Invisible Romans (55 page)

NOTE ON TRANSLATIONS

Material from a number of my main sources are given from others’ excellent translations as follows, with the permission of the relevant publisher:

Curse tablets: John G. Gager,
Curse Tablets and Binding Spells from the Ancient World
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992).

Dorotheus of Sidon:
Carmen Astrologicum,
trans. David Pingree (Abingdon, MD: Astrology Classics, 2005); original publication in
Carmen Astrologicum,
trans. David Pingree (Munich: K. G. Saur, 1976).

The New Testament: THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2010 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Papyri: Roger S. Bagnall and Raffaella Cribiore, with contributions by Evie Ahtaridis,
Women’s Letters from Ancient Egypt, 300 BC–AD 800
(Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2006); Jane Rowlandson (ed.),
Women and Society in Greek and Roman Egypt: A Sourcebook
(Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1998).

Popular literature: William Hansen (ed.),
Anthology of Ancient Greek Popular Literature
(Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1998).

All other translations are my own, except for those attributed to another scholar in this format: ‘/Luck.’ These scholars can be found in the list of Abbreviations on pp. 342–6.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Next to the satisfaction of seeing a completed book in your hands, the greatest pleasure comes from acknowledging the help others have offered along the way. And the way has been long, from the initial encouragement of Donald Lateiner through some bemused if not skeptical receptions to acceptance and, at last, final completion. My editor, John Davey, has been steady in his support, seeing promise and nurturing the book with just the right combination of nudging, praise, and discipline. Colleagues have helped in various ways, some with simple belief in the project, others by taking their valuable time to set me straight on details or to read chapters and offer insightful suggestions for improvements. I would particularly like to express my appreciation to Natalie B. Kampen, who not only had steadfast, inspiring enthusiasm for the project, but spent many long hours reading early versions of sections. Likewise Erich Gruen was supportive and patient with requests for help. Arthur Pomeroy generously shared his own work and ideas; Abigail Turner’s labors on soldiers set me on the right path; Douglas Oakman helped with early Christian perspectives; and William Fitzgerald showed me how stimulating thinking a bit outside the norm could be – he, Carlos Galvao-Sobrhino, Lauren Petersen, and my Berkeley colleague Susanna Elm all helped greatly with the sections on slaves, freedmen, and ordinary men. Finally, Jeffrey Smith, who wanted to be mentioned, and most of all my wife, who has lived a quarter of her life
with this project, supporting it always not only with the usual spousal encouragement, but with many insights and stimulating comparative suggestions derived from her own work on a different people and its empire, the British; I doubt that many family dinner tables have seen the stimulating conversations ours has on the wide range of topics treated in
Invisible Romans.
Finally, the book is dedicated to my mother, who always wanted me to write a book she could read. Although she is gone now, my filial duty is met at last.
Dis manibus matris amantissimae filius pius f.c.

LIST OF FIGURES

1. Couple in bed. Musée Nationale des Antiquités, St. Germaine-en-Laye Inv. 72474. Photo: RMN/Gérard Blot/Art Resource, NY

2. Execration figure stuck with needles. Terracotta. Egyptian, Roman period. Louvre, Paris, France. Photo: Herve Lewandowski, Réunion des Musées Nationaux/Art Resource, NY

3. Married couple. Grave relief discovered in AD 1593 in a tomb near the Via Nomentana, Rome, now in London. Photo courtesy of the British Museum

4. Shop scene. Painting on the outside wall of the Shop of Verecundus, right pier of doorway 7, Pompeii. Photo: M. Della Corte,
Pompeii
(Pompeii, 1930) fig. 3 = Tanzer,
Common People of Pompeii
(Baltimore, 1939) fig. 7

5. Market scene. Relief sculpture, Ostia. Museo Ostiense, Ostia Antica, Italy Inv. 134. Photo: Schwanke (Neg. 1980.3236). Courtesy of the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Rome

6. Tomb relief of a butcher, 2 CE, Roman. Marble, Inv. ZV44. Photo: Elke Estel. Skulpturensammlung, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden, Germany. Photo courtesy of Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin/Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden/Elke Estel/Art Resource, NY

7. Dancers. Photo: A. De Moore,
Koptisch Textile uit Vlaamse privéverzamelingen
(Zottegem, 1993) cat. 60

8. Tomb offerings. Reconstruction of the burial field at Isola Sacra, Ostia Antica. Susan Walker,
Memorials to the Roman Dead
(London: British Museum, 1985) p. 10. Photo courtesy of the British Museum

9. Procession of slaves. The burial stele of Timotheus, Amphipolis, (Amfipoli), Greece. H. Duchêne, ‘Sur la stele d’Aulus Caprilius Timotheus, somatemporos,’
BCH
10 (1986): 513–530 fig. 1. Photo Jacques Ruger, courtesy of H. Duchêne

10. Slave auction. Tombstone from Capua. Museo Campano, Capua, Italy, Inv. 70. Photo: G. Fittschen (Neg. 1983 VW1305). Courtesy of the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Rome

11. Auctioning a slave. Relief sculpture from Arlon, France, now lost. Photo, E. Esperandieu,
Recueil général des bas-reliefs de la Gaule romaine
(Paris: Impr. nationale, 1907) V p. 226 (no. 4034)

12. Footprints of two slave women. Pietrabbondante, Italy. Photo courtesy of Davide Monaco

13. Granting freedom to a slave. Musée Royale Mariemont-Belgium Inv. R 14 (26). Photo Courtesy of Musée Royale Mariemont

14. Slaves freed in the testament of their owner. Tomb of the Haterii, Vatican Museum, Vatican State, Italy, Inv. 9999. Photo: Schwanke (Neg. 1981.2858). Courtesy of the Deutsches Archäologishes Museum, Rome

15. Freedman family Museo Nazionale Romano alle Terme di Diocleziano, Rome. Photo: Singer (Neg. 1973.0752). Courtesy of the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Rome

16. Soldiers in battle. Relief from the base of a column in the Mittelrheinisches Landesmuseum, Mainz, Germany. Photo: DeA Picture Library/Art Resource, NY

17. Housesteads fort. R. Embleton and F. Graham,
Hadrian’s Wall in the Days of the Romans
(Newcastle upon Tyne: Frank Graham, 1984) p. 133

18. Barracks. R. Embleton and F. Graham,
Hadrian’s Wall in the Days of the Romans
(Newcastle upon Tyne: Frank Graham, 1984) p. 106

19. Hospital in a camp. R. Embleton and F. Graham,
Hadrian’s Wall in the Days of the Romans
(Newcastle upon Tyne: Frank Graham, 1984) p. 146

20. A common soldier. Gravestone relief from Ljubljana Emona, Austria. ©Archäologisches Museum Carnuntinum, Bad Deutsch Altenburg, Austria. Photo: O. Harl

21. A common soldier. Gravestone relief from Petronell-Carnuntum, Austria. ©Archäologisches Museum Carnuntinum, Bad Deutsch Altenburg, Austria. Photo: O. Harl

22. A common soldier. Gravestone relief from Petronell-Carnuntum, Austria. ©Archäologisches Museum Carnuntinum, Bad Deutsch Altenburg, Austria. Photo: O. Harl

23. A common soldier. Gravestone relief from Petronell-Carnuntum, Austria. ©Archäologisches Museum Carnuntinum, Bad Deutsch Altenburg, Austria. Photo: O. Harl

24. A soldier’s family. Gravestone relief from Csákvár, Hungary. © Hungarian National Museum, Budapest, Hungary. Photo: O. Harl

25. Soldier and family. Gravestone from Budapest III Aquincum, Hungary. © Hungarian National Museum, Budapest, Hungary. Photo: O. Harl

26. Soldiers sacrificing. Gravestone relief. Magyar Nemzeti Múzeum, Budapest. Ortlof Harl, Ubi Era Lupa (
http://www.ubi-erat-lupa.org/
, Bild-ID: 6049–5). Photo: O. Harl

27. Interior of Pompeian brothel. House of the Lupanare, Pompeii, Italy Photo by Fotografica Foglia, courtesy of Scala/Art Resource, NY (ART174345)

28. A man entertained by a prostitute. Wallpainting from Pompeii. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Italy. Photo: Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY

29. Female gladiators. British Museum, London. Photo courtesy of the British Museum

30. Gladiatorial ‘souvenirs’. British Museum, London. Photo courtesy of the British Museum

31. Gladiator and his best friend, his dog From L. Robert,
Les gladiateurs dans l’Orient grec
(Paris: E. Champion, 1940), fig. 4

32. Gladiator offering to Nemesis. Relief from Sankt Peter in Holz, Austria. © Landesmuseum Kärnten, Austria. Photo: O. Harl

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

1. Street in Pompeii. Pompeii, Italy. Photo: Werner Forman/Art Resource, NY

2. Fresco mural of forum activity, Pompeii. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Italy. Photo: Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY

3. Relief of cutlery merchants, Pompeii. Vatican Museums, Vatican State, Italy. Photo: Scala/Art Resource, NY

4. Carpenters’ procession. Fresco (1 CE) from the Bottega del Profumiere, Pompeii. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Italy. Photo: Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY

5. Sorceress. Mosaic from Pompeii, House of the Dioscuri. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Italy. Photo: Scala/Art Resource, NY

6. Religious procession. Fresco on the wall of the Shop of the Procession to Cybele, Pompeii. Soprintendenza Archeologica di Pompei. Archivio Fotografico degli Scavi

7. The Big Game Hunt. Mosaic in the ambulatory of the Villa del Casale, Piazza Armerina, Sicily, Italy. (3–4 CE). Photo: Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY

8. Prostitutes. Fresco on the wall of the Terme Suburbane, Pompeii, Italy. Photo: Fotografica Foglia, courtesy of Scala/Art Resource, NY

9. Dice players (AD 3). Mosaic in a Roman villa near the Odeon, Carthage, Tunisia. Photo: G. Dagli Orti. © DeA Picture Library/Art Resource, NY

10. An ordinary woman. Fresco in the House of the Gilded Putti, Pompeii. Image courtesy of Alimdi

11. An ordinary woman. Fresco from Herculaneum, Italy. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Italy. Photo: Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY

12. Danae and Perseus as a Child. Fresco from the Casa Calepi, Pompeii. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Italy. Photo: Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY

13. Woman in childbirth. Funerary relief from tomb 100, Isola Sacra, Ostia Antica. Photo courtesy of the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Rome

14. Woman’s letter. University of Michigan Papyrology Collection
SB
V 7572 =
P. Mich.inv.
188. Photo courtesy of the Papyrology Collection. “Thermouthas to Valerias her mother, very many greetings and always good health. I received from Valerius the basket in which there were twenty pairs of wheat cakes and ten pairs of other cakes. Send me the blankets at the price (we agreed upon) and find quality wool, four fleeces. Give these items to Valerius. Also, I am at the moment seven months pregnant. And I greet Artemis and little Nikarous and Valerius, my lord (I long for him in my mind), and both Dionysia and Demetrous, many times, and little Taesis, many times, and all those in your house. And how is my father doing? Please send me news, because he was ill when he left me. I greet grandma. Rodine sends you greetings. I have set her to the handiwork; again I have need of her, but I am cheerful.” Translation of no. 220 in Jane Rowlandson, ed.,
Women and Society in Greek and Roman Egypt. A Sourcebook
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998)

15. Day laborers. Fresco from the catacomb of Trebius Justus, Via Mantellini 13 (at the intersection with the the Via Latina). J. Wilpert,
Die Malereien der Grabkammer des Trebius Iustus aus dem Ende der Konstantinischen Zeit,
fig. 16, in F. Dölger, ed.,
Konstantin der Grosse und seine Zeit
(Freiburg: Herder, 1913)

16. Tomb relief of a butcher, 2 CE, Roman. Marble, Inv. ZV44. Photo: Elke Estel. Skulpturensammlung, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden, Germany. Photo courtesy of Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin/Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden/Elke Estel/Art Resource, NY

17. Danae and the fisherman. Fresco from the Exedra, casa V,I,18, Pompeii. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples. Photo: Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY

18. Beggar. Fresco of a market scene from the atrium of the House of Julia Felix, Pompeii. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Inv. Num. 9059. Photo: A Maiuri,
Roman Painting
(Milan: Skira Publishing, 1953) plate 78, p. 140

19. A slave is struck. Relief from the Roman theatre, at the base of the stage, Sabrata (Sabratha), Tripolitania, Libya. Photo courtesy of Luca Bonacina