How were Roman Women protrayed (in paiting, literature etc.) the Imperial Age?

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How were Roman Women protrayed (in paiting, literature etc.) the Imperial Age?
Very hot but plump.
Reply:The ideal Roman woman was the virtuous matron, who was good and chaste wife and mother. The paragon was Cornelia, a virtuous widow, who turned down an offer of marriage from a Ptolemy (the ruling house of Egypt), and remained faithful to the memory of her husband, Tiberius Gracchus, to whom she had borne twelve children. In 'Women's Life in Greece and rome; a Sourcebook' it says





'Cornelia was admired for her virtue, fidelity, and not least, her intelligence. She was the standard by which roman matrons were measured and has been remembered as the ideal of roman womanhood for two millenia.' Plutarch wrote of her:





" She remained a widow, and of her children, only a duagher survived, who married Scipio the younger, and the two sons, the subject of these biographies, Tiberius and Gaius. After they were born she raised them in such a laudable manner that, although they were generally agreed to be the most naturally gifted of all romans their virtue was regarded as having come from their education rather than their birth."





The historian Tacitus praised the good mothers of the past:





'In the old days every child born to a respectable mother was brought up not in the room of a bought nurse but at his mother's knee. It was her particular honour to care for the home and to serve her children. An older female relative, of tested character, was picked to be in charge of all the children in the house. She supervised not only the boys' studies but also their recreation and games with piety and modesty. Thus, tradition has it, Cornelia, mother of the Gracchi, Aurelia, mother of Julius Caesar, and Atlia, mother of Augustus, brought up their sons and produced princes.'





A Roman philosopher called Musonius Rufus advocated women's education. He wrote:





'Women have received from the gods the same ability to reason as men have. Likewise women have the same senses as men, sight, hearing, smell and all the rest. Likewise each has the same parts of the body, and neither sex has more than the other. In addition, it is not men alone who possess eagerness and a natural inclination towards virtue, but women also. Women are pleased no less than men by noble and just deeds, and reject the opposite of such actions. Since that is so, why is it apporpiriate for men to seek out and exmaine how they might live well, that is, to practice philosophy, but not women? Is it fitting forf men to be good, but not women?"





Roman literature contains stories of courageous women like Cloelia, a woman who was taken as a hostage in the Etruscan wars. Livy writes of her:





"Seeing that the romans so repsected courage, women too were inspired to carry out acts of heroism and Cloelia, one of the girls given as hostages, since the Etruscan camp was situation not far from the bank of the Tiber, eluded the gaurds and swam the Tiber amidst a rain of enemy spears at the head of a group of other girls. They all reached rome safely and she restored them to theri families."





Funeral eulogies described the qualities admired in Roman women. One such eulogy says:





"Why should I mention your domestic virtues: your loyalty, obedience, affability, reasonableness, industry in working wool, religion without superstition, sobrietyof attire, modesty of appearance? Why dwell on your love for your relatives, your devotion to your family? You have shown the same attention to your mother as you did to your own parents, and have taken care to secure an equally peaceful life for her as you did for your own people, and you have innumerable other merits in common with all married women who care for their good name."





Pliny the Younger, the historian, wrote a letter to his wife's aunt praising his wife to her:





"I am sure you will be happy to hear that she is proving worthy of her father, her grandfather, and you. She is highly intelligent, and extremely frugal; she loves me, which is a sign of chastity. Her love for me has made her take up books. She reads and rereads my writings and even memories them. She is solicitous for me when I am starting a new case and happy with me when it is over. when I am in court, sh e has messengers tell her how the case is going. When I read my own work aloud, she sits discreetly behind a curtain and soaks up the praise. She accompanies herself on the lyre as she sings my verses, with no instructor but love, the best teacher of all."





Of Julia, daughter of the emperor Augustus, who became notorious for her love affairs, Macrobius writes:





'She abused the indulgence of fortune no less than that of her father. Of course her love of literature and considerable culture, a thing easy to come by in that hosuehold, and also her kindness and gentleness and utter freedom from vindictiveness had won her immense popularity, and people who knew about her faults were amazed that she combined them with qualities so much their opposite.'





The poet Martial wrote in praise of a woman poet called Sulpicia of the 1st century AD, whose poems are now lost:





'Let all girls read Sulpicia if they want to please their husbands alone. And let every husband read Sulpicia who wants to please his bride alone. She doesn't write about the Colchians fury or Thysestes' deadly dinner; she doesn't believe in Scylla and Byblis; but she teaches chaste and honest loves, the games, the delights, the humour of love. he who appreciates her poetry will say that no woman was more mischievous, and no woman more modest. And, Sappho, if she'd been your teacher or classmate, you'd have learned more and kept your chastity intact. But if hard Phaon had seen you and her together he'd have loved Sulpicia.'