L. J. Trafford - Sex and Sexuality in Ancient Rome

Sex and Sexuality

in Ancient Rome

in Ancient Rome

LJ Trafford

First published in Great Britain in 2021 by

Pen & Sword History

An imprint of

Pen & Sword Books Ltd

Yorkshire Philadelphia

Copyright LJ Trafford 2021

ISBN 978 1 52678 687 6

eISBN 978 1 52678 688 3

The right of LJ Trafford to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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To Kate and Clare, with gratitude for pizza, wine and gossip

Romes greatest morality master, the emperor Augustus.

Stoic philosopher and tutor to Nero, Seneca.

The Tabularium on the Capitol Hill in Rome, where new citizens of the city were registered.

An example of a more ornate bulla Roman boys would have worn.

A 16th century representation of the rape of Lucretia that brought down the Roman monarchy.

The Vestal Virgin Tuccia being inspected while carrying water in a sieve to prove her chastity.

The Sleeping Hermaphroditus.

Terracotta statuette of a dancing youth.

Flavia Julia Titi, daughter of Titus.

Marble portrait of Matidia.

Julia Domna, wife to Septimius Severus, sporting her do.

Marble portrait of the co-emperor Lucius Verus.

Terracotta votive scalp, Roman, 200 BCE 200 ce .

A clay-baked vulva. Roman votive offering.

Clay-baked uterus. Roman votive offering.

Three Roman votive offerings: penis.

Marble statue of the so-called Stephanos Athlete

Roman surgical instruments, embryo hook and decapitator.

Copy of vaginal speculum, Europe, 19011939.

Statue of the roman poet Gaius Valerius Catullus in Sirmione, Lake Garda, Italy.

Venus and Cupid Lorenzo Lotto (Italian, Venice ca. 14801556 Loreto).

Constantine the Great, whose wife and son died in mysterious circumstances.

Bust in white marble of Antinous favourite of the Emperor Hadrian, worshipped in guise of Dionysius but here represented as a young man.

Braschi Antinous as Dionysos, plaster cast.

Portrait bust of Hadrian, plaster cast.

Image from the famous Warren cup, now in the British Museum.

The enterprising Caligula who set up a brothel in the palace.

Gladiator Merchandise in the shape of a glass cup.

Priapus: A man using scales to weigh his genitals.

A very jangly hanging phallus from Pompeii.

Phallic sign found on a Pompeii house, the inscription means Here Lives Happiness.

Plaster copy of an original phallus design.

One of the many pavement penises in Pompeii, are they directing patrons to the nearest brothel?

Villa Jovis on the island of Capri, where allegedly Tiberius got up to all kinds of depravity.

A young and innocent looking Commodus.

An innocent looking perfume bottle responsible for the decaying morals of Rome, mid 1st century CE .

T here is a certain image of ancient Rome that prevails in the modern mind: one of a city soaked in depravity and decadence; a sexual free-for-all where anyone could do anything to anyone they wanted; an empire whose lack of morality was the catalyst for its decline and ultimately its fall, at least according to Edward Gibbon.

This sinful city picture is somewhat ratified by what the surviving sources and archaeological artefacts have to say: there is biographer Suetonius frankly eye-popping account of what the Emperor Tiberius got up to on the island of Capri; the first-century CE poet Martial, whose subject matters include a rant on his girlfriend refusing to let him sodomise her, grey pubic hair, and a claim that an acquaintance is handing out dinner party invitations based solely on penis size.

Elsewhere the great unpublished can be seen expressing their sexual complaints/comments/boasts on the walls of Pompeii and Herculaneum. We are told that the gladiator Celadus makes all the girls moan, that Theophilius performs oral sex on women, and then there is the anonymous soul who believed the walls of a local villa were the perfect place to confess to his fellow townsfolk, I have buggered men.

Even religion wasnt exempt from this bawdiness. The gods themselves partook in adultery, incest and even bestiality, all of which were represented in the art of the era, along with a multitude of depictions of the male sexual organ on walls, pavements, in shrines, homes, above shop doorways and on jewellery.

Naples Museum has a secret cabinet of artefacts from Pompeii and the surrounding area that were deemed too shocking to be seen by regular tourists. Visiting this secret cabinet was to be confronted with hundreds of terracotta penises, alongside frescoes of couples entwined in love making and a truly stupendous statue of the god Pan having it away with a goat.

Sex was very much on public display in ancient Rome. It was depicted in art, discussed in poetry, scrawled on walls and used in politics to smear your opponent. Is it any wonder we see ancient Rome as a 400-year-long orgy? But is this a true portrait of a society?

Rome at its height in the first century CE was home to a million people; it would be very surprising if they all held the same views on any topic, including sex and sexuality. In fact, if you dig a little deeper beneath the in-your-face depictions of penises on every street corner and explicit frescoes, the story gets a lot more complex. Despite being a society lacking the Christian notion of sexual sin, Rome was far from being a free-for-all; there were constraints, both social and legal, on sexual behaviour. In Sex and Sexuality in Ancient Rome we shall delve into these rules, looking at what was expected sexual behaviour for both men and women, and whether the reality matched the ideal. We shall look at what was understood about sex, procreation and contraception in the ancient world, examine what was truly taboo in the bedroom, and explore why there are quite so many penises depicted in Pompeii.

Leave your preconceptions at the door and let us get into bed with the Romans.

T hose of a delicate sensibility would be wise to step away from this book now, for we are going to delve into how the ancient Romans talked about sex. Fruity is not the word, think more of a thumping great plank to the face. Words were not minced, they were hurled aggressively towards their target. But it is an important topic to start with for it helps explain much about Roman society that we will look at later, including why such extreme stories of sexual depravity attach themselves to emperors, and how female sexuality was viewed.