Table Of ContentW O M E N ’ S
L I V E S ,
W O M E N ’ S
V O I C E S
ROMAN MATERIAL CULTURE
AND FEMALE AGENCY IN THE BAY OF NAPLES
Edited by Brenda Longfellow and Molly Swetnam-Burland
W O M E N ’ S L I V E S ,
W O M E N ’ S V O I C E S
W O M E N ’ S L I V E S ,
W O M E N ’ S V O I C E S
ROMAN MATERIAL CULTURE
AND FEMALE AGENCY IN THE BAY OF NAPLES
Edited by Brenda Longfellow & Molly Swetnam-Burland
University of Texas Press Austin
This book has been supported by an endowment dedicated to classics and the ancient
world and funded by the Areté Foundation; the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation;
the Dougherty Foundation; the James R. Dougherty, Jr. Foundation; the Rachael and
Ben Vaughan Foundation; and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Copyright © 2021 by the University of Texas Press
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Printed in the United States of America
First edition, 2021
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Longfellow, Brenda, 1973- editor. | Swetnam-Burland, Molly, editor.
Title: Women’s lives, women’s voices : Roman material culture and female agency in the Bay of Naples /
edited by Brenda Longfellow and Molly Swetnam-Burland.
Description: First edition. | Austin : University of Texas Press, [2021] | Includes bibliographical references
and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021007086
ISBN 978-1-4773-2358-8 (cloth)
ISBN 978-1-4773-2359-5 (library ebook)
ISBN 978-1-4773-2360-1 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Women—Italy—Pompeii (Extinct city) | Women—Italy—Herculaneum (Extinct city) |
Material culture—Italy—Pompeii (Extinct city) | Material culture—Italy—Herculaneum (Extinct city) |
Material culture—Italy—Naples, Bay of. | Civilization, Classical.
Classification: LCC DG70.P7 W725 2021 | DDC 305.40937/72568—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021007086
doi:10.7560/323588
Contents
List of Illustrations vii
Introduction. Negotiating Silence, Finding Voices, and Articulating Agency 1
Brenda Longfellow and Molly Swetnam-Burland
PART I. PUBLIC AND COMMERCIAL IDENTITIES
Chapter 1. Pompeian Women and the Making of a Material History 11
Lauren Hackworth Petersen
Chapter 2. Women’s Work? Investors, Money-Handlers, and Dealers 29
Molly Swetnam-Burland
Chapter 3. From Household to Workshop: Women, Weaving, and the Peculium 51
Lauren Caldwell
Chapter 4. Buying Power: The Public Priestesses of Pompeii 67
Barbara Kellum
Chapter 5. Real Estate for Profit: Julia Felix’s Property and the Forum Frieze 85
Eve D’Ambra
PART II. WOMEN ON DISPLAY
Chapter 6. Contextualizing the Funerary and Honorific Portrait Statues of Women
in Pompeii 109
Brenda Longfellow
Chapter 7. Portraits and Patrons: The Women of the Villa of the Mysteries in Their
Social Context 133
Elaine K. Gazda
Chapter 8. “What’s in a Name?” Mapping Women’s Names from the Graffiti of
Pompeii and Herculaneum 151
Erika Zimmermann Damer
Chapter 9. The Public and Private Lives of Pompeian Prostitutes 177
Sarah Levin-Richardson
PART III. REPRESENTING WOMEN
Chapter 10. Women, Art, Power, and Work in the House of the Chaste Lovers at
Pompeii 199
Jennifer Trimble
Chapter 11. The House of the Triclinium (V.2.4) at Pompeii: The House of a
“Courtesan”? 217
Luciana Jacobelli
Chapter 12. Sex on Display in Pompeii’s Tavern VII.7.18 229
Jessica Powers
Chapter 13. Drawings of Women at Pompeii 247
Margaret L. Laird
Epilogue. The Complexity of Silence 275
Allison L. C. Emmerson
Bibliography 283
List of Contributors 319
Illustration Credits 322
Index 326
Illustrations
FIGURES
Figure 1.1. The mosaic from the ekklesiasterion from the Temple of Isis (VIII.7.28),
Pompeii 12
Figure 1.2. Plan of the House of the Menander (I.10.4, 14–16), Pompeii 16
Figure 1.3. The elite male’s daily temporal use of space 16
Figure 1.4. Atrium of the House of the Menander (1.10.4, 14-16), Pompeii 18
Figure 1.5. Enactment of working over the cooktop at the House of the Prince of Naples
(VI.15.7–8), Pompeii 20
Figure 1.6. Columella of Tyche, tomb 16, Herculaneum Gate, Pompeii 22
Figure 1.7. Necklace from the body of a woman at the House of Holconius Rufus (VIII.4.4),
Pompeii 22
Figure 1.8. Curse tablets from the Tomb of the Epidii, Pompeii 23
Figure 2.1. Fresco from the façade of the Shop of Verecundus (IX.7.6–7), Pompeii 38
Figure 4.1. Plan of the Forum, Pompeii 66
Figure 4.2. Plan of Eumachia’s building (VII.9.1), Pompeii 68
Figure 4.3. Forum façade of Eumachia’s building (VII 9.1), Pompeii 69
Figure 4.4. Romulus with the spolia opima, mural from the façade of the house of fuller
Ululutremulus (IX.13.5), Pompeii 72
Figure 4.5. Aeneas leading his father and son to safety, mural from the façade of the house of
fuller Ululutremulus (IX.13.5), Pompeii 72
Figure 4.6. Concordia Augusta fountainhead outside the back entrance to Eumachia’s build-
ing (VII.9.67), on the Felix (II.4.3), Via dell’Abbondanza, Pompeii 75
Figure 4.7. The animal-inhabited acanthus currently at the entry of Eumachia’s building
(VII.9.1), Pompeii 76
Figure 4.8. Sacrifice scene from the west side of the Augustan marble altar in Mamia’s
Temple of the Genius of Augustus (or the Colony) (VII.9.2), Pompeii 77
Figure 4.9. Modern copies of the portrait statues of a public priestess and a heroized young
man from the east side of the Macellum (VII 9.7), Pompeii 79
Figure 5.1. Plan of the estate of Julia Felix (II.4.3), Pompeii 86
Figure 5.2. Stepped entrance to the estate of Julia Felix (II.4.3), Pompeii 88
Figure 5.3. Atrium of the estate of Julia Felix (II.4.3), Pompeii 91
vII
Figure 5.4. Still-life painting in the domus of the estate of Julia Felix (II.4.3), Pompeii 94
Figure 5.5. Engraving of fragment 9 of the Forum frieze in the atrium of the estate of Julia
Felix (II.4.3), Pompeii 96
Figure 5.6. Engraving of fragment 15 of the Forum frieze in the atrium of the estate of Julia
Felix (II.4.3), Pompeii 100
Figure 6.1. Statue of an anonymous woman from the Herculaneum Gate necropolis,
Pompeii 110
Figure 6.2. Detail of the anonymous woman from the Herculaneum Gate necropolis,
Pompeii 112
Figure 6.3. Façade tomb 7 OS, aedicula tomb 9 OS, exedra tomb 11 OS, and aedicula tomb
13 OS, Nucerian Gate necropolis, Pompeii 114
Figure 6.4. Flavia Agathea from tomb 7 OS, Nucerian Gate necropolis, Pompeii 115
Figure 6.5. Vertia Philumina from tomb 13 OS, Nucerian Gate necropolis, Pompeii 117
Figure 6.6. Anonymous woman from tomb 9 OS, Nucerian Gate necropolis, Pompeii 118
Figure 6.7. Anonymous man and woman from tomb 9 OS, Nucerian Gate necropolis,
Pompeii 120
Figure 6.8. Statue of Eumachia from Eumachia’s building (VII.9.1), Pompeii 122
Figure 6.9. Detail of the statue of Eumachia from Eumachia’s building (VII.9.1), Pompeii 123
Figure 7.1. Room 5 of the Villa of the Mysteries, Pompeii 134
Figure 7.2. The domina on the west wall of Room 5, Villa of the Mysteries, Pompeii 135
Figure 7.3. The bridal toilette in the southwest corner of Room 5, Villa of the Mysteries,
Pompeii 135
Figure 7.4. Head of the domina before restoration 137
Figure 7.5. Mosaic portrait of a woman from shop VI.13.15, Pompeii 137
Figure 7.6. Plan of Room 5, Villa of the Mysteries, Pompeii 139
Figure 7.7. Head of a woman with a child, Room 5, Villa of the Mysteries, Pompeii 141
Figure 8.1. Map of Pompeii 155
Figure 8.2. Women’s names in the Campus ad Amphitheatrum (Grand Palaestra, Pompeii),
mapped by column 161
Figure 9.1. Map of epigraphic attestations of the brothel’s prostitutes outside the purpose-
built brothel (VII.12.18–19), Pompeii 180
Figure 9.2. Paths from the purpose-built brothel (VII.12-18-19), Pompeii 181
Figure 9.3. Plan of the purpose-built brothel (VII.12-18-19), Pompeii 183
Figure 9.4. Plan of the forum latrine (VII.7.28), Pompeii 183
Figure 9.5. View through VII.12.18, Pompeii 184
Figure 9.6. Fresco vi (westernmost fresco on the south side of the hallway) from the purpose-
built brothel (VII.12-18-19), Pompeii 184
Figure 9.7. View through VII.12.19, Pompeii 186
Figure 9.8. Still of digital reconstruction of the purpose-built brothel 186
vIII ILLUSTRATIONS
Figure 10.1. Plan of the House of the Chaste Lovers (IX.12.6), Pompeii 201
Figure 10.2. View of the triclinium, House of the Chaste Lovers (IX.12.6), Pompeii 202
Figure 10.3. Painting of Mercury from the façade of the House of the Chaste Lovers (IX.12.6),
Pompeii 204
Figure 10.4. Painting of Venus from workroom g, House of the Chaste Lovers (IX.12.6),
Pompeii 205
Figure 11.1. Plan of the House of the Triclinium (V.2.4), Pompeii 218
Figure 11.2. Central scene from the north wall of room u, House of the Triclinium (V.2.4),
Pompeii 222
Figure 11.3. Central scene from room 23, House of the Citharist (I.4.5) Pompeii 223
Figure 11.4. Central scene from the west wall of room u, House of the Triclinium (V.2.4),
Pompeii 224
Figure 12.1. Relief depicting a couple, marble, National Archaeological Museum, Naples, inv.
no. 27714 228
Figure 12.2. Plan of tavern VII.7.18, Pompeii 228
Figure 12.3. East wall of room 4, tavern VII.7.18, Pompeii 230
Figure 12.4. Relief depicting a couple, right edge, Naples, National Archaeological Museum,
inv. no. 27714 232
Figure 12.5. Relief depicting a couple, detail, Naples, National Archaeological Museum, inv.
no. 27714 232
Figure 12.6. Relief depicting a couple, back, Naples, National Archaeological Museum, inv. no.
27714 233
Figure 12.7. Double-sided relief with theatrical masks, marble, Naples, National Archaeologi-
cal Museum, inv. no. 6619 235
Figure 12.8. Double-sided relief with theatrical masks and dolphins, marble, Naples, National
Archaeological Museum, inv. no. 6638 235
Figure 12.9. South wall of room 11, House of the Ephebe (I.7.10–12), Pompeii 237
Figure 13.1. Drawings of mortal women surviving in situ or in apographs 249
Figure 13.2. Drawings of mythological women surviving in situ or in apographs 251
Figure 13.3. Drawing of Minerva; drawing of a man wearing a palla 252
Figure 13.4. Drawing of Fortunata from the Shop of the Fruit Vendor Felix (I.8.1),
Pompeii 254
Figure 13.5. Drawing of a woman identified as Sagania, from Porta Nocera tomb 12 EN,
Pompeii 255
Figure 13.6. Profile of Nigra and salutation, façade of the Shop of Sotericus (III.2.2),
Pompeii 257
Figure 13.7. Obsidian mirror between triclinium 11 and cubiculum 12, House of the Orchard
(I.9.5–7), Pompeii 259
Figure 13.8. Plan of the Stabian Baths (VII.1.8), Pompeii 262
Figure 13.9. Drawing of Hiria in the peristyle of the house at I.7.19, Pompeii 264
ILLUSTRATIONS Ix
