Editing Roman Empire (section)

====Women in Roman law====
{{Main|Women in ancient Rome}}

{{Multiple image
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| image1 = Fanciulla intenta alla lettura (IV stile), I sec, da pompei, MANN 8946.JPG
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| image2 = Bronze young girl reading CdM Paris.jpg
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| footer = '''Left:''' Fresco of an [[Auburn hair|auburn]] maiden reading a text, [[Pompeian Styles|Pompeian Fourth Style]] (60–79 AD), [[Pompeii]], Italy<br />'''Right:''' Bronze statuette (1st century AD) of a young woman reading, based on a [[Hellenistic art|Hellenistic]] original
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Freeborn Roman women were considered citizens, but did not vote, hold political office, or serve in the military. A mother's citizen status determined that of her children, as indicated by the phrase ''ex duobus civibus Romanis natos'' ("children born of two Roman citizens").{{Efn|The ''civis'' ("citizen") stands in explicit contrast to a ''[[Peregrinus (Roman)|peregrina]]'', a foreign or non-Roman woman<ref>{{Citation |last=Sherwin-White |first=A.N. |title=Roman Citizenship |date=1979 |publisher=Oxford University Press |author-link=A. N. Sherwin-White |pages=211, 268}}; {{Harvp|Frier|McGinn|2004|pp=31–32, 457}}</ref> In the form of legal marriage called ''conubium,'' the father's legal status determined the child's, but ''conubium'' required that both spouses be free citizens. A soldier, for instance, was banned from marrying while in service, but if he formed a long-term union with a local woman while stationed in the provinces, he could marry her legally after he was discharged, and any children they had would be considered the offspring of citizens—in effect granting the woman retroactive citizenship. The ban was in place from the time of Augustus until it was rescinded by [[Septimius Severus]] in 197 AD.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Phang |first=Sara Elise |title=The Marriage of Roman Soldiers (13 B.C.–A.D. 235): Law and Family in the Imperial Army |date=2001 |publisher=Brill |page=2}}; {{Cite book |last=Southern |first=Pat |title=The Roman Army: A Social and Institutional History |date=2006 |publisher=Oxford University Press |page=144 |author-link=Pat Southern}}</ref>}} A Roman woman kept her own [[Roman naming conventions|family name]] (''nomen'') for life. Children most often took the father's name, with some exceptions.{{Sfnp|Rawson|1987|p=18}} Women could own property, enter contracts, and engage in business.<ref>{{Harvp|Frier|McGinn|2004|p=461}}; {{Harvp|Boardman|2000|p=733}}.</ref> Inscriptions throughout the Empire honour women as benefactors in funding public works, an indication they could hold considerable fortunes.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Woodhull |first=Margaret L. |chapter=Matronly Patrons in the Early Roman Empire: The Case of Salvia Postuma |date=2004 |title=Women's Influence on Classical Civilization |publisher=Routledge |page=77}}</ref>

The archaic [[manus marriage|''manus'' marriage]] in which the woman was subject to her husband's authority was largely abandoned by the Imperial era, and a married woman retained ownership of any property she brought into the marriage. Technically she remained under her father's legal authority, even though she moved into her husband's home, but when her father died she became legally emancipated.{{Sfnp|Frier|McGinn|2004|pp=19–20}} This arrangement was a factor in the degree of independence Roman women enjoyed compared to many other cultures up to the modern period:<ref>{{Cite book |last=Cantarella |first=Eva |title=Pandora's Daughters: The Role and Status of Women in Greek and Roman Antiquity |date=1987 |publisher=Johns Hopkins University Press |pages=140–141 |author-link=Eva Cantarella}}; {{Cite journal |last=Sullivan |first=J.P. |date=1979 |title=Martial's Sexual Attitudes |journal=Philologus |volume=123 |issue=1–2 |doi=10.1524/phil.1979.123.12.288 |page=296 |s2cid=163347317}}</ref> although she had to answer to her father in legal matters, she was free of his direct scrutiny in daily life,{{Sfnp|Rawson|1987|p=15}} and her husband had no legal power over her.{{Sfnp|Frier|McGinn|2004|pp=19–20, 22}} Although it was a point of pride to be a "one-man woman" (''univira'') who had married only once, there was little stigma attached to [[Marriage in ancient Rome#Divorce|divorce]], nor to speedy remarriage after being widowed or divorced.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Treggiari |first=Susan |author-link=Susan Treggiari |title=Roman Marriage: 'Iusti Coniuges' from the Time of Cicero to the Time of Ulpian |date=1991 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=0-1981-4939-5 |pages=258–259, 500–502}}</ref> Girls had equal inheritance rights with boys if their father died without leaving a will.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Johnston |first=David |title=Roman Law in Context |date=1999 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |chapter=3.3}}; {{Harvp|Frier|McGinn|2004|loc=Ch. IV}}; {{Cite book |last=Thomas |first=Yan |chapter=The Division of the Sexes in Roman Law |date=1991 |title=A History of Women from Ancient Goddesses to Christian Saints |publisher=Harvard University Press |page=134}}</ref> A mother's right to own and dispose of property, including setting the terms of her will, gave her enormous influence over her sons into adulthood.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Severy |first=Beth |title=Augustus and the Family at the Birth of the Empire |date=2002 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=1-1343-9183-8 |page=12}}</ref>
[[File:Wall painting - mistress and three maids - Herculaneum (insula orientalis II - palaestra - room III) - Napoli MAN 9022.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Dressing of a priestess or bride, Roman fresco from [[Herculaneum]], Italy (30–40 AD)]]

As part of the Augustan programme to restore traditional morality and social order, [[Leges Iuliae|moral legislation]] attempted to regulate conduct as a means of promoting "[[family values]]". [[Marriage in ancient Rome#Adultery|Adultery]] was criminalized,{{Sfnp|Severy|2002|p=4}} and defined broadly as an illicit sex act (''[[stuprum]]'') between a male citizen and a married woman, or between a married woman and any man other than her husband. That is, a [[double standard]] was in place: a married woman could have sex only with her husband, but a married man did not commit adultery if he had sex with a prostitute or person of marginalized status.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=McGinn |first=Thomas A. J. |date=1991 |title=Concubinage and the Lex Iulia on Adultery |journal=Transactions of the American Philological Association |volume=121 |doi=10.2307/284457 |pages=335–375 (342) |jstor=284457}}; {{Cite book |last=Mussbaum |first=Martha C. |chapter=The Incomplete Feminism of Musonius Rufus, Platonist, Stoic, and Roman |date=2002 |title=The Sleep of Reason: Erotic Experience and Sexual Ethics in Ancient Greece and Rome |publisher=University of Chicago Press |page=305 |author-link=Martha C. Nussbaum}}, noting that custom "allowed much latitude for personal negotiation and gradual social change"; {{Cite book |last=Fantham |first=Elaine |chapter=''Stuprum'': Public Attitudes and Penalties for Sexual Offences in Republican Rome |date=2011 |title=Roman Readings: Roman Response to Greek Literature from Plautus to Statius and Quintilian |publisher=Walter de Gruyter |page=124 |author-link=Elaine Fantham}}, citing [[Papinian]], ''De adulteriis'' I and [[Modestinus]], ''Liber Regularum'' I. {{Cite book |author-link=Eva Cantarella |first=Eva |last=Cantarella |title=Bisexuality in the Ancient World |publisher=Yale University Press |date=2002 |orig-date=1988 (Italian), 1992 |page=104}}; {{Harvp|Edwards|2007|pp=34–35}}.</ref> Childbearing was encouraged: a woman who had given birth to three children was granted symbolic honours and greater legal freedom (the ''[[ius trium liberorum]]'').<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Grace |first=Angela |date=2015-08-28 |title=Fecunditas, Sterilitas, and the Politics of Reproduction at Rome |url=https://yorkspace.library.yorku.ca/items/11ea9842-ee50-4950-ab9f-0ec10232d16f |journal=York Space}}</ref>