Content warning: mention of sexism, slavery, rape and violence

By Leea Rebeca Ruta – Graphics Editor

On Thursday, April 2, the Classics and Religions at Bishop’s Society (CRABS) hosted a “Sex and Gender in the Roman Empire” presentation. The workshop, held in association with the Sexual Culture Committee (SCC), welcomed classical studies professor Catherine Tracy who gave a mini lecture on Roman attitudes towards sex and gender during the Empire. 

Prof. Tracy began by first outlining the Roman social hierarchy, then defined the concept of stuprum, a term difficult to adequately translate from Latin.  Stuprum could be equated to a sex crime. It essentially refers to a sex act with someone of the wrong status, and most often describes disgraceful behavior related to unchastity that could be a punishable offense. By our standards today, stuprum blurred the line between rape and seduction since crime was defined by status.

Adultery, for example, was a form of stuprum, and was deemed socially and legally unacceptable. However, by Roman definition, only married women and their lovers could be charged with adultery. Wives had to be faithful to their husbands, but husbands did not have the same obligation to their wives. The man whose wife had adultery charges had to divorce her immediately, lest he be considered her pimp.

Prof. Tracy then described marriage workings. Enslaved people could not get married, but they could form marriage-like relationships with other slaves or freed persons. Such relationships were named contubernia — from the word contubernales, meaning tent-mate in the Roman army. 

Enslaved women, according to Roman writer Columella, would be rewarded for bearing a certain number of offspring: having three children, she could get an exception from work, and after four children, she could receive her freedom. However, this was a double-edged sword. The woman had to exchange her freedom at the expense of giving her kids to the slave-master.

In the Roman Empire, the legal age for a girl to get married was 12, though they could get engaged even younger. Soldiers could not marry, and their kids were considered illegitimate up until the second century CE.

It goes without saying that Rome was very patriarchal: everything focused on the male head of household. The pater familias, or father of family, had the legal power of life and death over most members of his household. An exception was the wife in certain cases – who could have still been under the power of her father. A wife’s role was mainly to produce legitimate children, to be in charge of the stores, food production and cloth making (spinning and weaving).

Prof. Tracy also described Roman attitudes towards penetration in heterosexual acts, which were only allowed if it was a male Roman citizen doing the penetration. Otherwise, they would lose their citizenship. Being penetrated was thought to be intrinsically female, servile and socially inferior, whereas penetration was associated with power, freeborn status, masculinity and social dominance – this explains why Roman men were obsessed with the phallus. 

Other topics discussed were instances of intersex and potentially trans experiences in ancient sources, sex work and women gushing over gladiator fighters or dancers.

One of the attendees, Classics student Anne-Marie Laroche, mentioned the importance of learning these difficult subjects and ancient attitudes towards sex and gender. Not only can we see how they evolved over time, but we can reconsider our own social mores, for better or for worse, Laroche explained.

Another Classics student, Virginia Marquez-Pacheco, also noted how topics like these can “help us understand how those categorizations and their consequences are being formed [in our times]” and that “understanding past sexual culture can help improve the one we have now.”