Roman Women

by Alfred Brittain

In the final strife between the forces of Vitellius and Vespasian, the city of Cremona, which was held by the former, was besieged. Tacitus informs us that, in their zeal for the cause which their city had adopted, some of the women of Cremona took part on the field of battle and were slain. In view of what followed at the taking of their city, they were fortunate in their lot. "Forty thousand men," says the historian, "poured into it. The number of drudges and camp followers was still larger, and more addicted to lust and cruelty. Neither age nor dignity served as a protection; deeds of lust were perpetrated amidst scenes of carnage, and murder was added to rape. Aged women who had passed their prime, and who were useless as booty, were made the objects of brutal sport. Maidens were contended for by ruffians who ended by turning their swords against each other."

The bloodshed and rapine were carried into the city of Rome itself. When he saw that his case was hopeless, the ignoble, indolent Vitellius wished to abdicate; but this neither his soldiers nor the people would allow him to do. Flavius Sabinus was prefect of the city, and he, with the soldiers of the Vespasian party, took refuge in the Capitol. There were women who voluntarily took their places with these besieged men. Among them was Verulana Gratilla, who, having neither children nor relatives, followed the fortunes of the war for no other apparent reason than the pleasure she derived from scenes of carnage. In this conflict the Capitol was fired and the temple of the Empire reduced to ashes. Yet, while all these things were occurring, the common people of Rome, indifferent as to whether they were ruled by Vitellius or Vespasian, looked on as if they were at a gladiatorial show. It was to them nothing more than a spectacle, except that it was also an occasion for absolute lawlessness and an incitement to frenzied indulgence in everything vicious. So brutalized were the people that, while in some parts of the great city the streets were filled with heaps of slain, in other parts, to which the conflict did not extend, there prevailed revelry of the most frantic kind, in which shameless women took a leading part.

The legions of Vespasian conquered; and with his enthronement Rome returned to peace and sanity. The enormities in which she had indulged since the reign of Augustus were for the time expiated.

In the Flavians, a new and healthy dynasty came to the throne of the Cæsars, though not later than the third reign, that of Domitian, it also was to succumb to the effects of the possession of unbounded power. Vespasian had come from an obscure family living at Reate in the Sabine country. His father had collected the revenue in the province of Asia, where his statue had been erected with the inscription: The Honest Tax Collector. His mother, whose name was Vespasia Polla, was descended from a good Umbrian family. Tertulla, his grandmother by his father's side, had charge of his education, and her memory was always held by him in the highest regard; much more than appears is suggested in the remark of Suetonius that, after his advancement to the Empire, Vespasian loved to visit the place where he spent his childhood. The house and all the surroundings were kept exactly in the same condition, so that amid unchanged scenes he might live over again his boyhood days. It was a simple country house, with no pretension to the splendor in which the great mansions of the city vied with each other; yet it was artistic.

In those times, not even the simplest farmstead was without its statuary; and we may well believe that, as Tertulla, in the courts of Phalacrine, superintended the education of the future builder of the Colosseum, she could point to examples of sculptured beauty to illustrate those ideas of art which were included in every Roman's training. In the great common room, where the work of the house was done, and where, on winter evenings, the slaves were kept busy with useful occupations, Polla presided, as had the matrons of the old days. In the atrium she entertained her rural neighbors in simple style; and there also she sometimes lectured her son, who greatly displeased her by his tardiness in putting off his boyish ways. She was ambitious for him, and longed to hurry him away to Rome, that in the stir of the city or the camp he might win renown for the Vespasian name. Polla little understood that the time her son spent, idly, as she supposed, watching the teams and cattle about the drinking troughs of the inner court, was fortifying him to withstand the moral dangers of a court of another sort. The rugged, straightforward, simple-mannered soldier, who honored festival occasions by drinking from a silver cup which he treasured as a keepsake from his grandmother, was such an emperor as the Romans had not before seen the like of.

Flavia Domitilla was the wife of Vespasian; but she did not survive to participate with him in the imperial dignity. Of her life and character we know little. There is in existence but one likeness of her--a colossal head found near Puteoli and now preserved in the Campana Museum. This gives her the appearance of a strikingly handsome woman, with a suggestion of pride, but not too powerful to overcome the aspect of good nature. Suetonius says that she was at first the mistress of Statilius Capella, a Roman knight. It may seem strange that a man of Vespasian's character should marry a woman who had sustained such a former relation; but in those times, wives with a past history in which their present husbands had played no part were not so rare that they were even remarkable. Domitilla enjoyed by birth all the legal privileges of a Latin woman, but she was not a citizen of Rome until a suit had been brought by her father for her in the courts. Possibly this suit was instituted in regard to her inheritance of property; for the privileges of citizenship, as they related to women, consisted of the ability to receive legacies and bequeath property, and to form such matrimonial unions as would be held valid when brought into question in matters concerning property. It is very likely that the explanation of the fact that Domitilla is spoken of as the mistress rather than the wife of Statilius is to be found in the further fact that, he being a Roman knight and she not yet a citizen of Rome, legal marriage could not take place between the two. Suetonius tells us that after the death of Domitilla, Vespasian renewed his union with his former concubine Cænis, the freedwoman and former amanuensis of Antonia, whom he treated, even after he became emperor, almost as if she had been his legal wife; and it is safe for us to suppose that, had he been legally able to do so, Vespasian would have made Cænis Empress of Rome.

Domitilla bore her husband three children: Titus and Doraitian, who became emperors in succession, and Domitilla, who died before her father attained to the purple.

The salutary influence of Vespasian's character was soon made apparent in the improvement of Roman morals. He was not an energetic reformer; but he curtailed those abuses which were most flagrant, and himself set an example which those who desired his favor found it to their advantage to follow. He expelled from the Senate those who were extraordinarily vicious in their lives, and among them one who had, by request of Nero, contended with a Greek girl in the arena. He required the Senate to pass a decree that any woman who entered into a liaison with the slave of another person should be herself considered a slave--a law which indicates to what lengths the license of women had carried them during the preceding reigns.

One act of cruelty to a woman stains the records of this reign. An insurrection had been stamped out in Belgium; but Sabinus, the leader, had made his escape. His house was burned; still he could easily have escaped into Germany, but that he was unwilling to leave his young wife, Eponia, unprotected as well as homeless. "He concealed himself in an underground hiding place, whose entrance was known only to two faithful freedmen. He was believed to be dead; and his wife, sharing the opinion of those around her, had been for three days plunged in inconsolable affliction. Being secretly informed, however, that Sabinus was alive, she concealed her delight, and was conducted to his place of refuge, where in the end she determined also to remain. After seven months, the husband and wife ventured to emerge, and made a journey to Rome for the purpose of soliciting pardon. But being warned in season that the petition would be in vain, they left Rome without seeing the emperor, and again sheltered themselves in their subterranean refuge. Here they lived together during nine years. Being at last discovered, Sabinus was taken to Rome, where Vespasian ordered his execution. Eponia had followed her husband, and she threw herself at the emperor's feet. 'Cæsar,' she cried, showing her two sons, who were with her, 'these have I brought forth and nourished in the tombs, that two more suppliants might implore thy clemency.' Those present were moved to tears, and even Vespasian himself was affected; but he remained inflexible. Eponia then asked to die with him whom she had been unable to save. 'I have been more happy with him,' she said, 'in darkness and under ground, than thou in supreme power,' Her second request was granted her. Plutarch met at Delphi one of their children, who related to him this sad and touching story." Why this usually tolerant and always sensible emperor should have been so inexorable on this occasion is a mystery.

There is another instance recorded, in which a woman of different character, presenting a petition of another kind, received an acquiescent response. A lady of rank pretending, as Suetonius puts it, to be desperately enamored of Vespasian,--it must have been that she hoped to achieve a permanent relationship with the widowed emperor,--requested that which it would have been more consistent with her modesty to have avoided. In addition to granting her petition, Vespasian made her a present of four hundred thousand sesterces. When his steward asked how he would have the sum entered in his accounts, he replied: "For Vespasian's being seduced." Considering, however, the parsimonious character which the historian attributes to this emperor, we are more inclined to think that the sum must have been entered on the credit side of the ledger.