This chapter examines the presence of women in the Roman census and its socio-economic and political implications during the Republic. In the professio, citizens sui iuris had to declare their name, age, offspring, place of residence, occupation and properties. Viduae (a term including not only widows but also women who were no longer married) and women sui iuris also submitted census declarations. Special lists existed, for instance, of viduae and female wards, who were subject to specific taxes, namely, the aes equestre et hordiarium. This study explores the nature of the information recorded about female citizens in the census and the ways in which they were categorized. In sum, it argues that Roman female citizens should be included into a history of the census and taxation during the Roman Republic, rather than being treated as a marginal or overlooked group.

Ambrose of Milan’s funerary oration for Valentinian II (392 ce) confronts violence, civil war, and imperial authority, ultimately redefining the emperor’s body as a collection of relics. The oration’s ambiguity regarding the circumstances of Valentinian II’s premature and violent death was not merely a matter of political expediency; it also served as a rhetorical strategy to support Ambrose’s innovative treatment of the emperor’s corpse. By weaving passages from the Song of Songs into his oration, Ambrose evoked imagery resonant with same-sex desire, while presenting himself as the emperor’s guarantor – but in his very own way: as a “womanly” father and a lover mourning his beloved. In portraying Valentinian II as a selfless soldier-martyr, Ambrose rehabilitated an emperor who may have died by suicide and without the sacrament of baptism, while also redefining key imperial virtues at a time when they – and the empire – faced mounting challenges from both internal and external forces.

During the Roman Republic, almost all women without living fathers required the authorization of a male tutor (‘guardian’) for certain important legal and property transactions. This chapter examines the legal rules and lived reality of tutela mulierum (‘guardianship of women’) during the Republic. First, it outlines Roman women’s property rights and the circumstances in which a woman required her tutor’s auctoritas (‘authorisation’). Next, it considers the different types of tutor, how they were appointed and how these factors affected women’s financial freedom. Finally, it explores the variability of women’s experience of tutela, depending on the type of tutor(s) a woman had, as well as their personality and the nature of the transaction the woman wanted to perform. The chapter concludes that, although tutela might be a mere formality for some women, for others it could be a real burden and an impediment to disposing of their property as they wished.

Polybius Histories 31.25-28 is an invaluable account of the testamentary and dotal arrangements of the Aemilii Paulli and Cornelii Scipiones. The testaments encompass the introduction of the lex Voconia in 169 BCE and raise many questions about Roman women’s property rights. Does the increasing number of female heirs in the second century reveal a developing preference for female heirs? What kinds of property dispositions should be included in the study of female inheritance? How should the emphasis on Aemilius Paullus’ childlessness and legal rights of Aemilianus’ sisters be understood? This chapter argues that Roman society expected women to enjoy significant shares in their family’s estates despite the introduction of the lex Voconia; that Polybius’ point about the childlessness of Paullus demonstrates his understanding of Roman inheritance law; and, the comment that Aemilianus’ sisters lacked any legal right to Papiria’s property indicates the prosopography of the Aemilii Paulli should be revised.

This chapter aims to qualify any defined boundaries between educated Roman women and their political or public engagement. As one moves further into the post-triumviral period, women pursuing cultural and educational endeavours appeared to gain more acceptance and admiration. This observation is particularly applicable to the case of Octavia Minor, the sister of Octavian Augustus and the fourth wife of Marcus Antonius. This chapter explores instances of Octavia’s educational pursuits, such as her involvement in creating networks of philosophers and tutors to educate her son, Marcellus (Strabo), her patronage (Vitruvius and the Porticus Octaviae) and instances of speech crafted for the Plutarchan Octavia, which blend the political and private spheres and are interpreted as a suasoria (Plutarch). Through these examples, this study positions Octavia as a prominent figure who exemplifies how female political engagement and paideia could be reconciled during the triumviral period.

How do the property rights that are explored in this volume compare with those of women in the different world of ‘modern’ Europe. Welch and Scott examine several situations, including pre-1870 England, Scotland, revolutionary and post-revolutionary France and the states that would go to make up Germany after unification. Each of these contexts was different in itself, but none offered to women the same potential for agency as did ancient Rome, even though even in Rome gender circumscribed that agency in many important ways. Moreover, a significant divergence can be seen between legal systems that favoured English/Norman notions of coverture (whereby a married woman was largely denied legal personhood) and those that maintained a relationship with the Roman past. The conclusions that can be drawn from a necessarily brief and selective survey are significant. Some of the rights at law that Roman women enjoyed were denied to many European women until well into the lifetime of the authors of this chapter and are still denied to many others alive today. There is no doubt that Roman women of different social levels and over different historical situations suffered in different ways under the weight of gender expectations but the law did not stand in their way as it did in other contexts. Even more importantly, the industrial revolution had a profound impact on the economic roles of (especially) middle-class women in the nineteenth century, resulting in a new belief that a respectable married woman stayed at home and ran the house. When male writers of Roman history wrote their narratives, they wrote about Roman women in ways that reflected their own prejudices and attitudes towards a ‘woman’s place’. No history runs in a straight line, including the history of women. An awareness of the variability of contexts for women allows us to appreciate what was different about Rome as well as the way things both change and remain the same.

Roman imperial and non-Roman royal women seized the opportunities provided by frequent warfare and by the politics of court society to advance their interests and goals in novel ways in the fifth and sixth centuries. Admittedly, not all of their efforts succeeded. Nonetheless, some Roman imperial women did realize some of their goals, providing models for royal women in the wars that unfolded in the post-Roman Ostrogothic kingdom in Italy. This chapter discusses four women as case studies: two fifth-century imperial women, Justa Grata Honoria and Licinia Eudoxia, and two Ostrogothic royal women, Amalasuintha and Amalafrida. These women used the opportunities presented to them by war and the negotiations that precipitated fighting to assert political influence, demonstrating womanly agency in Late Antiquity.

In mid-Republican Rome, the highly visible women within the aristocratic elite, occupying respected positions within their families and society, as patronae of individuals and of communities and with considerable funds at their disposal, might be in a position to achieve desired political goals. This chapter focuses, however, upon the symbolic capital they represented. We consider eight matronae: Cato’s first wife; the mother of Scipio Africanus; and six other women associated with the Scipionic and Gracchan households. Their public projections were all-important, and in the hothouse of elite competition and bitter political debate, those images and the memories of significant women were objects of contention. Surviving portraits (or sketches) are, for the most part, constructed creations transmitted with a purpose. While variations in the ancient portraitures (often contradictory) appropriately prompt doubts about the uncovering of the reality underlying those projections, the fact of the contested memories speaks to their significance.

This chapter explores the relationships between regulations (laws, senatorial decrees) and female visibility in Republican Rome. The focus is on the earliest epigraphic and literary evidence for regulations mentioning women, citizen and non-citizen. Key examples include the senatus consultum de Bacchanalibus (186 BCE), one of the Clusium Fragments (late second to early first century BCE), the lex Osca Tabulae Bantinae (100–91 BCE), the Tabula Heracleensis (post-Social War), the lex Coloniae Genetivae (59 to 44 BCE), as well as Cicero’s references to a lex on female mourning from the XII Tabulae (Twelve Tables), the lex Voconia of 169 BCE and the pontifical responsum and senatus consultum on the Vestal Licinia in 123 BCE. These are compared with Republican regulations attested in later sources. This chapter argues that these regulations rendered some women visible, both physically and symbolically, and that they offer us valuable insight into women’s agency, authority and property in the Roman Republic.

This chapter challenges the traditional view of Roman elite women as passive holders of wealth by highlighting their active roles as property owners and managers in the Late Republican economy. While jewels and adornments symbolized status, elite women also exercised economic agency beyond mere conspicuous consumption. Beginning with the famous speech by Hortensia reported by Appian (App. B Civ. 4.32–34) and primarily drawing on Varro, as well as Cicero’s speeches and letters, the chapter explores how women owned, managed and profited from land, urban real estate and financial assets. Despite legal restrictions, women navigated economic structures to control, preserve and enhance their wealth more actively than is often assumed, with their economic engagement having significant socio-political implications. Ultimately, gendered assumptions about wealth and power in the Roman Republic will be discussed.

This chapter delves into female influence on money and wealth from an individual perspective, using the concept of matronage as a framework. Cicero, who was often burdened by financial concerns, had two women as intermediaries: his wife Terentia and Teucris, possibly to be identified with Mucia Tertia. Mucia, by leveraging her personal and familial wealth, showcased remarkable agency in strategically deploying capital during her marriages to Pompey and Scaurus. Her career and influence highlight the power of matronage, particularly in times of crisis, when Scaurus relied on her network. The chapter calls for a re-evaluation of sources, which often take an androcentric perspective and neglect the significant role of women in power structures and their impact on political and economic events. Mucia epitomizes many elite women who exercised decisive influence through their networks and resources.