ROMAN FAMILIES
Familia: Group subject to paterfamilias
Paterfamilias: Senior male family member
Patria Potestas: Authority of paterfamilias
over members of familia
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Rights to all family property
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Power of life & death (cf. Brutus)
Ideal of filial pietas (Aeneas & Anchises)
Parricide as abhorrent crime
Familial Ideal
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Single union (wife = univira)
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Descent of property/name to sons
... masking more diverse reality
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Serial monogamy, adultery & divorce
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Childlessness & adoption
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Widowhood
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Unconventional families
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Same-sex relationships
Marriage
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No state or religious certification
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But has legal standing & obligations
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Minimum Age: 12 for women, 14 for men (but most men
married later)
-
Divorce easy for either partner
Two Types:
1) With manus: husband becomes paterfamilias
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Confarreatio: "spelt-sharing" ritual
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Coemptio: symbolic purchase
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Usus: = our 'common-law' marriage
2) Without manus: father still paterfamilias
Dowry
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Father pays husband (vs. bride-price)
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Must be returned on divorce
Marriage links father-in-law (socer) & son-in-law
(gener)
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Husbands > Sabine Women < Fathers
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Aeneas > Lavinia < Latinus
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Pompey > Julia < Julius Caesar
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(Younger Cato > Marcia < Hortensius)
Childbirth & Raising Children
High infant mortality rates
Birth Control
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Non-productive intercourse (anal, oral)
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Coitus interruptus
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Contraceptive drugs, douches (how effective?)
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Abortion (induced by drugs)
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Infanticide ("exposure")
Augustan Moral Legislation
Privileges for having 3+ children
Philippe Ariès, Centuries of Childhood (1960)
Is 'childhood' a modern invention?
Childhood in the Roman world
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Work for most; school for few
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More adult care-givers (e.g. slave wet-nurses)
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Less spatial segregation from adults
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Complex families (adoption, divorce, remarriage)
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