A Short History of Women's Rights Part 6

[158] Ulpian in Dig., 38, 16, 1: suos heredes accipere debemus filios filias sive naturales sive adoptivos. Instances of daughters being left heiresses of whole estates may be found, e.g., in Dig., 28, 2, 19: c.u.m quidam filiam ex a.s.se heredem scripsisset filioque, quem in potestate habebat, decem lega.s.set, etc. Or the example mentioned by Scaevola in Dig., 41, 9, 3: Duae filiae intestato patri heres exst.i.terunt, etc.

[159] Callistratus in Dig., 48, 19, 26: crimen vel poena paterna nullam maculam filio infligere potest. namque unusquisque ex suo admisso sorti subicitur nec alieni criminis successor const.i.tuitur; idque divi fratres Hierapolitanis rescripserunt. "Nothing is more unjust," writes Seneca (de Ira, ii, 34, 3), "than that any one should become the heir of the odium excited by his father."

[160] Paulus, v, xii, 1.

[161] Paulus, v, xii, 12.

[162] Ulpian in Dig., 48, 4, 11.

[163] Ulpian in Dig., 48, 4, 11.

[164] Hermogenia.n.u.s in Dig., 48, 4, 9.

[165] Sulla had not only deprived the children of the proscribed of all their estates, but had also debarred them from aspiring to any political office--see Velleius Paterculus, ii, 28.

[166] For examples of the clemency of Augustus see Suetonius, _div.

Aug._, 33 and 51 and 67; Seneca, _de Ira_, iii, 23, 4 ff., and 40, 2; Velleius Paterculus, ii, 86, 87.

[167] For Tiberius see, e.g., Tacitus, _Annals_, iv--case of Silius; id., _Annals_, iii, 17, 18--case of Piso. For Nero, note Tacitus, _Annals_, xiii, 43--case of Publius Suilius. Clemency of Claudius mentioned in Dio, 60, 15, 16; of Vitellius in Tacitus, _Hist_., ii, 62.

[168] Spartia.n.u.s, _Had._, 18.

[169] Capitolinus, _Anton. Pius_, 7. See also the anecdote of Aurelian in Vopiscus, _Aurelian_, 23.

[170] Codex, iv, 12, 2, rescript of Diocletian: ob maritorum culpam uxores inquietari leges vetant. proinde rationalis noster, si res quae a fisco occupatae sunt dominii tui esse probaveris, ius public.u.m sequetur.

[171] Gaius, ii, 129 and 132.

[172] Gaius, ii, 132.

[173] Codex, iii, 36, 11: Inter filios ac filias bona intestatorum parentium pro virilibus portionibus aequo iure dividi oportere explorati iuris est.

[174] Gaius, iii, 25-31.

[175] See, e.g., Codex, vi, 60, i: Res, quae ex matris successione fuerint ad filios devolutae, ita sint in parentum potestate, ut fruendi dumtaxat habeant facultatem, dominio videlicet eorum ad liberos pertinente.

[176] For all this, see Codex, v, 9, 5, and vi, 18, q.

[177] Paulus, v, 4, 14, who adds that exile was the penalty if the crime had not been completely carried out. It would seem also that ravished women had the option of deciding whether their seducers should marry them or be put to death--see the _vitiatarum electiones_ as mentioned by Tacitus, _Dial. de Orat_., 35. According to Ruffus, 40, a soldier who did violence to a girl had his nostrils cut off, besides being forced to give the injured woman a third part of his goods: militi, qui puellae vim adtulerit et stupraverit, nares abscinduntur, data puellae tertia militis facultatum parte.

[178] Paulus, v, 4, 21.

[179] By the lex Fabia. Paulus, v, 30 B. Digest, 48, 15; 17, 2, 51.

[180] Ulpian in Dig., 48, 8, 8; ibid., Tryphoninus, 48, 19, 39.

[181] Paulus, v, 23, 14; id. in Dig., 48, 19, 38.

[182] Paulus, supra cit.

[183] Martial, x, 35, and x, 38.

[184] Sappho, Telesilla, and Corinna belong to an earlier period, when the Oriental idea of seclusion for women had not yet become firmly fixed in Greece. Women like Agallis of Corcyra, who wrote on grammar (Athenaeus, i, 25) and lived in a much later age, doubtless belonged to the _hetaerae_ cla.s.s.

[185] See, e.g., Pliny, _Letters_, v, 16.

[186] Pliny, _Letters_, i, 16.

[187] Persius, i, 4-5: Ne mihi Polydamas et Troiades Labeonem praetulerint? "Are you afraid that Polydamas and the Trojan Ladies will prefer Labeo to me?" The _Trojan Ladies_, of course, stand for the aristocratic cla.s.ses, Colonial Dames, so to speak, who were fond of tracing their descent back to Troy just as Americans like to discover that their ancestors came over in the _Mayflower_.

[188] Juvenal, vi, 434-440.

[189] Cf. Martial, ii, 90: sit mihi verna satur, sit non doctissima coniunx.

[190] The famous verses of Martial:

Quid tibi n.o.bisc.u.m, ludi scelerate magister? Invisum pueris virginibusque caput!

[191] Vespasian (69-79 A.D.) started free public education by appointing Quintilian Professor of Rhetoric subsidised by the state. Succeeding emperors enlarged upon it; but especially Alexander Severus (222-235 A.D.), who inst.i.tuted salaries for teachers of rhetoric, literature, medicine, mechanics, and architecture in Rome and the provinces, and had poor boys attend the lectures free of charge--see Lampridius, _Alex.

Severus_, 44.

[192] Pliny, _Paneg._, 26. Spartia.n.u.s, _Hadrian_, 7, 8-9. Capitolinus, _Anton. Pius 8_; id. _M. Anton. Phil._ II. Lampridius, _Alex_.

_Severus_, 57.

[193] Pliny, _Letters_, vii, 18. The sum was 500,000 sesterces.

[194] Any infringement of this vow was punished by burial alive--for instances, see Suetonius, _Domitian_, 8; Herodian, iv, 6, 4: Pliny, _Letters_ iv, 11; Dio, 77, 16 (Xiphilin). Their paramours were beaten to death.

[195] A full account of the Vestals will be found in Aulus Gellius, i, 12.

[196] Quintilian, vii, 3, 27: ad servum nulla lex pertinet. On the rare instances when a slave could inform against his master in a public court, see Hermogenia.n.u.s in Dig., v, 1, 53.

[197] Gaius, i, 52 ff.

[198] Gaius, iii, 222. Cf. Juvenal vi, 219-223, and 474-495.

[199] Gaius, iii, 222. Salvius Julia.n.u.s, Pars Secunda, xv. Aulus Gellius, xx, i.

[200] Paulus, v, 16.

[201] Paulus, iii, v, 5 ff. Pliny, _Letters_, viii, 14. Tacitus, _Annals_ xiii, 32.

[202] Valerius Maximus, vi, 8, in a chapter ent.i.tled _de fide servorum_ speaks with great admiration of instances of fidelity on the part of slaves. Seneca ate with his--_Epist_. 47, 13. Martial laments the death of a favourite slave girl--v, 34 and 37. Dio (62, 27--Xiphilin) notes the heroic conduct of Epicharis, a freedwoman, who was included in a conspiracy against Nero; but she revealed none of its secrets, though tortured in every way by Tigellinus. The pages of Pliny are full of the spirit of kindliness to slaves.

[203] See Tacitus, _Annals_, xiv, 42 ff.

[204] Suetonius, _Claudius_, 25. Dio, 60, 29 (Xiphilin).

[205] Sec, e.g., Seneca, _de Clem_., i,18, 1 and 2--especially the anecdote of Vedius Pollio (mentioned also by Dio, 54, 23).