Nay, their wish is that a law which you have admitted, established by
your suffrages, and confirmed by the practice and experience of so many
years to be beneficial, should now be repealed; that is, by abolishing
one law you should weaken all the rest. No law perfectly suits the
convenience of every member of the community; the only consideration is,
whether, upon the whole, it be profitable for the greater part.... I
should like, however, to know what this important affair is which has
induced the matrons thus to run out into public in this excited manner,
scarcely restraining from pushing into the Forum and the assembly of the
people.... What motive, that even common decency will allow to be
mentioned, is pretended for this female insurrection?
Why, say they,
that we may shine in gold and purple; that, both on festal and common
days, we may ride through the city in our chariots, triumphing over
vanquished and abrogated law, after having captured and wrested from you
your suffrages; and that there may be no bounds to our expenses and our
luxury.
"Often have you heard me complain of the profuse expenses of the
women--often of those of the men; and that not only of men in private
stations, but of the magistrates; and that the State was endangered by
two opposite vices--luxury and avarice, those pests which have been the
ruin of all great empires. These I dread the more, as the circumstances
of the commonwealth grow daily more prosperous and happy. As the Empire
increases, as we have now passed over into Greece and Asia, places
abounding with every kind of temptation that can inflame the passions,
so much the more do I fear that these matters will bring us into
captivity, rather than we them. Believe me, those statues from Syracuse
were brought into this city with harmful effect. I already hear too many
commending and admiring the decorations of Athens and Corinth, and
ridiculing the earthen images of our Roman gods that stand on the fronts
of their temples. For my part, I prefer these gods--
propitious as they
are, and I hope will continue to be, if we allow them to remain in their
own mansions.... When the dress of all is alike, why should any one of
you fear lest she should not be an object of observation? Of all kinds
of shame, the worst, surely, is the being ashamed of frugality or of
poverty; but this law relieves you with regard to both; since that which
you have not it is unlawful for you to possess. This equalization, says
the rich matron, is the very thing that I cannot endure.
Why do I not
make a figure, distinguished with gold and purple? Why is the poverty of
others concealed under this cover of a law, so that it should be thought
that, if the law permitted, they would have such things as they are not
now able to procure? Romans, do you wish to excite among your wives an
emulation of this sort, that the rich should wish to have what none
other can have; and the poor, lest they be despised as such, should
extend their expenses beyond their means? Be assured that when a woman
once begins to be ashamed of what she ought not to be ashamed of, she
will not be ashamed of what she ought. She who can will purchase out of
her own purse; she who cannot will ask her husband.
Unhappy is the
husband, both he who complies with the request, and he who does not;
for what he will not give himself he will see given by another.... So
soon as the law shall cease to limit the expenses of your wife, you
yourself will never be able to do so. Do not suppose that the matter
will hereafter be in the same state in which it was before the law was
made on the subject. It is safer that a wicked man should never be
accused than that he should be acquitted; and luxury, if it had never
been meddled with, would be more tolerable than it would be when, like a
wild beast, irritated by being chained, it is let loose.
My opinion is
that the Oppian law ought, on no account, to be repealed."
The women, however, were not without their champion. In a debate on some
ordinary affair of State, Lucius Valerius the Tribune would have been an
inconsiderable antagonist for Cato; but, on this occasion, what he
lacked in oratorical prestige was atoned for in that he had by far the
more reasonable side of the argument. The fact that it was the custom of
the Roman historians to compose, rather than report, the addresses of
their orators renders any comparison of these two Senatorial speeches on
woman's rights entirely uninteresting. Valerius is made to say: "Shall
our wives alone reap none of the fruits of the public peace and
tranquillity? Shall we men have the use of the purple?
Shall our
children wear gowns bordered with the same color, and shall we interdict
the use of it to women alone? Shall your horse, even, be more splendidly
caparisoned than your wife is clothed?" An appeal to the sympathy of the
voters is made, as the matrons of Rome are represented as "seeing those
ornaments allowed to the wives of the Latin confederates, of which they
themselves have been deprived. They will behold those riding through the
city in their carriages, and decorated with gold and purple, while they
are obliged to follow on foot.... This would hurt the feelings even of
men, and what do you think must be its effect on weak women, whom even
trifles can disturb? Neither offices of State nor of the priesthood, nor
triumphs, nor badges of distinction, nor military presents, nor spoils,
may fall to their share. Elegance of appearance, and ornaments, and
dress--these are the women's badges of distinction; in these they
delight and glory; these our ancestors called the women's world."
The Oppian law was repealed, and Cato, as if he wished to escape the
sight of the resulting disasters which he anticipated, took the command
of a fleet of war vessels and sailed away to Spain. How the new liberty
affected his own wife we are left to surmise; which is not difficult, in
view of the opening sentences of his address.
While we are on the subject of the extraordinary fight of the women for
the repeal of this sumptuary law, it will not be inappropriate to take a
glance at the female dress of the time. There is ample evidence to show
that the women of ancient Rome were as prone to changing fashions as are
the ladies of our own day; but for several centuries the various parts
of their attire remained very much the same, the varying style affecting
chiefly the material and the quality. The costume of a Roman lady
consisted of three principal garment?,--the under tunic, the stola, and
the _palla_.
The under tunic was simply a sleeveless chemise, which was worn next to
the body. Stays, of course, were utterly unknown to the ancients, as is
shown by their statuary, which in these times affords us our only
opportunity of knowing what a naturally developed female figure is like.
A bosom band, or, as it was called, a strophium, made of leather, was
frequently worn above the tunic.
The stola was a white garment with sleeves, which covered only the upper
part of the arm; it was fastened above the shoulder with a clasp. The
_stola_ hung in large folds reaching to and covering the feet; around
the bottom was sewn a broad flounce, called the _instita_. Above this
_instita_ was a purple band, which was the only color, other than white,
ever used for the _stola_, except a colored stripe or sometimes gold
around the neck. Among the Romans, the _stola_ had a serious
significance, beyond its use as an article of attire.
Only matrons of
unsullied reputation were permitted to wear it. Women of tarnished
character were obliged to wear a dark-colored _toga_, somewhat similar
to that of the men; we find Horace speaking of the _togata_,--in
contradistinction to the matrons, and Tibullus writes of the prostitute
with her _toga_.
The _palla_, the out-of-doors garment, was to the women what the _toga_
was to the men. This was a large, white, and probably square, robe, or
mantle,--later on, colors became fashionable,--and the complex manner of
wearing it may best be understood by an examination of Roman statuary.
The feet were protected by sandals in the house, and shoes for street or
public wear; these were greatly ornamented. The shoes were of various
colors, generally white, but frequently green or yellow, and fastened
with red strings.
The Roman ladies, like those of modern times, exercised great care in
the dressing and arranging of their hair; and it is not to be denied
that they frequently sought, by artificial means, to rectify mistakes
which they deemed nature had made in the selection of color. In the time
of Juvenal, blonde seems to have had the preference. The ordinary style
was to carry the hair in smooth braids to the back of the head and there
fasten it in a knot, as usually seen in the statues. In ancient Rome the
curling iron was no less an intimate and indispensable friend of the
lady of fashion than it is at present; by this and other means, too
intricate for explanation by the uninitiated, marvellous creations were
produced. The satirist says: "Into so many tiers she forms her curls, so
many stories high she builds her head; in front you will look upon an
Andromache, behind she is a dwarf,--you would imagine her another
person." History reveals no age in which attention to personal adornment
was not such an intimate characteristic of female nature that women,
when unendowed with remarkable beauty, have been able to refrain from
unwisely seeking to attract notice by disfiguring themselves.
The Roman women wore ornaments in considerable profusion. These
consisted principally of necklaces, arm bands, finger rings, and ear
rings. Generally they were of gold, set with precious stones, and the
workmanship was often of a most exquisite character. A necklace was
found at Pompeii which was made of a band of plaited gold; on each half
of the clasp there is a well-executed frog, and on the edges where the
clasp joined were rubies, one of which still remains in its setting;
suspended to the necklace are seventy-one small, artistically shaped
pendants. Very many specimens of the jewelry worn by the women of
ancient Rome are still in existence, and they indicate fine artistic
taste on the part of the wearers, as well as great ability in design and
execution on that of the makers.
On the dressing table of the fashionable Roman lady there appeared a
wealth and a variety of cosmetics and costly essences in boxes and
receptacles delicately formed of ivory and precious metals, as well as
many other appliances for the toilet; so that her advantages in these
respects were probably in no way inferior to those of her fair
successors in modern times. An age was drawing near which, among many
other examples of its monstrous luxuriousness, gave birth to efforts to
enhance feminine attractiveness--efforts which doubtless were as futile
as they were foolish.
The time, however, had already come when, notwithstanding that their
manners were under the eye of such a censor as Cato, the women of Rome
had entirely and forever abandoned their old simplicity of life. In the
_Epidicus_ of Plautus, written at about the time of the disturbance over
the Oppian law, the matrons were represented on the stage as though
decked out with valuable estates; the cost of a cloak was the price of a
farm.
The new woman had begun to make her appearance in Rome.
This proverbial
phenomenon, so greatly talked of in our own time, is by no means a
modern discovery. She is a principal and an inevitable accompaniment of
progress in every age and race. She is either a natural evolution or a
monstrosity, according to the social conditions of her time. When
progress is normal and national development healthy, a more enlightened
and more sanely independent type of woman is continually appearing; but
so naturally and so quietly does she step into the higher position for
which she has been enabled to prepare herself that her coming is without
observation. On the other hand, where society is decadent, where
abnormal growths are favored by the heat of unrestrained passions, and
where volcanic revolutions in a nation may exalt characters which belong
to the shades of inferiority to positions of high conspicuity, there
appear feminine wonders upon earth; and men's hearts fail them for fear,
as they await with consternation the things which are shortly to come to
pass. Rome, during the latter years of the republican period, was in a
condition favorable to the production of anything bizarre and
phenomenal. The new wealth, the new learning, the new idleness, and the
new vices were fit soil for the production of a new woman who would
astonish the world for all time with her capacity for every excess of
moral insanity.
We do not, however, mean to allege that with the greater privileges and
increased freedom which entered into woman's life the old virtues and
time-honored excellences entirely disappeared. As Cornelia graced with
her learning and dignity the Rome of Cato's day, so did Cæcilia with her
charity and her goodness the Rome of Cicero. That orator was undoubtedly
prejudiced in her favor on account of the great kindness she showed to
Roscius, his client; but he could not have eulogized this matron as he
did, had not public opinion concurred with him in setting her up as a
model for all other women. "An incomparable woman," her accomplished
relations had no less honor conferred on them by her character than she
received by their dignity. Thus an unbroken chain of noble-minded
matrons may be traced through the darkest days of Rome's decadent
morality. Nevertheless, though virtue did not cease to be exemplified by
the few, or to be extolled by the writers, the growing depravity of the
times made it constantly easier for unprincipled and impudent women to
find their conduct accepted as the ordinary rule of life.
One chief cause--perhaps it is more correct to call it an
accompaniment--of the breaking-down of the ancient ideals is found in
the increasing tendency to deprecate the indissolubleness of marital
bonds. Divorce became common and easy, so that the student of Roman
biography finds it increasingly difficult to trace his characters
through the many involutions of their various matrimonial alliances.
Pompey married five times. Concerning his first two wives, Plutarch
makes the following comment: "Sylla, admiring the valor and conduct of
Pompey, ... sought means to attach him to himself by some personal
alliance, and his wife Metella joining in his wishes, they persuaded
Pompey to put away Antistia, and marry Æmilia, the stepdaughter of
Sylla, she being at that very time the wife of another man, living with
him, and with child by him. These were the very tyrannies of marriage,
and much more agreeable to the times under Sylla than to the nature and
habits of Pompey, that Æmilia, great with child, should be, as it were,
ravished from the embraces of another for him, and that Antistia should
be divorced with dishonor and misery by him for whose sake she had just
before been bereft of her father--for Antistius was murdered in the
Senate because he was suspected to be a favorer of Sylla for Pompey's
sake. Antistia's mother, likewise, after she had seen all these
indignities, made away with herself, a new calamity to be added to the
tragic accompaniments of this marriage; and that there might be nothing
wanting to complete them, Æmilia herself died, almost immediately after
entering Pompey's house, in childbed."
Down to a very late date, a divorce is not met with in the annals of
Rome; but with what unconcern the undoing of the marriage knot came to
be regarded is well illustrated in the life of Cato the Younger.
Attilia, his first wife, was put away for misconduct.
Then he married
Marcia, against whose reputation no blighting wind of scandal ever
raged. Among the dearest friends of her husband was Hortensius, known as
a man of good position and excellent character.
Evidently, as the sequel
shows, in all seriousness he sought to persuade Cato that the latter's
daughter Portia, who was married to a man to whom she had borne two
children, might be given to him. His argument was that she, as a fair
plot of land, ought to bear fruit; but that it was not right that one
man should be provided with a larger family than he could support,
while another had none. Cato answered that he loved Hortensius very
well, and much approved of uniting their houses; but he could not
approve of forcibly taking away his daughter from her husband. Then
Hortensius was bold enough to request that Cato, who, he thought, had
enough children, should relinquish to him his own wife.
Cato, seeing
that he was in earnest, consented to do this, stipulating first that his
wife's father should be consulted. No objection being raised in that
quarter, a marriage was performed between Marcia and Hortensius, Cato
assisting at the ceremony. In all this there is no mention made of
Marcia's consent being given or even asked. Some years afterward, Cato,
wanting someone to keep his house and take care of his daughters, took
Marcia again, Hortensius being now dead and having left her all his
estate. Cæsar, upon this, reproached Cato with covetousness; "for," he
said, "if he had need of a wife, why did he part with her? And if he had
not, why did he take her again? unless he gave her only as a bait to
Hortensius, and lent her when she was young, to have her again when she
was rich." The historian answers this by quoting the verse of Euripides:
"'To speak of mysteries-the chief of these Surely were cowardice in Hercules.'
"For," he says, "it were much the same thing to reproach Hercules for
cowardice and to accuse Cato of covetousness." The explanation of this
singular action, the cold nature which Cato inherited from his
grandfather the Censor being taken into consideration, seems to lie in
the fact that the Roman idea of the necessary guardianship over women
precluded any just conception of their rights in the disposal of their
own persons. The giving and the taking of a woman in marriage was
wholly the business of her father and her suitor; nothing was required
of her in the transaction save thankful obedience. Cato was perfectly at
liberty to give away his wife, if he so desired; this right was
guaranteed to him by the simple fact that she was his property.
For the same reason, while chastity on the part of the wife was regarded
as an absolute essential, the same virtue was by no means considered as
necessary to the good character of the man. The demand for purity in the
wife was largely based on the idea of proprietary rights which the
husband had in her person; hence the man could divorce the woman for
infidelity, but the reverse was not conceded. Plautus introduces upon
the stage two matrons, one of whom complains of her husband, and the
other consoles and exhorts her thus: "Listen to me. Do not quarrel with
your husband; let him love whom, and let him do what, he pleases, since
you have everything you want at home; keep in mind the fearful sentence:
'Begone, woman!'"
The new era which had dawned in Rome brought a certain freedom of
circumstances and activity within the reach of women; but it did not
give them in the marriage contract any more liberty than they had of
old. The only women who were allowed the disposal of their own persons
were the courtesans. There are many evidences that these were not
regarded with the disrespect in which their class is held in modern
times. For an example, Flora, who was famous in the last days of the
Republic, received on account of her exquisite beauty the high honor of
having her statue dedicated to the temple of Castor and Pollux; which
may be regarded as a kind of precedent for artists who in an Italy of a
much later date employed their mistresses as models for their Madonnas.
That this class of women did not hesitate to place a high value upon
themselves is proved by the instance of Tertia, to whom Verres presented
a Sicilian city. Lucretius speaks of the cost of their favors, giving us
also an interesting picture of the gayly dressed wanton:
"Amply though endowed.
His wealth decays, his debts with speed augment, The post of duty never fills he more, And all his sick'ning reputation dies.
Meanwhile rich unguents from his mistress laugh, Laugh from her feet sott Sicyon's shoes superb; The green-rayed emerald o'er her, dropt in gold, Gleams large and numerous; and the sea-blue silk; Deep-worn, enclasps her.
What his sires amassed
Now flaunts in ribbands, in tiaras flames Full o'er her front, and now to robes converts Of Chian loose, or Alidonian mould; While feasts and festivals of boundless pomp, And costliest viands, garlands, odors, wines, And scattered roses ceaseless are renewed."
The Voconian law, which had been enacted in the days of the elder Cato,
the purpose of which was the prevention of large accumulations of
property in female hands, did not prevent women from becoming rich in
the manner suggested above. A man might give away all his property while
alive; the law only vetoed excessive legacies. By its provisions, no
woman was allowed to receive by inheritance property exceeding the value
of one hundred thousand sesterces. "Since with the growing power of the
Empire the riches of private persons were increasing, fear was felt lest
the minds of women, being rather inclined by nature to luxury and the
pursuit of a more elegant routine of life, and deriving from unbounded
wealth incentives to desire, should fall into immoderate expenses and
luxury, and should subsequently chance to depart from the ancient
sanctity of manners, so that there would be a change of morals no less
than of the manner of living." These were the reasons for the enactment
of this measure. It was the kind of law which was dear to the heart of
the Censor, and it was with great delight that he lent his aid to its
passage. The people were a little doubtful as to its justice; but Cato
put an end to all hesitation by inveighing, with his usual asperity,
against the tyranny of women and their insufferable insolence when
opulent. He complained that oftentimes, when they brought a rich dowry
to their husbands, they kept back a large part of the money, and then
made loans to their husbands as though these were mere debtors. The
historian says that this assertion, enforced with a loud voice and good
lungs, moved the people to indignation, and they voted to pass the law.
It was exceedingly characteristic of the sentiments of the ancient
Romans to be convinced by Cato as he strenuously objected to that in
women which he strongly advocated as a rule for men.
There are two feminine names which, though belonging to women who were
contemporaries, well represent different aspects of the transition from
the old Rome of uncultured simplicity to the new Rome of immoral
refinement. One is Cornelia, who was the fifth wife of Pompey the Great;
the other is Clodia, the sister of Clodius the Turbulent. One conjoined
the new learning with the ancient purity of life, the other united
luxurious living with an abandoned career; one was a worthy successor of
her worthy namesake of a former generation, the other was a forerunner
of the amazing female characters of the most depraved days of the
Empire.
Cornelia, like the