Sexuality in ancient Rome
Sexual attitudes and behaviors in ancient Rome are indicated by art, literature, and inscriptions, and to a lesser extent by archaeological remains such as erotic artifacts and architecture. It has sometimes been assumed that "unlimited sexual license" was characteristic of ancient Rome, but sexuality was not excluded as a concern of the mos maiorum, the traditional social norms 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 and Imperial periods. The censors—public officials who determined the social rank of individuals—had the power to remove citizens from the senatorial or equestrian order for sexual misconduct, and on occasion did so. The mid-20th-century sexuality theorist Michel Foucault regarded sex throughout the Greco-Roman world as governed by restraint and the art of managing sexual pleasure.
Roman society was patriarchal, and masculinity 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, "virtue", was an active masculine ideal of self-discipline, related to the Latin word for "man", vir. The corresponding ideal for a woman was pudicitia, often translated as chastity or modesty, but it was 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. With extremely few exceptions, surviving Latin literature preserves the voices of educated male Romans on 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, former slaves.
Some sexual attitudes and behaviors in ancient Roman culture differ markedly from those in later Western societies. Roman religion promoted sexuality as an aspect of prosperity for the state, and individuals might turn to private religious practice or "magic" for improving their erotic lives or reproductive health. Prostitution was legal, public, and widespread. "Pornographic" paintings were featured among the art collections in respectable upperclass households. "Homosexual" and "heterosexual" did not form the primary dichotomy of Roman thinking about sexuality, and no Latin 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] was denounced, especially in political rhetoric, sex in moderation with male prostitutes or slaves, usually documented in the form of pederasty, was not regarded as improper or damaging to masculinity, so long as the male citizen took the active and the slave or prostitute the receptive role. Hypersexuality, 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.
A late-20th-century paradigm analyzed Roman sexuality in relation to a "penetrator–penetrated" binary model. This model, however, has limitations, especially in regard to expressions of sexuality among individual Romans. Even the relevance of the word "sexuality" 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 antiquity—such as comedy, satire, invective, love poetry, graffiti, magic spells, inscriptions, and interior decoration—have more to say about sex than elevated genres such as epic and tragedy. Information about the sex lives of the Romans is scattered in historiography, oratory, philosophy, and writings on medicine, agriculture, 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, whose plots often revolve around sex comedy and young lovers kept apart by circumstances;
- the statesman and moralist Cato the Elder, who offers glimpses of sexuality at a time that later Romans regarded as having higher moral standards;
- the poet Lucretius, who presents an extended treatment of [|Epicurean sexuality] in his philosophical work De rerum natura;
- Catullus, whose poems explore a range of erotic experience near the end of the Republic, from delicate romanticism to brutally obscene invective;
- Cicero, with courtroom speeches that often attack the opposition's sexual conduct and letters peppered with gossip about Rome's elite;
- the Augustan elegists Propertius and Tibullus, who reveal social attitudes in describing love affairs with mistresses;
- Ovid, especially his Amores and Ars Amatoria, which according to tradition contributed to Augustus's decision to exile the poet, and his epic, the Metamorphoses, which presents a range of sexuality, with an emphasis on rape, through the lens of mythology;
- the epigrammatist Martial, whose observations of society are braced by sexually explicit invective;
- the satirist Juvenal, who rails against the sexual mores of his time.
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, 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, as Ovid notes:
in some spot which depicts various couplings and sexual positions: just as Telamonian Ajax sits with an expression that declares his anger, and the barbarian mother 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.
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 '
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, 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], and [|group sex] 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 supposedly had a mirrored room for sex, so that when he hired a prostitute he could watch from all angles. The emperor Tiberius had his bedrooms decorated with "the most lascivious" paintings and sculptures, and stocked with Greek sex manuals by Elephantis in case those employed in sex needed direction.
In the 2nd century AD, "there is a boom in texts about sex in Greek and Latin," along with romance novels. 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 had become an ideal among the growing number of Christians, and Church Fathers such as Tertullian and Clement of Alexandria debated whether even [|marital sex] should be permitted for procreation. The sexuality of martyrology 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. The obscene humor of Martial was briefly revived in 4th-century Bordeaux by the Gallo-Roman scholar-poet Ausonius, although he shunned Martial's predilection for pederasty and was at least nominally a Christian.
Sex, religion, and the state
Like other aspects of Roman life, sexuality was supported and regulated by religious traditions, 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 were a council of deities in male–female pairs, to some extent Rome's equivalent to the Twelve Olympians of the Greeks. At least two state priesthoods were held jointly by a married couple. The Vestal Virgins, 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: "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 of priests were expected to marry and have families. Cicero held that the desire ' to procreate was "the seedbed of the republic", as it was the cause for the first form of social institution, marriage. Marriage produced children and in turn a "house" ' for family unity that was the building block of urban life.Many Roman religious festivals had an element of sexuality. The February Lupercalia, celebrated as late as the 5th century of the Christian era, included an archaic fertility rite. The Floralia featured nude dancing. At certain religious festivals throughout April, prostitutes participated or were officially recognized. Cupid inspired desire; the imported god Priapus represented gross or humorous lust; Mutunus Tutunus promoted marital sex. The god Liber oversaw physiological responses during sexual intercourse. When a male assumed the toga virilis, "toga of manhood," Liber became his patron; according to the love poets, he left behind the innocent modesty ' of childhood and acquired the sexual freedom ' to begin his course of love. A host of deities oversaw every aspect of intercourse, conception, and childbirth.
File:Sulla Coin.jpg|thumb|Denarius issued ca. 84–83 BC under Sulla picturing Venus with a diadem and a standing Cupid with a palm branch, and on the reverse two military trophies and religious implements
The connections among human reproduction, general prosperity, and the wellbeing of the state are embodied by the Roman cult of Venus, who differs from her Greek counterpart Aphrodite in her role as a mother of the Roman people through her half-mortal son Aeneas. The fascinum, a phallic charm, was ubiquitous in Roman culture, appearing on everything from jewelry to bells and wind chimes to lamps, including as an amulet to protect children and triumphing generals.
Classical myths often deal with sexual themes such as gender identity, adultery, incest, and rape. Roman art and literature continued the Hellenistic treatment of mythological figures having sex as humanly erotic and at times humorous, often removed from the religious dimension.