one of the few surviving fragments of Gaius Lucilius, Lucilius, Rome's earliest satirist, jokes about a personified penis ''(Mutunus Tutunus#Etymology, Mutto)'' whose girlfriend Laeva ("Lefty") wipes away his "tears". A graffito from Pompeii reads "when my worries oppress my body, with my left hand I release my pent-up fluids".
The etymology of the Latin verb ''masturbari'' is unclear. It has been argued that it is a compound of ''turbare'' 'agitate' and ''mas'' 'male', in an otherwise unattested usage for 'penis'. One traditional view sees ''man(u)-'' 'hand' with an altered form of ''#Stuprum, stuprare'' 'to defile, commit a sexual wrong against'. Calvert Watkins proposed that it derives from a Proto-Indo-European root meaning 'marrow, brain', since ancient medical writers believed that semen descended from the brain through the bones; if this is correct, the word ''turbare'' may still have influenced the formation in Latin.
Bestiality
The classical mythology, mythological tradition is full of sexual encounters between humans and animals, especially mortal women and gods in the guise of animals. Bestiality is a particular characteristic of intercourse with Jupiter (mythology), Jupiter (Greek Zeus), who visits Leda (mythology), Leda as a swan and Europa (mythology), Europa as a bull. The Minotaur is born when Pasiphaë feels such sexual attraction for a bull that she has herself disguised as a cow to mate with him. Satyrs, known for their sexual voracity, are often pictured with bestial features.
Mock bestiality is recorded as a form of sexual roleplay in Imperial Rome. Nero is supposed to have enjoyed a form of Bondage (sexual), bondage with either male or female partners in which he dressed in animal skins to attack their genitals, just as condemned prisoners were bound and attacked by wild animals in the arena (see ''Damnatio ad bestias''). The historian Cassius Dio, Dio tells of how a prostitute pretended to be a leopard for the gratification of a senator. The actor Bathyllus was known for an erotic dance in which he dressed as Leda having sex with the swan; the women watching were variously aroused. Bestiality is also a theme of Apuleius' novel ''Metamorphoses'' (or ''The Golden Ass''), in which the protagonist, transformed into a donkey, is desired by a wealthy noble matron, just as Pasiphaë desired the bull.
There is some indication that violent sexual encounters, like other mythological scenarios, were acted out as punitive entertainments in the arena. The poet Martial
Marcus Valerius Martialis (known in English as Martial ; March, between 38 and 41 AD – between 102 and 104 AD) was a Roman poet from Hispania (modern Spain) best known for his twelve books of ''Epigrams'', published in Rome between AD 86 and ...
praises a scenario for its fidelity to the Pasiphaë myth. The logistics of staging a sex act between a woman and a bull is a matter of speculation; if "Pasiphaë" were a condemned criminal to be tortured and killed, the animal may have been induced by the application of "vaginal secretion from a cow Estrous cycle, in season". In Apuleius's novel, a Venefica sorceress, female poisoner condemned ''ad bestias'' is scheduled to appear in the arena for intercourse with the protagonist in his bestial form.
Hermaphroditism and androgyny
In his chapter on anthropology and human physiology in the encyclopedic ''Natural History (Pliny), Natural History'', Pliny notes that "there are even those who are born of both sexes, whom we call hermaphrodites, at one time ''androgyni''" (''andr-'', "man", and ''gyn-'', "woman", from the Greek). The Sicilian historian Diodorus Siculus, Diodorus (1st century BC) wrote that "there are some who declare that the coming into being of creatures of a kind such as these are marvels ''(teratology, terata)'', and being born rarely, they announce the future, sometimes for evil and sometimes for good". Isidore of Seville (''c.'' 560–636) described a hermaphrodite fancifully as those who "have the right breast of a man and the left of a woman, and after coitus in turn can both sire and bear children".
In contemporary English, "hermaphrodite" is used in biology but has acquired pejorative connotations in referring to people born with physical characteristics of both sexes (see intersex); in antiquity, however, the figure of the so-called hermaphrodite was a primary focus of questions pertaining to gender identity
Gender identity is the personal sense of one's own gender. Gender identity can correlate with a person's assigned sex or can differ from it. In most individuals, the various biological determinants of sex are congruent, and consistent with the i ...
.Clarke
Clarke is a surname which means "clerk". The surname is of English and Irish origin and comes from the Latin . Variants include Clerk and Clark. Clarke is also uncommonly chosen as a given name.
Irish surname origin
Clarke is a popular surname i ...
, p. 49[#Taylor, Taylor, p. 78.] The hermaphrodite represented a "violation of social boundaries, especially those as fundamental to daily life as male and female". In Religion in ancient Rome, traditional Roman religion, a hermaphroditic birth was a kind of ''prodigium'', an occurrence that signalled a disturbance of the ''pax deorum
The vocabulary of ancient Roman religion was highly specialized. Its study affords important information about the religion, traditions and beliefs of the ancient Romans. This legacy is conspicuous in European cultural history in its influence o ...
'', Rome's treaty with the gods, as Diodorus indicated. Livy records an incident during the Second Punic War when the discovery of a four-year-old hermaphrodite prompted an elaborate series of expiations: on the advice of the ''haruspex, haruspices'', the child was enclosed in a chest, carried out to sea, and allowed to drown. Other rituals followed. A hermaphrodite found in 133 BC was drowned in the local river; executing the hermaphroditic person by drowning seems to have been the prescribed way to repair the perceived violation of the natural order.
Pliny observed that while hermaphrodites were once considered Glossary of ancient Roman religion#portentum, portents ''(prodigia)'', in his day they had become objects of delight ''(deliciae)''; they were among the human curiosities of the sort that the wealthy might acquire at the "monsters' market" at Rome described by Plutarch. Under Roman law, a hermaphrodite had to be classed as either male or female; no third gender existed as a legal category.
In the classical mythology, mythological tradition, Hermaphroditus was a beautiful youth who was the son of Hermes (Roman Mercury (mythology), Mercury) and Aphrodite (Venus). Like many other divinities and Greek hero, heroes, he had been nursed by nymphs, but the evidence that he himself received cult devotion among the Greeks is sparse. Ovid wrote the most influential narrative of how Hermaphroditus became androgynous, emphasizing that although the handsome youth was on the #Rites of passage, cusp of sexual adulthood, he rejected love as Narcissus (mythology), Narcissus had, and likewise at the site of a reflective pool, the water nymph Salmacis saw and desired him. He spurned her, and she pretended to withdraw until, thinking himself alone, he undressed to bathe in her waters. She then flung herself upon him, and prayed that they might never be parted. The gods granted this request, and thereafter the body of Hermaphroditus contained both male and female. As a result, men who drank from the waters of the spring Salmacis supposedly "grew soft with the vice of ''Homosexuality in ancient Rome#Impudicitia, impudicitia''", according to the lexicographer Sextus Pompeius Festus, Festus. The myth of Hylas, the young companion of Hercules who was Lympha#Divine madness, abducted by water nymphs, shares with Hermaphroditus and Narcissus the theme of the dangers that face the beautiful adolescent male as he transitions to adult masculinity, with varying outcomes for each.
Depictions of Hermaphroditus were very popular among the Romans. The dramatic situation in paintings often elicits a "wikt:double take, double take" on the part of the viewer, or expresses the theme of sexual frustration. Hermaphroditus is often in the company of a satyr, a figure of bestial sexuality known for subjecting an unsuspecting or often sleeping victim to non-consensual sex; the satyr in scenes with Hermaphroditus is usually shown to be surprised or repulsed, to humorous effect. In a few works, Hermaphroditus is strong enough to ward off his would-be attacker, but in others he shows his willingness to engage in sex, even if the satyr seems no longer inclined:
Artistic representations of Hermaphroditus bring to the fore the ambiguities in sexual differences between women and men as well as the ambiguities in all sexual acts. ... Hermaphroditus gives an eternally ambiguous answer to a man's curiosity about a woman's sexual experience—and vice versa. ... (A)rtists always treat Hermaphroditus in terms of the viewer finding out his/her actual sexual identity. ... Hermaphroditus stands for both the physical and, more important, the psychological impossibility of ever understanding the feelings of the beloved. Hermaphroditus is a highly sophisticated representation, invading the boundaries between the sexes that seem so clear in classical thought and representation.
Macrobius describes a masculine form of "Venus" (Aphrodite) who received cult on Cyprus; she had a beard and male genitals, but wore women's clothing. The deity's worshippers cross-dressed, men wearing women's clothes, and women men's. The Latin poet Laevius wrote of worshipping "nurturing Venus" whether female or male ''(Si deus si dea, sive femina sive mas)''. The figure was sometimes called ''Aphroditos''. In several surviving examples of Greek and Roman sculpture, she is found in the attitude (art), attitude ''anasyrmene'', from the Greek verb ''anasyromai'', "to pull up one's clothes". The love goddess lifts her garments to reveal her masculine attribute, male genitalia, a gesture that traditionally held apotropaic or magical power.
Sexual conquest and imperialism
In 55 BC, Pompeius Magnus ("Pompey the Great") opened his theater complex dedicated to Venus Victrix, "Venus the Conqueror," which continued into late antiquity as a venue for performing arts, literature, landscape design, visual art, and architecture. The Theater of Pompey was in many ways the permanent monument of his Roman triumph, military triumph six years earlier. Among the displays were portrait galleries of female writers and of courtesans; a series of images illustrated freakish births that had served as war omens. In general, intellectuality and culture are represented as feminine and Hellenized, while war and politics are Roman and masculine. Statues personification, personified fourteen conquered ''nationes'' ("nations, peoples") as women in ethnic or "barbarian" dress. Other monuments throughout the Empire, including the Sebasteion at Aphrodisias and the altar of the Sanctuary of the Three Gauls at Lugdunum (modern Lyon, France), as well as various coins, embody conquered territories and peoples as women: Roman military power defeats a "feminized" nation. Although the figures from Pompey's theater have not survived, relief panels from Aphrodisias include scenes such as a Heroic nudity, heroically nude Claudius forcing the submission of Roman Britain, Britannia, whose #Breasts, right breast is bare, and Nero dragging away a dead Roman Armenia, Armenia, a composition that recalls the defeat of the Amazons, Amazon Penthesilea by Achilles.[#Penner, Penner, pp. 135–138.] A particularly well-documented Judaea Capta coinage, series of coins depicts ''Iudaea Capta'', a female personification of the Jewish nation as captive, issued after the Siege of Jerusalem (70), destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem in 70 AD.
Sexual conquest is a metaphor widely used by the Romans for imperialism, but not always straightforwardly for Roman domination. Horace famously described the Romans as taken captive by captive Greece: the image of Roman culture colonized from within by a civilization they had defeated but perceived as intellectually and aesthetically superior might be expressed by myths in which a man raped, abducted, or enslaved a woman but fell in love with her, as embodied for instance by Achilles and Briseis.[Alessandro Barchiesi, "Roman Perspectives on the Greeks", in ''The Oxford Handbook of Hellenic Studies'' (Oxford University Press, 2009), p. 104.]
See also
* Catamite
* Greek love
* Erotic art in Pompeii and Herculaneum
* ''Exoletus''
* History of erotic depictions
* History of human sexuality
* Homosexuality in ancient Greece
* Homosexuality in ancient Rome
* Homosexuality in China
* Homosexuality in India
* Homosexuality in Japan
* Homoeroticism
* Latin profanity
* Pederasty
* Pederasty in ancient Greece
Pederasty in ancient Greece was a socially acknowledged romantic relationship between an older male (the ''erastes'') and a younger male (the ''eromenos'') usually in his teens. It was characteristic of the Archaic Greece, Archaic and Classical G ...
Notes
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Further reading
* Ancona, Ronnie, and Greene, Ellen eds. ''Gender Dynamics in Latin Love Poetry''. Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005.
* Skinner, Marilyn. ''Sexuality in Greek And Roman Culture''. Blackwell Publishing. .
External links
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{{Sexuality by country
Sexuality in ancient Rome,
Society of ancient Rome