Domina: The Women Who Ran Ancient Rome

In ancient Rome, a woman was defined in relation to her family. Any fame she won was supposed to be confined to the private, domestic sphere.

She wove such fine wool; she kept such a fine house; she was so very chaste and never made her father look bad! They weren’t welcome in the public sphere of governance. They couldn't vote or hold office. Theirs was a distinctly patriarchal world, true fame and public achievement was supposed to be reserved for men. 

Where there’s a will, there’s a way, and in a society that coveted public glory, ambitious women found their way into the history books too, even if just in scraps and unflattering snatches. The tales we get of their lives come from male writers with their own agendas and prejudices, who treat them as cautionary tales and side stories as they write about important men. But when you read between the lines, we find women who stepped out from behind the shadows of their husbands and fathers to grasp real power and influence. 

But these dominas, or “female masters,” couldn’t just march out and take what they wanted; instead they had to be smart and calculating, walking a tightrope between respectability and their own ambition. Sometimes that tightrope was more of a knife’s edge. These women lived during tumultuous times: we’ll see them navigate unwanted marriages, political intrigue, exile to small islands, poisonous plots, poorly executed coups, bloodthirsty sons, cutthroat politics and MANY male haters, all while trying to stay alive and on top of the game in one of the world’s most successful of empires.

So let’s explore the lives of the women who lived during some of Rome’s most dramatic and game-changing periods. We’ll journey from the rough-and-tumble days of the late Roman Republic and see it through to its end, then into the first heady decades of the Roman Empire and the Julio-Claudian dynasty that ran the show for many decades. Who were these women, beyond the myths, legends, and smear campaigns? What decisions did they have to make, and what did it cost them to make them?

Grab a purple stola, a silver tongue, and a few vials of poison. Let’s go traveling.

This map shows how the Roman Empire grew over the years and highlights some of the women who fought against that expansion. You can buy a copy of this poster at my Exploress shop! Just go to the Store page.

MY Sources

Books

  • Caesar’s Wives: Sex, Power, and Politics in the Roman Empire by Annelise Freisenbruch. Simon and Schuster, 2010.

  • Encyclopedia of Women in the Ancient World, edited by Joyce Salisbury. ABC Clio, 2001.

  • Agrippina: The Most Extraordinary Woman of the Ancient World by Emma Southon (the USA edition is called Agrippina: Empress, Exile, Huster, Whore)

  • Julius Caesar: The Colossus of Rome by Richard A. Billows, Routledge, 2008.

  • Women at War in the Classical World by Paul Chrystal, Pen and Sword Military, 2017.

  • Antony & Cleopatra by Pat Southern, Amberley Publishing, 2009.

  • Plutarch, Parallel Lives, Vol. VII Demosthenes/Cicero/Alexander/Caesar, ed. by Bernadotte Perrin, Cambridge MA/London 1967. (found at Internet Archive)

  • Cleopatra: A Life by Stacey Schiff, Little, Brown and Company, 2010.

Podcasts

Online

Cornelia Refuses the Crown of the Ptolemai by Laurent de La Hyre, Wikicommons.

Cornelia Refuses the Crown of the Ptolemai by Laurent de La Hyre, Wikicommons.

Transcript

Keep in mind that I ad lib and edit a bit as I record, so this won’t be an exact match for the audio. And kindly ignore any typos: I do my best, but sometimes they slip through. also, the quotes in bold are ones I’ve made up for the drama, so please don’t quote them in your high school history paper as fact!

PART 1

It’s important to remember that we only know of these women because of their attachment to famous men. Ancient male writers are usually only including them as a footnote, and often those footnotes aren’t overly kind. For some of these women, we only have one or two ancient sources to go on, some of whom weren’t even alive at the same time. They treat gossip as fact, and twist those facts to fit their own agendas. Writers like Plutarch and Cicero like to reduce powerful women to either paragons of virtue who stayed at home and had many babies, or shameless harlots and harbingers of doom. All of which is to say that these are threads we’re dangling from here, not whole tapestries. We’re going to have to take what we think we know about these ladies, then put ourselves in their shoes and add in a splash of conjecture, building on their stories from there.

Also, if you haven’t listened to episodes 14 through 16, called When In Rome, I’d go back and do that before diving into this one. It’ll give you a whole lot of useful context on what it means to be a woman in Rome and help you understand the world we’re about to go traveling through.

Putting her up on a pedestal

To begin, let’s conjure up a picture of the “ideal Roman woman,” shall we? She’s modestly dressed, of course – no cleavage, ladies – with eyes downturned, looking at once both chaste and resolved to maintain that chastity at any cost. Male or female, your virtus--or honor--matters, and much of our honor is situated...directly between our legs. Of course it is.

To flesh out our Ideal Woman, let’s throw in the tales that formed the backbone of the Roman origin story. The mythological founders of Rome, Romulus and Remus, were conceived when their priestess mother, Rhea Silvia, was raped by the god of war. Then there’s the story of the Sabine women, who helped populate the city of Rome when it was little more than a frontier town dude ranch.

They were just minding their own business, bathing in a local stream, when some Roman men rode by and said something like:

ROMANS: Hey ladies, wanna take this party back to our place?

SABINE WOMEN: Um, no thank you.

ROMANS: Is this a ‘no means yes’ situation? Because that’s the vibe we’re getting.

SABINE: No. We do not want to party with you, or hold your hands, or be your wives. Please go away now.

ROMANS: You know, that sounds like a YES to us.

The women were kidnapped and taken back to Rome to produce strapping Roman youths: no consent required! And then, when their rageful menfolk came storming over to get them back, the Sabine women told them to put down their pitchforks and just roll with it, because what’s done is done, and they would rather DIE than cause any violence between their old families and their new ones. And then there is Lucretia, that early Roman matron who invited the Roman king’s son in like a good hostess, only to have him sneak into her bedroom and take her by force. When her husband found out, he told her it wasn’t her fault, but she said she’d rather die than live with the shame of it. Her suicide sparked a revolution that ended Rome’s monarchy and helped birth the Republic.

Rape, suicide, sacrifice. Are we sensing a disturbing trend? In all of these stories, we have women forced into sexual acts they don’t want, which is written over by what it gives the men around her. They become either a bridge that reaches over troubled waters, like the Sabines, or a flame that ignites a massive change. They all give up their lives to give birth to something. And THAT is part of the Roman picture of what an ideal Roman woman should be…yikes. 

These mythological women were lauded and revered, but not because they were famous. No: a ‘good Roman woman’ does not seek fame or notoriety. She is NOT ambitious, certainly: that’s super masculine, or so the ancient writers like to stress. How did real-world women deal with these impossible standards and cultural framework? How did women who wanted it all walk that line between public honor and infamy? 

If there was a Rate-Your-Roman-Matron scale, ranging from 10 for ‘Living Goddess’ to 1 for ‘Scourge Straight from the Mouth of the Underworld’, we’d find the three women we’re about to cover at three vastly different points. One’s up at 1, putting squarely into the Nasty Woman category. Another is at about a 5, I’d wager, in the Slightly Suspicious, But Also Respectable section. But the first woman we’re going to spend time with is right at 10, a shining beacon that every woman should aspire to be like. Her name is Cornelia Africana, and she is everything you’ll never be able to be. But who’s the real, flesh-and-blood lady who becomes the poster child for what it means to be a ‘good Roman woman?’ Let’s dig into her story and try to find her.

Cornelia being just a little bit insufferable. Cornelia and her Sons, Padovanino, courtesy of the National Gallery of London.

Cornelia being just a little bit insufferable. Cornelia and her Sons, Padovanino, courtesy of the National Gallery of London.

CORNELIA: MORE THAN THE MOTHER OF THE GRACCHI

But before we dive into Cornelia’s life, let’s set the scene for the Rome this woman is living in, because it’s different in many ways from the raging height of Empire we explored in episodes 14 through 16.

In 509 BCE, back when Lucretia was raped by that horrible prince and the Romans decided they were done with kings, they ditched monarchy and formed a new government. This wasn’t Greece’s absolute democracy, but a republic: a system where elected Roman citizens ruled the city on behalf of the populace, but the number of people participating in that process was pretty small. Much like in Greece, only citizens could participate, and then only men. And the people running Rome are mostly wealthy. But no one of those men could achieve too much power in the Republican system. Though Rome never writes up a constitution, this system of checks and balances ticks along quite nicely for quite a long time. 

To understand Lucretia’s Rome, and the Rome that came after, we need to understand the distinctions made between social and economic classes, which dominate how a person, male or female, moves through this world. Okay, so imagine a mountain. Those luxe villas at the very tippy top are the patricians: they’re all supposedly descended from Rome’s first major clans, making them extra special, and they represent the city’s richest and most prestigious. Most of the rest of the mountain is populated by the plebeians, or plebs, who are essentially the working class. While some live pretty humble lives, others grow quite rich and influential, and they do serve roles in government, but they aren’t considered as high class as patricians. Below that in the foothills are freedpeople - people who were once enslaved, but now aren’t, and who have little power in government, at least at this point in Rome’s history. And then, down in the swamps, there are Rome’s growing slave population, and well, they have no rights at all.

While we’re at it, let’s talk about the political power pyramid, because this is something we’ll need to understand. In terms of how the Republic is run, we have three basic elements: elected non-hereditary magistrates, the Senate, and popular assemblies. This is a time before emperors, remember, but we need someone making quick decisions. For that, we have two consuls: appointed by the popular assembly, this position is pretty much as high up the chain as you can go. They have serious executive power: to command armies, propose legislation, AND lord it over the Senate. They wear special togas with purple borders, they sit in special chairs, and they’re protected at all times by lictors: those guys who the Vestal Virgins also get to spend time with, who wave around special sticks to make sure no one touches them. Right now, this is as close to royalty as Rome gets. Only patricians can be consuls, at least in this era, and they hold so much power that terms can only go for one year, and no one’s allowed to serve for more than one term in a row. But in that year, they can do a whole lot of damage. If we were to climb down the power ladder from consul, we’d pass through preators, who look after legal cases; censors, who guide morality and property investment; aediles, who supervise markets and temples; and quaestors, who look after public finance.

Slide to the side and you get to the Senate. It controls its purse strings, supervises foreign affairs, debates state legislation, and directs Rome’s religious life. So while this legislative body actually holds no legal power, it’s incredibly influential as an advisory body. Senators are unpaid, can’t participate in banking or foreign trade, and their positions are usually for life, so it’ll surprise you not at all to learn that only patricians can be Senators. Who else could afford it? And they tend to use their powers to better their own situations, often to the detriment of the working class. And then there are the popular assemblies. Plebs participate in these, as they are meant to represent the interests of the Roman people. They elect tribunes, AS WELL, who are kind of like the patrician consuls: they can veto any magistrate decision as it relates to the plebs, which means they can cause enough trouble to give patricians the Senate the occasional migraine. But still, there’s a steep difference in power here. And that, unsurprisingly, is going to cause unrest that ebbs and flows. Still confused? Check out the Diagram of Power I made you over on the show notes.

Diagram of Power flow chart.png

At this point, Rome’s a real rising star on the Conquering Foreign Nations front. This century, we will see it balloon outward, eating up modern-day Spain, bits of north Africa, Greece, northern Italy. In just one generation, it’s going to more than double in size. And because the Roman army at this time is made up of citizen soldiers, while the men are away, the ladies of Rome will start stepping in to take over their business. With so many heads of families dying abroad, someone has to pick up the slack.

In 215 BCE, concerned by the alarmingly large number of women making fortunes, the Senate passes a wartime austerity measure called the Lex Oppia: a law meant to curb what women can wear and do in public. Years into the blatantly sexist law, a bunch of frustrated women march on the Forum, showing up in force to proclaim that they’re pretty done being kicked around. We talked about this in episode 15, but in sum: they heckle the men into changing the law, showing that while women can’t vote, they CAN make a marked difference on the political landscape.

Speaking of war, let’s meet Cornelia’s father. If Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus had an OK Cupid profile, it might go a little something like this:

Oh, I’m just your average Roman military genius. I’m what you’d call a self-starter. Since marching off to war at 17, I’ve known very few days without my armor on, but the woman brave enough to peel it off will find a soft heart underneath. My interests include long, grueling marches, being chivalrous because it makes me look good, and soundly defeating my rivals. My motto: Sleep is for the weak.

As a teen, he marches off to war with his father to fight the Carthaginians, their greatest rival, who the Romans will fight several times from 264 to 146 BCE. After losing both father and brother in battle, he rose up through the ranks and essentially won the Second Punic War for Rome, defeating the dreaded Hannibal with tactics that would be studied for many centuries to come. He does it against steep odds and becomes known for giving his enemies a healthy dose of clemency. While in Spain, Livy tells us, his troops supposedly captured a lovely lady from a local chief and presented her as a prize to Scipio. He’s keen at first, but when he found out she was already engaged, he called the guy over and gave her back with his apologies. A gentleman AND good at swordplay! In short, this guy is one of the Roman world’s most massive deals, and his illustrious pedigree is going to make any children he has famous – kind of like the children of big movie stars in our era.

Scipio returning a captured woman to her betrothed: what a guy! The Continence of Scipio by Nicholas Poussin. Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow.

Scipio returning a captured woman to her betrothed: what a guy! The Continence of Scipio by Nicholas Poussin. Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow.

And so with all that in mind, we arrive at our girl Cornelia Africana Minor, born around 191 BCE. What a name! The ‘Africanus’ part is a title given by the Roman Republic as a reward for his conquering bits of Africa, and because girls take on their father’s name, she gets it too. Her family clan is the Cornelii, one of six major patrician families. Which means that, socially speaking, she’s the cream of the crop.

As will swiftly become a theme with our Roman women, even famous ones, we don’t know much about her childhood. Much of what we know was written well AFTER she lived, and by men looking to use her story to make a point about something.

How might she grow up? We know she’s not confined to women’s quarters, as the women are over in Greece: she probably spends time hanging out with the men in her family. She'll see her mother, a noble woman named Aemilia Paulla, spending a lot of time with her husband when he’s around, going out to dinner, soaking in his prestige. She can go out, with permission and guidance, to public events like religious festivals, games, and to do some bathing. She can even act as a witness if called to court. The Republican matron is especially revered when she has babies, whom she is in charge of educating, and admired for her position in the family structure. 

But the truth is, for the most part, the Republic keeps a fairly tight leash on its women. As early as 450 BCE, the Law of the Twelve Tables made sure that women were placed under the control of male heads of the household. The Republican matron is in many ways treated like a child, legally speaking. Whether she enters into a manus marriage, as we talked about in episode 15, or a marriage where her father stays the boss of her, she is confined, constricted, and controlled by the men in her family. And those family members expect her to stay mostly at home, showing – as this first-century eulogy says - “proper restraint, [and]…not desire a diversity of words.” If you say so.

 We can assume Cornelia gets a decent education, given what an intellectual she becomes later on. And we can assume that she knows what a big deal her father is. She probably spends time listening to his war stories and meeting the illustrious people who come to visit him. Here is Dr. Rad from the podcast The Partial Historians, who, along with her co-host Dr. G, are here to help tell these women’s tales:

Dr. G: “She comes from a very elite background. And this is definitely important because, of course, she is, you know, of very high standing. She's the daughter of a guy called Scorpio Africanus, who is a very, very, very well-known figure in Roman politics and in our Roman military circles. He’s very well established, so the fact that she has that kind of pedigree, very important as well, makes her a very desirable candidate for marriage.” 

Cornelia doesn’t get her father for long, though. Scipio dies in 183 BCE: RIP, dad. But he still manages to think ahead and arrange a marriage for his daughter. So around the age of 17, she hooks up with a guy named Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus. While he isn’t necessarily as big a deal as old Scipio – I mean, who is? – he certainly was no slouch in either the political arena. Livy called him “far and away the sharpest young man of that time.” Born into a plebeian family, he served bravely in the East in campaigns run by Scipio and his brother Lucius, helping them win a mighty victory there. It’s worth nothing here that in settling that war, the Scipio Boys amassed gigantic sums of money, even accepting bribes from local kings. And so, when they marched back into Rome, ready to be showered in glitter and hailed as heroes, the Senate instead charged them with corruption. Awkward! But Gracchus is a tribune of the plebs at the time – remember, they’re about as powerful as a plebian can get – and he vetoed the proceedings and essentially got them off the hook for the whole sticky business. So Cornelia’s husband is a man on the rise, to be sure. But in winning Cornelia’s hand, he’s basically hit Rome’s Bachelor Jackpot.

Her husband goes on to serve not one but TWO consulships—remember, this is the highest position you can get in politics, baby. He throws some lavish games, makes a notable peace agreement over in Spain, and finds himself awarded two triumphs. These are basically giant street parties thrown to celebrate a guy’s military victories: in Cornelia’s day, getting two of them is almost unheard of. Amidst all that, he and Cornelia seem to enjoy a happy marriage. I like to imagine this consists of Cornelia both hosting lavish dinners AND staying up late discussing policy with her handsome husband, though we can only really guess what kind of relationship they have. We know they must get on alright in the bedroom, because she bears him 12 children. Let me repeat that: 12! Children!

CORNELIA: I know. It’s excessive, but what can I say? I’m fertile as hell. And my husband really knows how to rock a toga.

In Rome, having three kids is considered pretty good innings, and in the ancient world having children is a dangerous business. If you ask me, I think she deserves a medal just for that. 

Sadly, but unsurprisingly given Rome’s child mortality rate, only three survive into adulthood: a girl named Sempronia and two boys, Tiberius and Gaius. Even in a world where infant death is fairly common, we have to imagine she’s devastated at the loss. Imagine the strength it would take to live through 12 deliveries, then the pain of losing so many of them. It makes her that much more protective of the ones she has left.

Unfortunately, her marital bliss can’t last. Not after he finds snakes between their covers.

Dr. RAD: “There's a story of two serpents appearing in their marriage bed.”

Dr. G: “Wait, you're telling me there's more than one snake in here?”

In Rome, we’re REALLY BIG on signs and portents: everything has some potential for meaning; every strike of lightning is cause for concern. And unlike the snakes found in our Macedonian friend Olympias’s bed, this is not considered a sign that Zeus is impregnating anyone. Concerned, Tiberius puts those snakes in a terrarium or something and goes to some priests to ask their advice. This is what they come up with:

PRIESTS: Okay, Tiberius, here’s the sitch. One of those snakes is a male, and one is a female, and they represent you and your wife. You’re going to have to kill one of them. Whichever one you kill, the person they represent is going to die also. That’ll be three secterces for the reading, k BYEEEE!

I’d probably release them into the wild and hope for the best, but apparently that isn’t a viable option for Pappa Gracchus. He kills the male snake, knowing he’ll perish also. This might be a practical move: he’s much older than Cornelia, after all, and his sons will need their mother. “But it also seems to be because he respects and admires her so much. He wants her to live on.”

It’s quite possible that this whole story is a bunch of hooey. But still, as Dr. Rad says:

Dr. RAD: “He certainly predeceases her by quite some way. So, yeah, it's interesting that he as the husband made that choice.”

However he dies, we can assume she might be sad about it. And there’s the fact that she remains a widow forever after. A woman who does this is called an univira or “one-man woman.” And this is, in many ways, a really savvy move.

Dr. G: “...it's a special place to be. She's only known one man. And this is considered, for a Roman matrona, the pinnacle. To have never remarried.”

This is something that Romans consider a position to shoot for: a woman who stays faithful to only one man, even after that man has passed away? We love a lady who stands by her man, even in death. But being an univira is a luxury that most women can’t afford. Remember that our paterfamilias, the male head of the family, is in charge of us. So if dad’s alive, he’s going to be very interested in using his daughters as a way to cement alliances with other families through marriage, whether they’re excited about it or not. When one husband dies, most women are going to find themselves swiftly married to another one. But Cornelia’s father is dead, and that means he has no control over whether she remarries. She’s got plenty of money AND she’s already had 12 children.

CORNELIA: That’s 12 years of being pregnant, ya’ll. So yeah...I’m done.

This is a rare sweet spot for a Roman matron to be in: she gets to keep her good standing without having to tie herself to a man to get things done. I suspect she doesn’t marry again not because she’s so super heartbroken about losing her husband, or because she just doesn’t see anyone worth marrying. It’s that she sees a rare path to true independence and grabs it. As a widow, she has respectability and power over her own destiny. She sees a chance to have her cake and eat it, too. 

Not that she doesn’t get some impressive offers. One of them is supposedly Ptolemy VIII, the current pharaoh of Egypt. He’s like, “I’ll make you a queen, baby.” And she’s like, “You know what? I’m good.” As Dr. G says…

Dr. G: “… People are sort of like, "let me at her." And she's like, no thanks. I'm done here. She's like, "I had my man. He sacrificed a snake for me."

Instead she settles down to the task of taking care of her kids, which is a job she takes quite seriously. As Plutarch writes: “Cornelia took charge of the children and of the estate, and showed herself so discreet, so good a mother, and so magnanimous, that Tiberius was thought to have made no bad decision when he elected to die instead of such a woman.” Plutarch is a real Cornelia fanboy!

Though it’s proper for a Roman matron to take the lead in educating her sons, she usually gets tutors in for the truly hard-hitting stuff: I mean, it’s not as if she knows anything about politics or speechmaking. And Cornelia does bring in noted scholars to educate her sons, but because she’s running her own damn show she actually sits in on their lessons with them. Latin, Greek, philosophy: Cornelia is loving this mature-age student lifestyle, full of debate and intellectual discussion that she probably didn’t get to indulge in during childhood. And it seems her passion rubs off on her kids. 

She dotes on her sons Tiberius and Gaius, and we hope her daughter too, though the ancient sources obviously don’t have time to give her more than a quick mention. And like a proper Roman matron, Cornelia becomes famous for considering those kids her finest achievement. There’s a story that says that, one day, she’s hanging out with one of her gal pals, who’s showing off some glitzy jewels. Cornelia, of course, doesn’t mess with any such glitzy business. She doesn’t need to. Instead, she just waves at her sons and says proudly, “these are my jewels.” This smacks of something a male writer came up with to shame other Republican women for liking shiny things, but it’s easy to believe that she feels proud of her children and invested in them. They are hers to shape: her legacy, and she’s going to make sure they are headed for greatness. Though I don’t think she’s quite ready for what shape that greatness takes.

Kauffmann_Cornelia_mater_Gracchorum.jpg

Who needs jewels when my sons are so fine?

Cornelia Presenting her Sons as Her Treasures, Angelica Kauffman, courtesy of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond. c. 1785.

Again we zoom out, remembering that Cornelia’s brought her boys up in a century of Roman war and expansion, which has brought mad money and expanded borders, but also serious unrest. The wars made some Romans rich, including Cornelia’s family, but it also brought tons of prisoners of war flooding into Italy as slaves. Which is, of course, terrible for them, as they’re forced to endure lives of hard labor, but it’s also wreaked havoc on the Roman economy. Where once it ran on a lot of small farms worked by local families, this sudden plethora of cheap labor means that the rich can create huge estates and run them cheaply, totally displacing blue-collar Roman workers. And with farming men gone for long periods fighting in war after war, their farms often lie fallow and they go bankrupt, forced to sell for next to nothing to those patrician-run superfarms. Many of them go to Rome to find work, which isn’t plentiful, so they have time to sit and feel mutinous feelings. There are some major slave uprisings, too, which only create more disquiet about what seems like Rome’s growing corruption. The rich stay rich while the poor get poorer, and a lot of people are unhappy about it. But a populist movement is rising in Rome, led by people who want to Robin Hood this shady business. And Cornelia’s sons are going to be some of the sparks that help light the flame--a flame that marks the beginning of the end for Rome’s Republic.

Here’s another quick injection of Roman politics for you. At this moment, Rome has one major political group: the Optimates, otherwise known as the “Best Men.” Super humble! These guys are the rich landowners who the poor and unemployed in Rome currently feel like stabbing. They are also the guys who run the Senate, and they want to stay rich and in power by upholding the status quo. They’re so powerful that any attempt to change their ways up to this point has yielded very little, but a new political group is starting to shake things up. They’re called the Populares, and they’re the party of the people. As such, they try to disrupt the Optimates by drumming up support amongst the masses. Enter Cornelia’s sons.

When they sashay into the political spotlight, Rome is seeing a major economic downturn. Prices are up, grain is in short supply, and the downtrodden plebs are once again starting to grumble. Tiberius Gracchus looks around his city and sees problems. And he wants to be a great man like his dad: remember that he himself was a tribune of the plebs, back when he got Cornelia’s dad out of hot water over those corruption charges. Though he’s been raised in the lap of luxury, Tiberius is ready to take up the plebian torch.

In 133 BCE, he’s elected as a tribune of the plebs. And as such, he proposes something rather radical: that public lands be redistributed so that rich owners own no more than 350 acres, and the rest be divvied up between the working class. The common people love this, but the rich accuse him of trying to incite revolution.

Those pot-stirrers Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus. Why won’t they just quit while they’re kind of ahead? Wikicommons.

Those pot-stirrers Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus. Why won’t they just quit while they’re kind of ahead? Wikicommons.

But the problem is that there are two tribunes, and every time Tiberius tries to pass his law, the other tribune vetoes it down. In frustration, Tiberius starts vetoing ALL laws that come across his desk, bringing the government grinding to a halt. Eventually he takes one of his proposals straight to the assemblies, bypassing the Senate altogether. This is a precedent-breaking move that makes it so that plebeian assemblies can change laws that apply to everyone, no matter what the Senate might think about it. It changes the rules of the political game. 

Later, in 123, Cornelia’s son Gaius follows in Big Bro’s footsteps and is elected a tribune, and he also proposes some radical populist reforms. He wants voting by secret ballot, subsidized grain, new courts where no senators are allowed to be jurors. These guys are major pot stirrers, and they’re shaking things up in Rome.

So where’s Cornelia in all of this? It’s hard to say, exactly. Here’s Dr. Rad and Dr. G.

Dr. RAD: “...And we do get a sense from the source material, which admittedly is focusing on her sons, not really her. Most of the time it's...she's really used to explain their character and how they came to be the way they are and why their political career goes the way that it does. We have these interesting hints coming through the sources that it's because of Cornelia that her sons are so well educated and able to give such impressive speeches in their political careers. Most of our information does come from a source called Plutarch, who is a biographer writing much later. Well after Cornelia and all her children are dead. But we do also have a hint about Cornelia's ability with words and her education level coming through from sources that are earlier. Like Cicero. Cicero claims that he's actually read some of her letters and that he seems to attribute her high education level to the success of her sons and that having an influence on her sons in their later careers, which is interesting. Definitely Roman women are expected, particularly if they're elite, to be well educated so that I can pass on a good education to their children. But that only goes a certain level.”

Dr. G: “Well, yeah, it does seem unusual to credit the mother, mostly because mothers tend to have less education and a different style of education than men. So at some point you’re like... does this mean that Cornelia's education was continued and she showed a genuine interest and she was allowed to continue with that interest? If so, I think that's also quite interesting that for elite women, potentially the restrictions on education were less than they might have been for all the Roman women.”

These men are fantastic at oratory, at winning favor and making an impression wherever they go. For that, we’ve got to give at least some credit to Cornelia. Plutarch tells us she’s as politically minded as her sons are, and that she isn’t afraid to lean on them to try and get them to create the change she’s seeking. And it seems like her sons take her requests pretty seriously. It’s said that her son Gaius removes a law disgracing a guy named Marcus Octavius, a tribune her other son Tiberius deposed, just because Cornelia asks him to. Get it, Cornelia.

Dr. RAD: “…And they seem to have acceded to this particular request, which is kind of interesting, because this is fairly early on for a woman to be having this kind of influence. Like it's not like we're in the imperial period where women have been put more in the spotlight. So it is kind of interesting that she seems to have this sort of influence over them and that they might listen to her...”

 Dr. G: “And also that she's politically minded and politically active, because this is like women are not encouraged in any way to be in that public political space. And in fact, there would have been limitations on her capacity to hear and come across information of a political nature, because most of the settings in which that happened were exclusionary of women. So it is interesting that she's so politically focused and engaged.”

Cornelia may not be out there debating in the Senate and passing laws, but she is swaying the men she raised, who do. They even use her in their rhetoric whenever someone tries to make them look bad. One time, when another speaker apparently said something unkind about his family, Gaius says: “What, dost thou abuse Cornelia, who gave birth to Tiberius?” For shame!

DR. RAD: “And he then starts using her to attack his political opponents by talking about the fact that, you know, she's only ever been with one person or one sexual partner. Can you say as much?” 

And then, because this guy he’s clapping back at has a bit of a rep for being effeminate – horrors – and a bit of a tart: “With what effrontery canst thou compare thyself with Cornelia? Hast thou borne such children as she did? And verily all Rome knows that she refrained from commerce with men longer than thou hast, though thou art a man.” In other words: “mate, my MOM’S slept with fewer men than you have.” Kind of a weird way to win a debate, but I mean, whatever works.

Unfortunately, Tiberius’s populist riffraffery makes the Best Men so irate that a mob beats him and his followers to death in 133, that same year he’s elected tribune. Years later, Gaius is hunted so aggressively by his haters that it seems he might meet the same fate. We don’t know how Cornelia feels about her sons’ populist policies, but we can imagine how fearful she must be for Gaius. She doesn’t want to lose another much-beloved son.

A much later Latin biographer, Cornelius Nepos, gives us excerpts that he says come from one of Cornelia’s letters to Gaius.

“I would dare to take an oath solemnly, swearing that, except for those who have murdered Tiberius Gracchus, no enemy has foisted so much difficulty and so much distress upon me as you have because of the matters: you should have shouldered the responsibilities of all of those children whom I had in the past, and to make sure that I might have the least anxiety possible in my old age; and that, whatever you did, you would wish to please me most greatly; and that you would consider it sacrilegious to do anything of great significance contrary to my feelings, especially as I am someone with only a short portion of my life left. Cannot even that time span, as brief as it is, be of help in keeping you from opposing me and destroying our country? In the final analysis, what end will there be? When will our family stop behaving insanely? When will we cease insisting on troubles, both suffering and causing them? When will we begin to feel shame about disrupting and disturbing our country?”

In other words: “I’m getting way too old for this sort of drama, son, and your pot-stirring is giving me serious ulcers. So stop all this radical nonsense and listen to your mamma!”

You have to wonder if these are even her words: it’s possible they were written by her son’s enemies to make it look like even their MOM wasn’t down with their policies. I like to think she’s proud of her sons for championing the downtrodden, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she really just wants Gaius to chill out already. Sadly, chilling out is not his style. Things get so ugly for her remaining son that he’s forced to commit suicide. 

And so Cornelia has to bear outliving all of her children. But even in her grief, we’re told, she keeps a stiff upper lip. 

Dr. RAD: “She is sad, obviously, that they're no longer alive. But she takes pride in who they were and what they accomplished. And she's restrained in her grief. She just retires, you know, in a dignified way, and spends her time moving in educated circles, philosophies and that kind of stuff.”

So though her sons die violently, she spends her old age hosting salons and reading really good novels, and probably influencing the growing Republic in ways we’ll never know about.

Dr . RAD: “And we do have reports that a statue was erected of her, which is highly unusual for a statue to be erected of a woman and set up in a public place. And supposedly what it says is that this is Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi… I think this is important to emphasize because when we look at like the ancient sculptures of the past now there's a huge profusion of women depicted: Women of everyday life as well as goddesses and things like that. So I think it's important to distinguish that when we're talking about this period of the republic, one, statuary is more unusual, and two statuary of women is considered exceptionally rare. So she's kind of credited as the first to gain this sort of public depiction and to have as the inscription that she's the mother of the Gracchi. So the sons have superseded her own connection to her father. Very impressive as well.” 

The base of the statue of Cornelia that dates between 123-100 BCE. It can be found in the Capitoline Museums, Rome. Image courtesy of Ilya Shurygin.

The base of the statue of Cornelia that dates between 123-100 BCE. It can be found in the Capitoline Museums, Rome. Image courtesy of Ilya Shurygin.

The fact that she’s attached to them shows that they made quite a splash in Roman society, but also that society at large recognized her role in shaping them: that she, as their mother, had an important role to play.

Cornelia is held up forever after as a paragon of virtue – an image to beat later women over the head with when they step outside of society’s bounds. Was she really so well behaved? I doubt it. Would she have appreciated being used in this way? I suspect not. In fact, I think we should remember her less as an icon and more of a fighter. This charismatic woman who was interested in learning lived through a lot, both winning battles and losing them, and as such must have been so much more than an ideal. 

Here’s a little preview for you! Annnnnd next time, on the Exploress….

part 2

ET TU, LADIES? THE WOMEN AROUND THE GREAT JULIUS CAESAR

Now we travel forward some 100 years, to a very fateful year in Roman history: 44 BCE. 

This is the year Julius Caesar is assassinated and Rome shifts from a Republic into an Empire. If you like ancient Rome, then you’ll know the stories of the men we’re going to touch on. But what of the women who married them, inspired them, challenged and changed them? We’re going to explore this year, and the ones just before and after it, through the eyes of two Roman dominae. Wives, mistresses, behind-the-scenes influencers, even gang leaders: these women had important parts to play in shaping history during one of Rome’s most violent, wild, and tumultuous times. 

Strap your fanciest stola over your sharpest dagger. Let’s go traveling.

Before we truly get into it, let’s get some context for what’s changed in Rome since Cornelia’s time. Because by 44 BCE, the Roman Republic she knew is in serious peril. In fact it’s been in peril for quite a long time, despite the fact that they’re turning into a military juggernaut. If ancient Rome is some kind of bathroom mold infestation, it’s the kind that not even industrial bleach can get rid of. They control most of what the Mediterranean touches and show little signs of stopping. But along with that expansion has come a slow and general breakdown in our system of political checks and balances, allowing ambitious men to take more than their fair share.

Part of the issue is that we’re a culture that’s centered around our military. As Rome continues to expand, it becomes more and more reliant on (and obsessed with) great generals, and those generals accrue more and more power and wealth. Military victories – and the spoils that come with them – make these ambitious men feel that, really, they’re in a much better position to run things than any old Senator picking his nose back in Rome. It doesn’t help that, to reward their triumphs, the Senate often breaks its own rules. Case in point: a very successful general named Marius serves as consul – the highest position you can get in the Senate, and so influential you’re only supposed to have it for a total of one year – an unprecedented seven times in a row. They’re setting dangerous precedents in terms of who holds power, and how to get it, that we won’t be able to undo later.

Plus, the soldiers who fight for these generals often feel more loyal to them than to the Roman state. So they have money, sway, and huge armies they can inspire to march in any direction. And sometimes that direction is straight back into Rome. Take what happens in 88 BCE, when a civil war breaks out between the supporters of two different big-deal generals, Marius and Sulla. All you really need to know about this complicated cluster is that after several years of internal fighting and battling between different Roman factions, Sulla does something new. He becomes the first Roman general to ever march his army past the pomerium, the sacred boundary that surrounds the city of Rome, with the express intention of taking it by force. Which he does. And suddenly, in a land that hates kings with a fiery passion, he declares himself its dictator: you know, just until he can get the place under control. This was allowed, kinda: the law said a dictator could be appointed in case of emergency, but this law had never been put to the test. In exercising his absolute power, things got ugly quickly. He instituted something called proscriptions. This is as fancy word for writing up a Wanted Poster with a list of your enemies and nailing it to the Forum. Those who killed someone on the list and brought them to Sulla would even get a little cash money! Many of their heads were then hung up and displayed on the rostra, in the forum, even at Sulla’s house. Nothing says interior chicness quite like a severed head! Thousands died, many of them patricians, some because they were declared as enemies of the state, and some because…well, someone just wanted to off them. It was a scary, anxious time in Rome.

But eventually Sulla does step down, and the Republic goes pretty much back to how it was...at least on the surface. But by letting such a thing happen once, the Senate cracked open a door for ambitious men to wriggle through. It’s inspired a lot of guys to believe that they, too, can seize the reins of the Republic and ride it for all they’re worth. Which is how, by 44 BCE, Rome has come to be run by a dictator. One who is not just For Now, but For Life. His name is Julius Caesar.

Julius+Caesar_wiki.jpg

The only confirmed portrait of Julius Caesar made during his lifetime, in all his balding glory.

The Tusculum Portrait. Museum of Antiquities, Turin. Wikicommons.

This is a guy we’ll be spending some time with, so let’s peruse his Ok Cupid profile, which is, FYI, written entirely in the third person, because writing about himself by name is kind of his thing.

Some people say Julius Caesar has an ego, but he thinks he just has what you’d call a “big personality.” And he is big, in so many ways: ambition, intelligence, cunning…man tackle. His friends like to joke that he’s craftier than a Bond Villain, but obviously so much more virtuous and handsome. He enjoys nothing so much as war games, reciting poetry, very snappy dressing, slaying the ladies, the pointed adoration of his soldiers, and….wait, did he already say slaying the ladies? He’s never seen a title, a foreign land, or a fine woman he didn’t want to come, see, and conquer. And he’s a cool guy, so long as you’re Team Caesar. Just don’t joke about his bald spot. Seriously. Just…don’t.

In the years that elapse before he meets our first leading lady, his life has already been rather a drama-filled roller coaster. This rakish, calculating, headstrong man started out as a son from a noble patrician family, but of a father who lost the family’s money. Then, during Sulla’s reign over the city, he refused to divorce his wife when Sulla told him to, and then had to run from Rome for his life. Not the most promising of beginnings. And yet from there, he became a soldier, proving his mettle against Mithridates in the eastern Mediterranean. But he wasn’t content with that. If he was anything at all, Julius Caesar was ambitious. So when he returned home, he focused in on politics, turning himself into a rising star and defender of the people. 

 He doesn’t much care about rich food, and one guy will go on to say that he’s perhaps the only person who ever overthrew the Roman state while sober. But his bedroom exploits are legendary: he’ll go on to marry several women, sleep with a handful of queens, and maybe even a king somewhere in there. When he rides back into Rome during one of his triumphs, this is one of the songs his soldiers will roast him with: “Men of Rome, keep close to your consorts: here's a bald adulterer.”

But starting around 64 BCE, one woman will enter his life and remain a constant. Her name is Servilia. She’s there through all the ups and downs, his troubles and triumphs, for some two decades. And then her son has to go and spoil everything by stabbing Caesar in the chest.

But let’s back up and talk about Servilia’s life up to just before they meet, as it has a lot to tell us about being a patrician-born woman in the late Republic. Remember that the patricians are considered Rome’s oldest clans, their most distinguished families, and they believe very firmly in their right to run Rome. Hers, the Servilii, is very fine. She has many forebears who distinguished themselves in politics. They even claim that Romulus and Remus’s mom was a Servilii. She’ll have grown up with these stories, and the idea that her family is one of honor. But in Rome, honor is a thing that’s given by other people, and it’s something that has to be constantly earned. So it’s unfortunate that her grandad is defeated by so-called “barbarians” in battle, leaving Rome vulnerable and humiliating his relations. It’s possible that she and Caesar both have a chip on their shoulder about the actions of their patriarchs.

We know pretty much nothing about her childhood, except that her parents get divorced when she’s quite young. While divorce is pretty common in Rome – it’s not considered morally reprehensible, and legally speaking it isn’t difficult to achieve – we have to imagine it had an impact on her. What does she think of her mother leaving her father and marrying another man? We don't know. But it’s through that marriage that she ends up with a half-brother named Cato the Younger and a half-sister named Portia, not to mention her full sisters. As the oldest, it’s possible she feels she needs to take care of her siblings: that, or boss them around, and her stepbrother Cato is not an easy dude to live with. For one, he’s stubborn as hell. As kids, when a controversial politician named Quintus Poppaedius Silo visits the house, he asks playfully if he could have their vote. They all nod and smile, but Cato just gives him the stink eye. When he refuses to answer, Silo hangs Cato by the feet out of the window and tries to make him go along. Even then, he keeps his mouth south. This guy is as immovable as they come.

cato-minor.jpeg

Doesn’t Cato look fun?

Wikicommons.

In fact, Cato is going to keep creeping back up in Servilia’s story like a particularly bad smell that no frankincense perfume can cover. That smell is probably dominated by his unwashed feet. He’s a Stoic, which means that he thinks life should be as unfun as possible. Sounds like a real barrel of laughs.

We don’t have his dating profile – Cato doesn’t believe in online dating, or in being online period – but he’s written us up a little scroll manifesto.

My enemies call me stubborn, but I prefer to think of it as having standards. I hate nothing so much as corruption, and respect nothing so much as moral integrity. Perfume? No. Dancing? Double no. Merriment? I scorn such vices. And so should you, you brazen hussy!

So Servilia has to be pretty forceful and strong-willed to keep him in check.

When both of their parents die in 91 BCE, she finds herself moving house with her siblings to live with her uncle Marcus Drusus on the Palatine, Rome’s fanciest and most exclusive hill. While there, she’ll be educated alongside the boys, though probably not in the ways of politics and speech making. But those lessons can be had, if she only pays attention. Her uncle is in politics, and has been for years, which means that his house is a place to eavesdrop on all sorts of interesting conversations during the morning salutatio. Her uncle Drusus is a polarizing figure, with his For the People policies. He has crowds of enthusiastic followers who like his radical ideas about opening up citizenship to Italians outside of Rome, but he also makes a lot of Senatorial enemies. The stakes are high, even for such a distinguished family. If his efforts succeed, they will have more influence and power than ever. But if he fails…well, he does, and he’s stabbed in the forecourt of his house. Servilia might even be there as he bleeds to death slowly. And so, by the ripe age of somewhere around 13, Servilia has suffered several brutal blows already. She’s come to know in quite a personal way what happens when even a powerful patrician plays his cards unwisely.

After that, we think Servilia spends the rest of her childhood living with some formidable Servilii women, probably her aunt and grandmother. In her family, the men tend to die violently, but the women serve as constant guideposts. If only we could be flies on the wall beside their dinner couches, soaking up the conversation and lessons these women have to teach her about how a woman should navigate their fast-changing world. 

Eventually, she does what all Roman ladies are supposed to do and gets married. In this section of her story, we see how complex life can be for a woman like her. One of the most important values for a Roman man to strive for is virtus, or virtue, which is tied up in ideas about manliness, courage, and general worth of character. Women have an equivalent, but how they strive for it looks very different. “Men are made illustrious by consulships,” Seneca tells us. “Eloquence raises them to immortal fame, military glory and triumph over a new tribe hallow them…the peculiar virtue of women is pudicitia.” We’ve talked about this virtue before – it means chastity – but it isn’t just about being sexually chaste. It’s about moral purity. About always striving for loyalty, courage, and fidelity. As a woman, she has a narrow but important range of responsibilities: get married, have children, then raise them well. She must always be a credit to her family. But because she’s got money and status, Servilia also has opportunities to move in highly influential circles, have dinners where she lounges next to influential men. If she has a mind to, she might be able to whisper an idea in a politician’s ear; to drop hints and plant seeds that might influence the shape the Republic is taking. And while we can only really guess at her personality, we get an impression that she’s strong, determined, smart and very savvy. To survive the wild ride her life is going to take, she has to be.

Her first husband is a guy named Marcus Brutus, who is about twice her age, and around the age of 15 she bears him a son. Does she love her husband? With both her parents and her uncle dead, it’s fair to say that she’s somewhat independent under the law and may have a healthy hand in choosing him, so…maybe. Though the Romans admire love in a marriage, we don’t have any indication that she chose him because of it. It’s just as likely that she sees him as someone who’s going places that she wants to go as well. He becomes a tribune, but when the dictator Sulla comes onto the scene and changes the rules of Rome’s constitution, he finds that he’s ineligible to run for office again. This pisses him off, so he joins a rebellion against Sulla. In the ensuing struggle, he’s killed by a guy named Pompey: earmark that name for later. Given that he leaves Servilia a widow, she loathes him, and she brings her son Brutus up to loathe him too.

But she shrugs off her rage and her sadness, unlike Cornelia, marries again, this time to a man named Decimus. This time, she probably gets to pick him for herself. I get the feeling that Servilia likes cunning and political acumen in a man, and in this way Husband 2 ends up being disappointing. He comes from quite a good patrician family, but when he runs for the consulship Cicero tells us that he “lacked both friends and repute.” Oh, burn, Cicero! Later, he only gets another consulship by bribing people – a more and more common practice in the eroding Republican system. Even then, he doesn’t make much of an impact. Though he does give Servilia several daughters, he doesn’t give her what I think she truly craves: the chance to splash around in Rome’s most powerful waters. He dies around 62 BCE, and once again Servilia’s like, “I am On. The. Prowl.” 

And so our lovers meet somewhere around 64 BCE. We don’t know how they meet, but I like to imagine them both at the same dinner party, making eyes at each other over platters of dormice as they engage in witty repartee. He is, unfortunately, already married – when they hook up, it might be that SHE’S still married – but that doesn’t stop those sparks from a’flying. And why not? Caesar is charming, ambitious, smart, full of energy and gusto: all the things I suspect she is too. AND he’s her own age, and by all accounts pretty sexy: now that’s refreshing. She must like what she sees, and so must he, because their steamy affair is going to last for decades. Most historians paint her as the love of his life. 

Perhaps Julius Caesar and Servilia met at a dinner party like the one depicted in this mosaic found at Kunsthistorisches Museum. We can be assured that their sultry stares were very similar to the one depicted here.

Perhaps Julius Caesar and Servilia met at a dinner party like the one depicted in this mosaic found at Kunsthistorisches Museum. We can be assured that their sultry stares were very similar to the one depicted here.

There are plenty of factors that suggest this is more than just a sexy tryst. First, there’s the fact that it lasts. Caesar, as we’re already discovered, is quite fond of the ladies, but typically his loves don’t last for long. The fact that he continues to be tied to her in the records suggests that their bond is about more than really good horizontal tennis. There’s also the fact that she seems willing to face down the potential ramifications of the affair. Remember what we learned about the rules of such things in episode 16 – namely, that patrician men can sleep with who they like so long as they are single, of lower status, and unmarried. But Servilia is NOT of lower status. And if their affair starts in 64 BCE, as some sources claim, and it’s true that her husband doesn’t die until 62, then she’s also married. In the eyes of the Romans, that makes their union pretty scandalous indeed. 

And there’s the fact that Julius Caesar divorces his second wife Pompeia in 63 BCE, which we’ll talk about when we get into our next leading lady’s story. You’d think that would clear the way for Julius and Servilia to get hitched. So why don’t they? I have to say, this one has me scratching my head. Perhaps Caesar wants to keep his options open. In Rome, one of the very best ways to cement alliances is to marry someone’s sister or daughter, tying two families together. Servilia doesn’t have male relations he wants to get in political bed with, but she is clearly influential and very savvy. Hey Caesar, any thoughts?

CAESAR: Look. Caesar loves a headstrong, smart, opinionated woman...in BED. But he prefers his wives subservient and sweet. And he’s not really sorry about it, either.

Ugh, Julius. Maybe Servilia doesn’t want to marry him: being his sexy friend with benefits gives her power and influence without her having to be subservient to Caesar. Maybe she feels like she can influence and enjoy him more as a lover. But really, your guess is as good as mine.

It must be said that their honeymoon period ends pretty early. In 60 BCE, Julius joins up with two other ambitious gentlemen in an unofficial arrangement called the First Triumvirate. This is the name we’ve given it in our time: back when they first struck it up, some called it Tricaranus, or the Three-Headed Monster. That name sums up the kind of danger the alliance might pose. All three of these guys want things they can’t get on their own, and between them, they’re hoping they’ll be able to essentially run the show in Rome: kind of a “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” situation. There’s Crassus, who we’ll call the money: he’s rich as they come, and just as devious. There’s Julius, of course, who we’ll call the brain. And then there’s Pompey, who we’ll call the brawn. He is one of Rome’s most famous military generals, and, you’ll remember, one of Servilia’s sworn enemies. She can’t be super thrilled with this arrangement.

We can only imagine the fights Servilia and Julius may have over this particular power play. If we envision her as opinionated and proud, which I do, she can’t like seeing her lover and her enemy joining forces. But I also get the impression that Servilia is someone who doesn't let her emotions get the best of her. She knows how to be calculating, and she understands political cunning. That’s led some historians to label her as ruthless, desiring power at any cost. I think it just shows she’s savvy about the circles she swims in. As we’ll find out before long, women who let their emotions show, if those emotions fall outside of the image of a ‘good Roman woman,’ don’t seem to get far.

Perhaps Julius tells her that, with their backing, he’s going to go from rising star to show runner. We don’t know, but with their backing, Julius is able to quickly climb up the political ladder. By 59 BCE, he’s buying Servilia lavish presents. “Above all others, [Caesar] loved Servilia,” Seutonius tells us, “…and in his first consulship he bought for her a pearl costing six million sesterces.” It’s hard to translate what that would equate to in modern dollars, but we’re talking the equivalent of a harbor’s worth of very expensive yachts. This is, by the way, the year he’s marrying another woman named Calpurnia. Talk about some emotional whiplash.

This is not Servilia. I don’t know that there are ANY paintings of her whatsoever. If only I could paint. “A Pompeian Lady,” 1891, John William Godward.

This is not Servilia. I don’t know that there are ANY paintings of her whatsoever. If only I could paint. “A Pompeian Lady,” 1891, John William Godward.

It’s also the same year he has her half-brother Cato forcibly removed from the rostra for speaking against an agrarian law of his. Cato and his smelly feet have been working tirelessly to dismantle and otherwise ruin the triumvirate, whom he sees as a giant threat to the sanctity and health of the Republic. Cato and Caesar LOATHE each other, which is awkward for Servilia. Or maybe Servilia finds Cato as boring as her lover does. Plutarch tells us that during a tense debate in the Senate between Caesar and Cato, someone delivers a note to Caesar. Cato demands to read it aloud, convinced it’s some secret message that will prove he’s conspiring against the Roman state. Ugh, Cato. Julius hands it right over. “Totally, man. In fact, why don't you read it out loud? You have such a great reading voice.” So Cato starts to read…only to find himself airing a steamy love letter from Servilia. Whoops.

The affair most certainly isn’t a secret, and you’d think it would dent Servilia’s reputation as a good Roman woman. After all, women aren’t supposed to sleep around, at least not openly. Women aren’t supposed to have sexual urges at all! And yet her relationship doesn’t seem to hurt her. Instead it gives her new contacts and influence, which suggests that she’s smart. She isn’t one to parade the relationship around or overtly try and influence her lover’s politics. Instead she goes gently, with a deft touch, making friends and smoothing over any trouble. Caesar clearly isn’t the only man who respects Servilia, and she has her own friends in high places. 

SERVILIA: Of course I do. I am incredibly fabulous.

But the bigger he gets, the more debts Julius accrues from all the bribes he’s paying to climb the power ladder, and eventually he has to sneak out of Rome under cover of darkness to go find ways of paying them off. We don’t know how much, if any, Servilia participates in any of his schemes and what she thinks of his tactics while he’s away. But we have to imagine that they write when he marches off for several years on a wildly successful military campaign through Gaul, where he ruthlessly subdues what most consider an unconquerable people, cementing himself as one of Rome’s Most Brilliant Generals Ever. I can imagine her doing the equivalent of cutting out news clippings and pasting them into a little scrapbook. We can imagine her breathless anguish in 51 BCE when Pompey, now at the head of the Senate, orders Caesar to return to Rome unarmed and face the music for starting that war in Gaul without Senate approval. How she must cheer—or maybe not?—when he marches his troops into Rome across the River Rubicon, igniting a bloody civil war between the members of the First Triumvirate, from which he ultimately rises victorious. Who knows what she feels when he sails off to Egypt, where he helps Cleopatra secure her throne and has a steamy affair with her in the process. All we can do is wonder, as no one’s found Servilia’s Super Secret Diary. But I imagine if we asked her, she might say:

This is a painting of the Greek witch/semi-goddess Circe, but I think that Servilia would like the sentiment.

This is a painting of the Greek witch/semi-goddess Circe, but I think that Servilia would like the sentiment.

No doubt their affair ebbed and flowed during this time, on and off again during his long absences. And we can hope that savvy Servilia had other relationships and other hobbies besides being Team Caesar—I get the feeling she’s not one to sit around and pine. But even after all that, it seems they’re still devoted to each other, at least in friendship. Julius continues to give her gifts to show his favor. 

It’s interesting to note that while Caesar sends back cash to guys like Cicero and others seeking political office to help with their expenses, thinking they’ll be a wise pro-Caesar investment, he also sends gifts back to their wives. Why do that if these women have no sway with their husbands and have no chance of impacting his own situation? But of course, Servilia gets some of the best gifts of all.

Suetonius says that “during the civil war, he acquired some fine estates for her in a public auction at a nominal price and when some expressed their surprise at the low figure, Cicero quipped: “It’s a better bargain than you think, for he got a third off.” This little remark is supposed to suggest that he’s been sleeping with Servilia’s daughter: the word for third in Latin is tertia, which also happens to be very close to that daughter’s name. He suggests that, when Servilia starts to feel like Julius is losing interest in her, she pimps out her own daughter to him to sweeten the deal! Alrighty then…

There’s also a rumor that Caesar is young Marcus Brutus’s true father. Plutarch wrote that he treated Brutus with special attention:

“...out of a tenderness to Servilia, the mother of Brutus; for Caesar had, it seems, in his youth been very intimate with her, and she passionately in love with him; and, considering that Brutus was born about that time in which their loves were at the highest, Caesar had a belief that he was his own child.”
— Plutarch

Caesar would have been maybe 15 when Brutus was born, so unlikely, but it goes to show how much he cares for her. He certainly seems to have stepped into Brutus’s life as a sort of father figure.

But things get messy during the civil war that pits the three triumvirs against each other. Suddenly Rome is forced to choose sides in a very bloody squabble over their Republic’s future, and Servilia finds her family in turmoil. She, obviously, is Team Caesar. Her half-brother Cato is staunchly Anti-Caesar and picks up his sword to march against him. Ugh, Cato. And Brutus – her only son, her legacy, the boy she has pinned all her hopes on – decides to side with Pompey. POMPEY, who is not only Caesar’s rival, but Servilia’s enemy and Brutus’s father’s murderer. We don’t know what she feels, but I’m voting for a mixture of anger, worry, and betrayal. Ugh, men. 

But when Caesar defeats Pompey’s forces at Pharsalus, he puts out an order to make sure that Brutus goes unhurt and unpunished. This could be because he likes the kid, but it’s also got to be out of love for Servilia. He isn’t about to execute her only son. Which, it turns out, is a mistake.

But not all is well between son and mother. In 45 BCE, Servilia grows angry with Brutus for unexpectedly divorcing his wife Claudia Pulchra so he can marry his cousin, Cato’s daughter Porcia. Not cool, Brutus! Is this because she remembers her own parent’s divorce, and doesn’t think he’s being fair to Claudia? Or is it because she sees herself as his patriarch of a sort, and doesn’t like her son going against her plans for him?

The ancient sources would have us believe that Servilia and Portia do NOT get on well. Apparently, she worries about how much influence this new bride might have on her son – that Porcia might take her place in her son’s affections. At least Brutus stays high in Caesar’s estimation. He even promotes young Brutus to a praetorship in 44 BCE. Little does she know that her son will end up at the heart of the plot to kill the man she’s spent so many of her nights with. 

And so we’re back in 44 BCE, and in some people’s eyes, Julius Caesar is a hero. During his time as a general, he claimed to have killed almost two million people and won fifty battles. As a political leader, he gave grain to the poor and made sure his soldiers had land as reward for their services. As Dictator, he’s building libraries, reforming Rome’s calendar, creating jobs, kissing babies. He’s also balding, but seriously, don’t say anything about that!

In general, the public seems to love him. But there are members of the Senatorial elite who are getting really worried about what they see as his king-like powers. They don’t like that he’s a Dictator: a position that consuls are only supposed to appoint in military emergencies, and then only for six months. They don’t like that he doesn’t really listen to them.

And when he’s named Dictator for Life in February of 44 BCE, they know they’ve got a problem. It looks like he’s not going to step down from his position unless someone pries it from his cold, dead hands.

In which sons make questionable choices…

That same month, Caesar’s loyal second Mark Antony tries to put a wreathed laurel crown on his head in public – a sign of kingship. He refuses it, saying that only the god Jupiter is the king of the Romans. But a lot of people doubt he’s sincere about it; they think he may even have planned the whole thing, either to reassure the people or give them a little inspiration. Also, he’s just done something pretty racy for his girlfriend, queen Cleopatra. She’s in Rome as we speak, residing in one of Julius’s villas just outside of town. Can we talk about this for a second? He’s got a famous, very smart and savvy queen in one villa, his actual wife in another, and maybe Servilia in another, trying not to roll her eyes about the whole hot mess. That’s a lot of lover juggling! But I do wonder if at this point he and Servilia are mostly affectionate friends.

We’ll talk more about Julius and Cleo in a few episodes, trying to understand it all through her eyes, but for now here’s what you need to know: Cleopatra has come to town with Caesar’s son in tow – his only son, even if he is considered illegitimate. To make this worse, he’s just had a statue of her cast entirely in gold, which he’s placed in a temple alongside a statue of the goddess Venus. To the casual Roman at this point in Rome’s history comparing a living, foreign woman to a Roman goddess is…really, deeply uncool. OTT, Julius.

And so a cohort of men start to plot in secret to save the Republic from the man they see as a tyrant. Some of these men are Caesar’s enemies and rivals. But some are men who love him, including one Marcus Brutus. As the descendent of that other Marcus Brutus who helped to end Rome’s monarchy, he feels that it’s his birthright to kill tyrants. Which must be…really awkward for Servilia. Does she know of the conspiracy to kill her long-time lover? Probably not, or I think she would try to stop it. Perhaps she too has concerns about Caesar’s motivations and plans for the Republic. And I mean, he’s just cast another woman’s likeness in gold, so screw him. But as a pragmatic woman who’s made opportunity where other, less calculating women may have stumbled, I don’t think she’s in on the plot. Caesar has given her and her son many honors. I wonder, if she knew, if she would have betrayed her son to Caesar. Imagine having to make the choice between the man you’ve long loved, your only son, and the fate of the Roman Republic. What choice is the right one? She’s going to be heartbroken no matter which way she goes.  

And so comes the Ides of March, when Caesar is stabbed many times in the Senate building. Did he actually say, as Shakespeare has it, “Et tu, Brute?” – “And you, Brutus?” in horror at finding Servilia’s son wielding a knife? I doubt it, but he must be pretty cut up by the betrayal. Pun intended! No doubt Servilia is, too.

ET TU, BRUTE_.png

The conspirators march out into the street announcing what they’ve done. “The tyrant’s dead!” they scream to all and sundry. “Isn’t that wonderful and exciting?” They people do NOT find this wonderful OR exciting. In fact, they’re pissed. Caesar’s loyal friends are calling for the conspirator’s blood. For a while there’s a strained peace between the different camps, but Caesar’s very public funeral turns the tide against him. Suddenly, Servilia’s son is not a savior as he hoped for, but an enemy of Rome.

But even so, Servilia doesn’t turn her back on him. The conspirators meet at her house, where they try to decide what to do next. There’s only one thing TO do, and that’s leave the city before anyone stabs them.

Brutus spends a lot of time skulking around country villas, feeling sorry for himself and trying to decide how to get back into Rome’s good graces. And though she must be grieving for her lover and angry at her son for all he’s done to their family, she steps in ever calmly to help him, advising and campaigning. Cicero tells us that she co-chairs a meeting in 43 BCE, where they discuss next steps. The Senate is tossing around the idea of throwing Brutus and his fellow conspirator Cassius, who is married to one of Servilia’s daughters, a bone. That bone is in the form of a commission to facilitate Rome’s grain supply. It would get them away from the city AND improve their standing with the Roman people: a win for sure! Cicero, who’s Team Brutus, thinks the whole thing was beneath the two men and wants to tell Brutus so, but then he thinks ‘why bother?’ “…he follows his mother’s advice, or rather her prayers,” he wrote. “…why should I interfere?” It is decided that Brutus and Cassius will take the commission, but not the lowly order to secure the grain supply. But for that to work, that line item needs to be taken out of the Senatorial decree altogether before they vote on it. And Servilia’s like, “Hold my drink. I’m handling this.”

Once again this is NOT of Servilia, but I think it works just the same. “The Debate of Socrates and Aspasia,” c. 1800. Wikimedia Commons

Once again this is NOT of Servilia, but I think it works just the same. “The Debate of Socrates and Aspasia,” c. 1800. Wikimedia Commons

This one thing, more than anything else we know about her, suggests the breadth of her political sway and influence. She’s saying she can actually get a proposed bill changed before it goes to the official vote, even though she’s a woman with no political standing AND the mother of Caesar’s murderer. That she believes she can do such a thing – and that Cicero and the others believe she can do it– is pretty telling, and extremely impressive. If she could do this, what else has she accomplished that never made it into the history books?

Brutus goes off, leaving his mother to be his eyes and ears back in Rome. She helps him finance and organize his attempts to redeem his reputation. She is his mouthpiece, always worrying and fighting for him, acting as a bridge between him and important members of the Senate. Cicero says she’s highly capable and dynamic, and very worried for her offspring. “I was requested by that prudent and careful lady, your mother, all of whose anxieties refer to you and are consumed in you, to come to her on 25 July,” he writes to Brutus in 43 BCE. “So of course I did it without delay.”

But it’s all for naught. In the chaotic aftermath of Caesar’s death, a new power threesome rises, forming what’s called the Second Triumvirate. We’ll go into this little three-way more later, but right now let’s just say their #1 goal, other than one upping each other, is hunting down Caesar’s murderers and bringing them to justice. Once again, Rome is forced to choose who to back: these powers who say they want to settle the Republic, or Caesar’s assassins, who say they just wanted to save it. Brutus and the others raise forces to try and fight back, and I’m sure Servilia helps them where she can, but it’s a losing battle. In 42 BCE, Brutus commits suicide rather than be captured at a great battle at Philippi. We can only imagine how she feels upon receiving his ashes through the ancient world post.

EID MAR Denarius. Brutus sanctioned this coin in 43/42 BCE. It depicts him one one side (it was seen as ‘kingly’ to have your likeness on a coin while living…way to be a contradiction there, Brute), with the liberty cap between daggers on the other.…

EID MAR Denarius. Brutus sanctioned this coin in 43/42 BCE. It depicts him one one side (it was seen as ‘kingly’ to have your likeness on a coin while living…way to be a contradiction there, Brute), with the liberty cap between daggers on the other. The inscription EID MAR translates to the Ides of March. This coin seems to be an attempt of reassurance to the people of Rome that he had liberated them by assassinating Caesar. Nice try, son. (Wikicommons.)

The next 13 years are going to be rocky ones. Though the Senate and assemblies still meet, and elections continue, the triumvirs are pretty much running the show in Rome. In what they say is retaliation against the conspirators, they put lists of people to death and confiscate their property: some 3,000 patricians feel the burn. That includes Cicero, who is both Brutus’s friend and Servilia’s. And yet Servilia is spared. Why? Perhaps it’s because she was beloved by Caesar. More likely, it’s because she’s made sure she’s in such a powerful position that they wouldn’t dare. This says something about her power, too: that in a time of bloodshed and daggers under togas, Servilia lives for many more years and like Cornelia, dies a natural death. 

We know frustratingly little about Servilia: what was her relationship with Caesar like, really? How much power did she hold behind the scenes in Republican Rome? Who was she? Over time, she’s come to be portrayed as a devious temptress and a manipulative schemer with only her own interests at heart. Because if there’s one thing we know for sure, listeners, it’s that a woman who wants power must be a monster! The ancient Romans certainly found it something to be afraid of. But there’s one thing about Servilia that is, to me, as clear as day. In a time before empresses – before women had clear paths to power at the highest levels – this shrewd political dynamo not only influenced her world and some of the most influential men within it, but survived some of the bloodiest days that Rome ever saw. She won a lot and lost a lot, but at the end of it all she still managed to come out more or less on top.

Part 3

Fulvia: She’s a hustler, baby

It’s 47 or 46 BCE, and we’ve stepped into a private chamber, where a woman is pulling down her saffron-colored veil. Today she’s getting married, but she’s no blushing virgin. In fact, this is her third marriage, and she’s as shrewd, seasoned, and ambitious as they come. When she marries a man, she becomes his ultimate champion. And lucky for him, her fiancé is about to find out what it means to be married to Rome’s #1 lady gangster. Fulvia is a mighty force of nature. She’s also one of the scariest and least appreciated badasses that ancient Rome is ever going to see.

Grab some good walking sandals, your sharpest hairpins, and a flint, because we’re about to light this place all the way up. Let’s go traveling.

Just a reminder that if you haven’t listened to our three-parter called When In Rome or the previous two episodes in this Domina series, I’d go and do that. They’ll help you appreciate this woman we’re about to meet all the more.

But let’s back up and begin at the beginning. Fulvia Flacca Bambula is born somewhere around 83 BCE, probably maybe, but we really don’t know, and that is probably just as Fulvia would want it. She’s the daughter of a guy named Marcus Fulvius Bambalio. It’s important to note that Fulvia’s father is a plebian. Remember that in Rome, we have two major citizen classes: the patricians, or the wealthy elite, and the plebs. Now plebs can be wealthy, and they can be influential, but they’re essentially considered commoners by those who live up on Rome’s finest hills. Fulvia’s dad is quite a high-class pleb, but he’s still a pleb. A man, you could say, of the people. Here’s Dr. Rad from the podcast The Partial Historians, who along with her co-host Dr. G is here to help tell Fulvia’s story:

Dr. RAD: “So she actually doesn't come from like an amazing background. Her father...I mean, she's obviously part of the elite, but he wasn't. It's not like Cornelia where her father was, you know, this amazing military hero that people still study their battle strategies or anything like that. He had a fairly modest background, but she ends up becoming connected to some pretty notorious men in her lifetime.”

Her family has seen some ancestors rise to take places in the Senate, but if anything, they’re on the political decline. Her grandpa was known as feeble minded – he apparently was fond of going to stand in the Forum and throwing coins at people. Her father’s cognomen, or nickname, is Bambalio, which means “stutterer.” Not the most prodigious pedigree for a woman who will grow to be ambitious as hell.

We know pretty much nothing about how she grows up, her being a woman and all. We don’t know how much education she got, either, though we can assume at least some, and we don’t know how she spent her time. I like to envision her leading a baby gang around her local streets and hitting mean boys over the head with the amulet that all children wear around their necks. Somewhere along the way, it seems like she developed a keen desire for power—to play an active, public role, and for people to know her. The only way a fine Roman woman can do that is to hitch herself to some man’s wagon and help drive it to greatness. Here’s Dr. G:

Dr. G: “…she clearly is interested in being active in politics. Like she seems to have a political mindset. And in order to be active in politics, you got to work through the men. And she sort of stands out as like this sort of lightning rod in that sort of model of Cornelia of the Gracchi. Of sort of being like, "well, if it's through the men, so be it. I'll do what I have to do."”

So she doesn’t truly appear on stage in this story until she takes her first husband. That man is a guy named Publius Clodius Pulcher, but let’s just called him Clodius. 

Hey ladies and gents! Your boy Clodius here. People say I like drama, and you know it’s true. My interests include dress-up parties, drinking games, pranks, and causing trouble. I’m always down to clown, so holla at me.

He is a patrician: mercurial, controversial, a bit of a wild child, and most certainly someone who likes to stir the pot. Before he meets Fulvia, he’s already gotten into a bit of hot water over in Gaul, where he apparently incited a mutiny against the general amongst the troops and, the rumors went, had an incestuous tryst with that general’s wife. When he comes back to Rome, he finds he needs his own wife, preferably one with a little bit of cash money. Luckily, he has Fulvia, who is the heiress to her family’s fortune. And she needs a better man in her corner, as apparently around this time she’s hooking up with a guy named Quintus Curius. Sallust tells us he’s reckless, thoughtless, and apparently violent. He liked to “…promise her seas and mountains and sometimes to threaten his mistress with the steel if she did not bow to his will.” 

Not cute, Quintus. And though Clodius is a troublemaker, he is a well-connected patrician who will only elevate Fulvia in society. And I also have the feeling that, in his fiery nature and desire to shake things up, she sees a kindred spirit. They both seem to have a flair for drama. And in 62 BCE, the same year we think they marry, Clodius puts his on full and scandalous display.

Here’s where we circle back to Julius Caesar. Remember when he divorced his wife and then DIDN’T marry the epically glorious Servilia? It all starts in the winter of 62, which brings with it the sacred festival of the Bona Dea, or the “Good Goddess.” She has a real name, but men aren’t allowed to know it. Each December, the Vestal Virgins show up at a Roman citizen’s house to perform the sacred rituals to the Bona Dea. That house belongs to the Pontifex Maximus, or chief priest, who just so happens to be Julius Caesar. Since it’s a ladies-only festival, it’s his wife Pompeia who serves as hostess. Given that Julius is fairly new to his role as pontifex and has a lot he wants to accomplish, she’s under a lot of pressure to make sure it all goes off without a hitch.

We don't know what goes on at this all-female festival, though I like to imagine it’s much wine, some skinny dipping, and trash talking wayward husbands. There’s a secret rite that involves the Vestal Virgins, who you’ll remember it’s a deadly crime to touch. Which makes what Clodius does all the more scandalous. "… Pompeia was celebrating this festival,” Plutarch writes later, “and Clodius, who was still beardless and on this account thought to pass unnoticed, assumed the dress and implements of a lute-girl and went to the house, looking like a young woman. He found the door open, and was brought in safely by the maid-servant there, who was in on the secret; but after she had run on ahead to tell Pompeia and some time had elapsed, Clodius had not the patience to wait where he had been left, and so, as he was wandering about in the house and trying to avoid the lights, an attendant of Aurelia came upon him and asked him to play with her, as one woman would another, and when he refused, she dragged him forward and asked who he was and whence he came.” 

Clodius has been found out in the background in this deptiction of the Bona Dea Scandal by Augustyn Mirys. Wikicommons.

Clodius has been found out in the background in this deptiction of the Bona Dea Scandal by Augustyn Mirys. Wikicommons.

He’s caught and kicked out, but it turns out that his transgression is much more than a casual prank. He’s snuck into Caesar’s house and spent time unchaperoned with many women, including the sacred Vestal Virgins? Anything might have happened. But it’s not just that. He interrupts the sacred rights the Vestals are meant to perform, and they have to repeat them. Remember that the Vestals are symbols of Rome’s health and prosperity, so if something goes wrong with them, then everyone’s hot and bothered. It calls them into question. Also Caesar, as the pontifex maximus; Caesar’s wife, who Clodius was supposedly there to seduce; the whole festival of the Bona Dea is draped in a dark cloud of suspicion. This is one of the biggest scandals Rome has ever seen. And the ensuing trial is an interesting one, because it highlights one of the questions that burns brightest in the Roman male imagination: given that women are born with a certain moral weakness, what might they get up to if you gave them a barrel of wine and left them to their own devices? The potential answers make them very anxious indeed.

Clodius is taken to trial and accused of desecration for violating the ritual. The sentence carried for it is death. At first, Clodius tries to deny the whole thing, but there are just too many witnesses. Even Julius Caesar’s mom and sister, who were there, get in on the act of testifying against him. And even though Julius Caesar says he thinks his wife is innocent, he divorces her for even this small whiff of impropriety. Why? Because he’s an ambitious man still climbing the political ladder, is supposed to be the city’s chief priest, and this whole thing is really bad PR. He said as much in words that inspired the following catch phrase: “Julius Caesar’s wife must be above suspicion.” Meanwhile, he’s sleeping with Servilia and who knows who else, but mmmmk Julius! You throw your wife under the bus.

In the end, Clodius gets off without much punishment, perhaps because he bribes the jury. Which illustrates the fact that the Republic isn’t running quite as smoothly as it once did, and an unfair double standard that will play out in these stories again and again: Women are punished for even the suggestion of naughty behavior, or just because their behavior makes the men around them look bad, while men like Clodius just have to bribe the jury.

Anyway, the guy who gets up in court and runs the case against him is Cicero, a statesman, philosopher, and perhaps the most convincing orator of his day. 

CICERO: I, Cicero, am a master with words, and I’m always slinging them in the name of justice. Ladies and gents alike have been known to swoon over my bulging oratory. So watch out, tyrants! Because I’m coming for ya. Hard.

810px-Cicero_-_Musei_Capitolini.jpeg

Marcus Tullius Cicero, known as one of Rome’s greatest orators and Fulvia’s enemy.

Wikicommons

When he talks, people listen, and he is scathing in his attack on Clodius. He calls him a monster, effeminate, lusty, impious. Clodius will never forget the part he played in trying to disgrace him, and neither will Fulvia. That’ll be important later.

He may be free, but his fellow patricians had betrayed him and made him look bad. But there’s a silver lining. By not bringing him to trial on an accusation of adultery, Caesar basically gives him a get-out-of-jail free card. Why? Because Caesar too is getting sick of Cicero’s constant political roadblocking, and he wants Clodius on his side.

The thing is that Clodius is not eligible to run for the Senate. But you know what they say when one door closes, you open a window. And so it is that in 59 BC Fulvia’s husband has the opportunity to close the door on the patricians and join up with the plebs. With Caesar’s help as pontifex maximus, Clodius formally transfers out of his patrician clan into a plebeian family by having it ‘adopt’ him. This is controversial, and legally a little bit shady, but the move lets him enter back into politics as a tribune. And that’s good, because he is a member of the Populares: that political faction Cornelia’s son once helped get off the ground, and that represents the interests of the people. Clodius knows that the Senate hold a lot of power, but there are other ways to get things done, and the people can have power, too. There are a lot of them, and in a city where there is currently no police force, a mob can be a mighty force for change. The man – or woman – who controls that mob? They might just be unstoppable. 

Fulvia and her husband make their mark among the insulae: the tall, cramped apartments that take up much of the city and that house most of Rome’s people within them. They are better loved in the local taverna than in the gilded halls up on the Palatine, and it seems they’re fine with that. And always, Fulvia is there beside her husband; Cicero tells us that she and Clodius are almost never seen apart. 

The key to their success in the streets is getting in with the collegium. Collegium are any organized groups with a shared purpose or function: priesthoods, magistracies, tradesman’s guilds. In Rome’s complicated game of who owes who, a politician might become a patron of a particular collegia, knowing that they’ll back him politically. That could mean canvassing on his behalf, swelling the numbers in his entourage to make him look more important, or, as the Republic gets more corrupt, people who will intimidate people to hand over money or hand out bribes to grease the wheels. They might also start demonstrations on the streets or fight rival factions for dominance. Wait: are these trade groups or straight-up street gangs? Turns out that they’re mostly the latter, and Clodius and Fulvia aren’t afraid to use them.

Clodius does this by putting in a monthly grain doll, making Rome’s grain free for all, and chips away at any legal restrictions that might bar people from forming collegium. Clodius’ secretary even goes out and organizes collegia made up of Rome’s grateful poor in his name. Remember that the urban poor make up a vast part of the city’s population, and now they are trained to fight for Clodius and Fulvia if they ask them to. They can be anywhere in the city at short notice, more than ready to bust some skulls. Even Rome’s soldiers find it hard to fend off Clodius’ thugs in the city’s narrow alleys and twisting laneways, down amid the insulae they know so well. Rome is a dangerous city at night: with no streetlights, no police, and plenty of cutthroats. Within this world, Clodius makes himself into a gang lord, and Fulvia is his mob boss lady. With a wave of her hand, she can have someone booed out of public games, or beaten publicly in the streets—her streets. She has powerful politicians cowering in their homes, afraid to ever come out again.

By 60 BCE, the First Triumvirate is up and running, with Pompey, Caesar, and Crassus backing each other’s agendas no matter how much they might secretly want to push each other off a mountain. They help Caesar get elected consul in 59, and in turn he uses that lofty position to push through his frenemies’ agendas. They, in turn, help secure him a military posting in Gaul. But guys like Cicero are horrified by what he sees as their increasingly blatant corruption, and he isn’t afraid to make some noise about it. So while Caesar is off in Gaul, he knows he needs an enforcer in Rome to look after his interests and make sure guys like Pompey don’t get ideas about elbowing him out of the political frame. The one he chooses is the one and only Clodius, who is more than keen to stay in Caesar’s good graces. 

But he isn’t content to just send his thugs to crush skulls in the streets. In 58 BCE, he introduces a series of laws called the Leges Clodiae. Part of what they do is make it so anyone who has ever executed a Roman citizen without a trial has to be exiled. This law is popular with the plebs, as it feels like sweet vengeance, but it ALSO puts a target on the guy who’s been a thorn in Clodius’ and Caesar’s sides for so long: Cicero. And guy just does not know when to shut UP. He goes on about how horrible and unfair it is, about how Rome is going to hell in a handbasket.

And he has plenty of supporters who are horrified at the law as well. But Clodius and Fulvia are having none of it: screw diplomacy! Their gangs surround the Senate building, where Cicero and his friends are congregated, and chase them right out of it. They then get a bill passed forbidding Cicero “fire and water” for 400 miles around Rome, which essentially means he can’t come anywhere near it. They confiscate Cicero’s country homes and his house on the Palatine. And then they burn them to the ground. Damn, Fulvia… 

This is all making Pompey a little itchy. He was totally down with giving Clodius power in the beginning, when he and Caesar were still working together. But he’s a big deal general, dammit, and he’s sick of being chased around by Clodius’ thugs and hiding in his basement every time they come knocking. So he’s like, “you know what I need? An even BIGGER gang.” He gets a guy named Milo to create a thug posse comprised of ex-gladiators, and he and Clodius clash for years, fighting in the political sphere and in the streets alike in increasingly bloody fashion. Imagine being a woman out shopping at the market, just minding your business, and BOOM: guys with cudgels, just beating on everybody. Rome’s gang wars are getting out of control. 

And through it all, Fulvia is there, scheming, plotting, and intimidating. She’s found her way to her happy place, and it makes certain Romans very uncomfortable:

“Fulvia had no interest in women’s work such as spinning or housekeeping, and did not wish to preside over a husband who was not a public figure. Rather, she wanted to rule a ruler or command a general.”
— Plutarch on Fulvia

And Fulvia’s like, “Um, yeah, bitch. And your point is?”

This sounds almost like praise to our ears, but it’s definitely meant as slander. In the sources we have, Fulvia is described as being a violation of everything that’s sacred about a Roman matrona. Her behavior is, in their eyes, disturbingly masculine. Velleius Paterculus calls her “a woman in body alone.” To which I imagine Fulvia saying, “Honey, I am allllll woman. You can take your tiny manhood and shove it up your ass.”

If you’ve read or seen Shakespeare’s Macbeth, it’s almost as if Fulvia was the playwright’s direct inspiration for Lady Macbeth. I think she would completely identify with her whole “unsex me here” speech, where Lady Macbeth proclaims that she wants to trade in her femininity for masculine cruelty. She knows her husband probably doesn’t have what it takes to murder the king, and she knows she’s going to need to stage manage him. Fulvia’s the same, and she isn’t afraid to get her hands dirty.

Violence must be stirring to the loins, as well, as through it all they have two healthy children: a boy and a girl. But in January 52 BCE, life as she knows it comes screeching to a halt. Milo and his gladiator gang kills Clodius in the middle of Rome’s main street, the Appian Way. And this time, Fulvia isn’t there with her husband; she’s at home when someone brings her husband’s body to her door. Imagine opening the door to find your husband there, bloodied and beaten. She isn’t going to fade into the shadows and let grief swallow her. Instead, to get her vengeance, she’s about to turn the drama up to 11. 

She props up her husband’s body, showing off his wounds to the growing crowd, and gives a passionate speech that fuels the flames of their followers’ outrage. We don’t know what she says, but it must be pretty convincing. Because the crowd is so incensed that they carry the body, naked, through the streets of Rome, collecting angry mourners as they go. They take it to the Forum, where they rip apart the furniture to make a pyre for him. That’s right: they cremate his body by starting an impromptu fire in the Senate building. And through it all, I picture Fulvia standing with a match in her hand, saying: “Let’s burn. This. Shit. Down.”

Now Fulvia’s not just the wife of a gang lord. She IS the gang lord. She gives evidence in the ensuring trial against Milo, who is defended - of course - by Cicero, who has by this time wormed his way back into Rome. And it’s one of those trials where lots of people are allowed in to watch, including Pompey’s soldiers and Fulvia’s gang members. Cicero tries not to be intimidated, but even he can’t save Milo from Fulvia’s passionate, well-placed testimony. It brings the jury to tears and helps nail Milo to the wall.

Dr. RAD: “Milo is, in fact, banished for this crime. So this is a pretty big deal that she's involved in.”

From here on out, Cicero absolutely loathes Fulvia. She’s everything he hates. And that’s fine, because she loathes him right back. I imagine Fulvia’s sad about losing her husband, but that doesn’t mean she has to lose all they built together. And I get the feeling she isn’t one to rest on her laurels and eat bonbons. So she marries again, as you do. 

Dr. RAD: “She then moves on to a man called Curio, who doesn't seem to have been a particularly amazing politician until he gets married to Fulvia. We don't know whether those two things are connected or not, but it could be that she gave him sort of the drive that he needed to, you know, to try and take on more, I suppose, and have more of a career path sort of set out in front of him.”

He abandons the aristocracy for the plebs, much like Clodius, and probably because of Fulvia, and suddenly he’s a much more pointed and noteworthy politician. We don’t know if Fulvia is the key to his success, but…I mean, come on now.

But he doesn’t last for long. Curio dies in north Africa fighting for Caesar in 49 BCE. This is the same year Caesar takes his troops across the River Rubicon to seize control of Italy, starting a civil war with his frenemy Pompey. Crassus, by this point, has been killed abroad while trying to wage war against the Parthians. Fun side note: he died by having gold poured down his throat. That’s lavish. This is, by the way, the same year Caesar’s going to sail to Egypt, meet Cleopatra, and have a very public love affair. But what’s happening with Fulvia in Rome during all this? 

It’s time to get properly introduced to Fulvia’s third and final husband: Mark Antony. I’ll let him introduce himself:

Sup, girl. Wanna have a good time? Because I like to live it UP. My motto is “work hard, play hard, love hard.” I chug wine faster than anybody you’ve ever met. I love Greek plays, big parties, working out in short tunics, practical jokes, and spending money like it’s going out of business. Oh, and the ladies. I sure do looooove the ladies.

Portrait bust of Mark Antony. Found in the Vatican Museums. Wikicommons.

Portrait bust of Mark Antony. Found in the Vatican Museums. Wikicommons.

A little summary of his life so far: born in 83 BCE, he comes from a plebian noble family. His dad was a praetor, but he was defeated rather embarrassingly in battle, and his sons ended up bankrupt because of it. Later, his stepfather is put to death without a trial, rather scandalously, as part of something called the Cataline Conspiracy. I bring this up because Fulvia actually helped get these conspirators caught in the first place, and also because our favorite orator, Cicero, is the guy who took them down, and that’s something Mark Antony isn’t going to forget about in a hurry.

Anyway, none of that kept him from living large as a twenty-something. He ran around town with both of Fulvia’s first two husbands, earning a reputation as Rome’s #1 frat boy: drinking and womanizing, running up debts with everyone in town. In 57, he ends up joining the army, and he ended up proving himself really good at it. Eventually he ends up in Gaul, where he proves himself so good a bruiser that Caesar takes notice, becoming a kind of mentor to Antony. He eventually returns to Rome, becomes a quaestor, and at some point in 53 he and Clodius have a falling out, and apparently he gets involved in a sword fight with Fulvia’s husband in a bookshop? That’s what Cicero claims, anyway. Oh, Rome. 

So by this point, Caesar’s won the civil war and is Rome’s top dog, but he’s got some sexy business to tend to over in Egypt. This includes having fun with Cleopatra in her palace as angry local troops try to kill them, which we’ll talk all about in another episode. Meanwhile, he leaves Mark Antony in charge as Rome’s wonderfully named Master of Horse, which is basically his deputy. But it isn’t a well-defined position, and things in Rome in this period are wobbly at best. Mark’s job is to try and keep order, and so he’s allowed to command troops if he has to. But mostly he’s acting like a kid in a candy store, taking power by the fistful. He’s riding about on a chariot, wearing purple cloaks and showing up in the Senate in armor, and parading around with a bunch of lictors like a pompous ass hat.  

By the time he and Fulvia are getting reacquainted, Antony is a confirmed rake, drinking lavishly and sleeping with many women, including a very public affair with a popular actress: much scandal. But he’s Caesar’s man, and a man on the rise, full of ambition and passion. Just Fulvia’s type.

Sometime in 46 BCE, we think, he and Fulvia marry. Cicero suggests that Fulvia and Mark were secretly sleeping together long before that, maybe all the way back to her first husband’s trial over the Bona Dea scandal. Given that Marc Antony was tight bros with both of her husbands, they’d definitely have known each other and run in the same circles. Cicero describes how Mark Antony slipped away from his barracks one night to deliver a letter to Fulvia, telling her in passionate language that he loves her, and saying he promises he won’t two-time her with that hot actress Cytheris anymore...probably. Oh, Mark!

Cicero, who let’s remember is not a Fulvia fan, writes that he’s only marrying her for her money. But there’s a lot in the match for both of them. Fulvia comes with gangs at her command, influence over the people, money in her stola, a cunning mind, and with a healthy rose of ruthless ambition. And by all account, Mark Antony is like: “I’m INTO it.” So much so that he just can’t seem to deny her anything. As Plutarch will later say, while writing about the epic affair he’ll soon have with the queen of Egypt: “Cleopatra ought to have paid Fulvia tuition for schooling Antony to obey a woman. So docile and trained to obey a woman’s commands was he when she took him on.” 

For her part, I can see what she likes about Antony. He’s a powerful figure, a war hero, and a close friend of Caesar’s. He’s ambitious and passionate, a risk taker: just her type. Sure he’s brash, and he might not be great at self-control, but he is smart, and Fulvia has stage managed a man before. She’s more than ready to do it again. 

Though it’s the third marriage for both of them, it’s clear from the stories that there’s plenty of emotion in the union. Plutarch tells us about a fun little joke he plays on his wife when he rides out to meet Caesar, who’s returning from battle. He disguises himself as a messenger to bring Fulvia a note that’s supposed to be from him. When she asks if he’s alive, the messenger doesn’t reply, then stands there and waits for her reaction. Before long he uncovers his head and throws his arms around her, apparently pleased by her tears and her show of devotion. Super funny, Antony. I hope she punches him in the ribs for that. But one thing this story does show is that Fulvia has a softer side. She does care very much for her husband, enough that she would openly show worry and upset over his fate in front of a delivery boy. That’s a very different picture than the one we usually get of cruel, take-no-prisoners Fulvia. When she takes someone into her heart, it’s for keeps.

While Mark Antony is great at drinking and fighting, he’s not great at keeping peace. By the end of his time as Master of Horse, everyone’s mad at him. In this way, Fulvia proves her worth early. There’s a major debt crisis in Rome; No one can pay their bills, and so a tribune of the people named Dolabella wants to put in some big reforms of debt forgiveness. Antony opposes him, partially because Caesar won’t like it and partially because Dolabella once slept with Antony’s second wife, Antonia. Well that’s petty. Dolabella takes a mob to the Forum to make sure his reforms are passed. Apparently, he missed the memo on who exactly Mark is married to. Fulvia whips up her own gang to oppose Dolabella, and though some 800 people are killed in the ensuing madness, Antony wins the day. No way he could have done it without his gangsta lady.

When Caesar comes back from all his conquering abroad, he’s not best pleased with the way Mark Antony dealt with things in his absence. He falls out of favor and spends some time unemployed, probably sulking around their house and driving Fulvia crazy. But eventually, by the fateful 44 BCE, he and Caesar are back to being besties. Caesar even makes him the equivalent of an ancient Roman friendship bracelet by promising they’ll be joint consuls together. He converts Mark and his immediate family to a patrician family, elevating them in the eyes of everybody. We can only imagine that Fulvia’s been coaching and pushing him, and that she’s rubbing her hands together over this new rise in favor. At 39, at last, her husband is about to come into his own.

But when Caesar is killed by Servilia’s son and his conspirators, his death plunges Rome into absolute chaos. At first, Mark and Fulvia probably hide in their house. Mark was Julius’ right-hand man, so what’s to stop them from killing him too? But that doesn’t happen. Instead, people start picking sides. Some support Caesar’s assassins. Like Cicero, who’s going to use his silver tongue to try and win the people’s approval for Brutus. But others, like Mark, want Caesar’s killers brought to justice. Meanwhile, public opinion on the whole thing is changing with every stiff breeze. Fulvia and her husband know that whoever ends up controlling that breeze has a chance to define everything that’s about to happen. And who is the better strategist in this particular marriage? 

As the only remaining consul, Mark has more power in Rome than anyone in this moment. And he uses some of it, at first, to try and stave off government shutdown and civil war. As head of state, he contacts a guy named Lepidus, who has command of a lot of Caesar’s troops, and makes sure they’re still playing on the same side. Then he kidnaps Caesar's papers and his treasury. He convenes a meeting of the Senate and says hey, maybe we’ll give the conspirators amnesty. He even sends his and Fulvia’s infant son to the conspirator’s camp to try and show good faith, which seems...pretty bold. But he quickly discovers that if he wants to swing the public in Caesar’s - and thus, his - favor, he’s going to have to make them into the villains of this story. So he decides to stage Caesar’s funeral with the highest of drama. As Appian has it, “...he stripped the clothes from Caesar's body, raised them on a pole and waved them about, rent as they were by the stabs and befouled with the dictator's blood. At this the people, like a chorus, joined him in the most sorrowful lamentation and after this expression of emotion were again filled with anger.”

He even makes a wax effigy of Caesar, complete with stab wounds, and rotates it using some special pulleys to make sure that those sitting in the nosebleeds can see. Well that’s extra. He gives an emotional eulogy meant to stir up the crowd, which it does, and as Appian says: “Howling and lamenting, they surrounded the senate-house, where Caesar had been killed, and burnt it down…”

Wait, what? This is ripped straight out of the How to Start a Riot in Three Steps! playbook. Step One: Display the naked, wounded body. Step 2: Make a fiery speech. Step 3: build a pyre out of chairs and burn down a building. Why does this sound so familiar? 

Dr. G: “Maybe that's where he learnt it from.”

Dr. RAD: “Exactly. She was a pioneer.” 

Marc Antony's Oration at Caesar's Funeral. By George Edward Robertson. This scene taken straight from Fulvia’s playbook on how to get the people on your side and angry.

Marc Antony's Oration at Caesar's Funeral. By George Edward Robertson. This scene taken straight from Fulvia’s playbook on how to get the people on your side and angry.

We don’t have any evidence that she helps him plan this event, but I mean, come on now. As a result, Mark Antony ends up leader of the cause to punish the assassins, which means he’s straight up running things in the wake of Caesar’s death. 

Well...sort of. Here’s the rub: in Caesar’s will, he leaves very little to Mark Antony in the way of money. The person he leaves most of his wealth to is, in fact, his grandnephew, a sickly teenager named Gaius Octavian. Even more troubling, the will claims that Caesar’s posthumously adopting Octavian as his son. It isn’t uncommon in Rome to adopt a grown person into your family, legally speaking, but it’s pretty unusual for it to happen after someone’s dead. And remember that Julius has no legitimate sons with any of his wives - only that one son with Cleopatra, who he most definitely does not mention in his will. Poor Cleo. This makes Octavian his successor in pretty much every way that matters, and Octavian isn’t about to let Mark rain on that parade.

We’ll spend a lot of time with Octavian in future episodes, and so we’ll bask in his glory more properly then. For now, let’s just say that Antony is not excited to hand his old friend’s legacy over to this pimpled, pompous nobody. And when Octavian rides into town, he is not thrilled to have Mark Antony holding Caesar’s papers and his inheritance hostage. As consul, Antony’s essentially made himself the unofficial executor of Caesar’s will, passing laws because he says Caesar wanted them. Of course he’s not showing anybody what’s actually IN Caesar’s papers, so you know...they just all have to take his word for it. One person besides Octavian who is NOT taking his word for it is our favorite thorny statesman, Cicero. He thinks Mark Antony’s just making it all up as he goes along and only claiming he’s spouting Caesar intentions. So when Octavian gets to Rome, he decides it’s time to do some speechmaking.

Dr. RAD: “Cicero is definitely an enemy, a political enemy of Antony. And he writes some very well-known speeches that are against Antony and for this reason, FULVIA gets dragged into his speeches as well and becomes like a mode of attack as well.” 

It’s common enough for wives to get dragged in men’s speeches - remember that Cornelia’s sons once used her name to make a point - but Cicero’s Philippics – a series of 14 speeches delivered between September of 44 BCE and April of 43 BCE – get pretty nasty. He pumps up Octavian’s reputation, calling him the second coming of Caesar, but better. He also tries to take down Antony by throwing the book at Fulvia, calling her greedy, promiscuous, a husband killer and unwomanly. He says that she sold part of Rome, and perhaps her body as well, to get ahead. He tells a story about Mark Antony and Fulvia riding out to punish a legion for going against him through an act called decimation. This is a disciplinary action for when soldiers misbehave that involves them drawing straws, and every tenth man who draws a short straw is beaten to death by his fellows. Yikes! Cicero says that Antony does this horrible thing not on his own, but “…in the lap of his wife, who was not only most avaricious but also most cruel.” I read that to suggest that it’s Fulvia who actually drives this horrid act, not her husband. Cicero is not pulling any punches.

Dr. RAD: “So we do need to bear in mind with people like for we are, that she may be being overly criticized and demonized because of her connections to particular men. But having said that, that probably is a kernel of truth to what they're saying. And I think Fulvia must have been politically prominent enough to merit this kind of attention.” 

Dr. G: “Yeah. So no political invective can really be successful unless there is a plausibility about the accusations being made.”

We can only really imagine how much this must have enraged Fulvia. But she doesn’t hide: she does what she does best and takes to the streets, canvassing on her husband’s behalf as Cicero tries to get the senate to make him an enemy of the state. Of course they do, and Fulvia and her children have to take shelter. The winds of power aren’t blowing her way.

Antony and Octavian quickly become rivals. Caesar’s legions start picking sides, and skirmishes happen. But eventually they realize they have a better chance at grasping power if they join forces, however unwillingly. And so they form an alliance called The Second Triumvirate. Yes, because the first one turned out so well!

Dr. RAD: “This is where we see Octavian, Antony, and a man called Lepidus coming together and kind of carving up the Roman Empire between the three of them and sort of administering to the politics of the time between the three of them. But of course, it's not all smooth sailing because secretly they probably all want it for themselves.” 

Secretly...or maybe not. Regardless, to seal the deal, Octavian marries Fulvia's daughter from her first marriage, Clodia. We don’t know how Clodia feels about it, or Fulvia for that matter, but in ancient Rome, this kind of dynasty building is what daughters are great for. And so they go on in an uneasy peace. In the meantime, they start doing something that hasn’t been done since back when Sulla made himself Rome’s first dictator. 

Dr. RAD: “...basically when the Triumvirate is sort of coming together, one of the first things that they do is a period called the proscriptions. And this is where they nominate people who are essentially their political enemies and put them on the list and start killing them off one by one.”

This is a way to eliminate the people who they feel has wronged them, or might still wrong them, AND drum up some money for their war against the conspirators. A guy can’t get mad when you confiscate his estate if he’s not around to complain about it! In short, this is an ugly, frightful time to be a patrician. Heads start rolling in a serious way.

As Cassius Dio tells us:

“..the whole city was filled with corpses. Many were killed in their houses, many even in the streets and here and there in the fora and around the temples; the heads of the victims were once more set up on the rostra and their bodies either allowed to lie where they were, to be devoured by dogs and birds, or else cast into the river.”
— Cassius Dio on the Second Triumvirate's proscriptions

Fulvia is apparently very up and involved with the proscription process. You do not want to get on her bad side: because while she may be a woman, she’s one of the most influential people in Rome. Cassius Dio tells us that she uses the prescriptions not to get rid of threats, but settle scores. There’s a story about a guy named Rufus, who owns a nice house Fulvia wants to buy. He won’t sell it, though, and when people start dying, Fulvia makes it clear he’d better reconsider. Fearing for his life, he tries to give it to her for free, but Fulvia’s already got her quill out.

The vengeance of Fulvia by Francisco Maura Y Montaner, 1888 depicting Fulvia inspecting the severed head of Cicero_(Museo_del_Prado).jpg

“Ohhh I’m making a list, checking it twice, gonna find out who’s naughty or nice, Fulvia is coming to towwwwwwn!”

The guy’s severed head is brought over to Mark Antony while he’s eating dinner, and while everyone else turns away, Valerius Maximus says: “Antony ordered that it be brought nearer.” After staring at it for an uncomfortable number of seconds, he says, “Wait, who dis? I don’t know this guy. He must be one of my wife’s. Box it up and have it sent to her, minion.” 

Dr. RAD: “And apparently, he sends it on to FULVIA, who then impales it on a hat basically outside of his house instead of on the rostra, which is where you'd normally display the decapitated head of someone who...”

Dr. G: “You can't say she's not an innovator.”

Because ancient Rome is all about complicated relationships, this whole thing gets messy quickly. It’s not like Mark Antony can just choose one person who he feels plotted against him and put him on the Kill List. He has to talk it over with the other two Triumvirs, who might be friends with that person, and make him offer up someone else in exchange for getting him offed. “In consequence of the dealings they had had with one another they kept a sort of reckoning of the items of "friend" and "enemy,"” says Cassius Dio. “...and no one of their number could take vengeance on one of his own enemies, if he was a friend of one of the other two, without giving up some friend in return.” 

And you know who is most certainly NOT a friend of Mark Antony OR Fulvia’s? That guy Cicero. But he is a friend of Octavian’s, so to get him on the list Antony and Lepidus have to offer up family members for proscription. They hate him so much that they do it, and Cicero’s suddenly running from Rome for his life. Unfortunately for him, he doesn’t run fast enough. And I’m sure that Fulvia helps seal his fate. But that’s not all...

Dr. RAD: “...there's this horrible story that has to do with Fulvia and Cicero that apparently his head was delivered to her to inspect and she apparently pulls out his tongue, that poisonous tongue that spoke so many horrible things about her and Antony, and drives her hairpins through it.”

Dr. G: “That'll teach him.”

This is the thing Fulvia’s most famous for: stabbing a dead man with a hairpin. 

CICERO: Girl, that’s cold.

FULVIA: Sorry not sorry!

Did this happen? Or was it invented to try and show how brutal and horrible Fulvia was? Hard to say. But the fact that anyone would believe her capable of such a hardcore move speaks volumes about what men of her time think about her.

“Oh, wait, what’s that? You’re sorry for being such an ass hat? Well that’s too bad, because you’re dead as hell.” (Fulvia, probably). Fulvia with the head of Cicero by Pavel Svedomskiy. Wikicommons.

“Oh, wait, what’s that? You’re sorry for being such an ass hat? Well that’s too bad, because you’re dead as hell.” (Fulvia, probably). Fulvia with the head of Cicero by Pavel Svedomskiy. Wikicommons.

After that little interlude, in 42 BCE the Second Triumvirate sail off to pursue and defeat Cassius and Brutus at Philippi, at which point poor Servilia gets her son’s ashes sent home through the ancient world post. While they’re gone, that other triumvir Lepidus is left to keep things ticking along in Rome, but Dio tells us that it’s actually Fulvia who’s running shit.

That involves getting the Senate to grant her brother-in-law, Lucius, a triumph, using her money to manipulate politics, and being a bad feminist. You’ll remember from one of our When in Rome episodes that around this time a woman named Hortensia stands up at the rostra and speaks out against a tax being imposed on 1,400 of the wealthy women of Rome. That tax is meant to fund the civil war against the conspirators, so Mark Antony most certainly wants it to go through. Apparently, Hortensia goes to Fulvia’s house, hoping to convince her to persuade Antony to throw it out. Instead, she turns her away. She promised she’d fight for her husband’s interests, and for her that comes before everything else.

Meanwhile, the triumvirs proclaim themselves Rome’s leaders and its champions. Rather than fight over who is going to run what, the three of them carve up the Republic into spheres they’ll each govern: Octavian gets the West, Antony gets the East, and Lepidus gets...wait, what does Lepidus get? Some of Africa, I think…but not the good parts. And so Fulvia’s husband trots off to take a tour of his region, where he’s hailed as a hero and treated like his favorite god, Dionysus. He lives a bit like Dionysus, too, partying and living it up. It’s on this epic pleasure cruise that he’ll meet and begin a passionate, doomed affair with Cleopatra, pharaoh of Egypt. But meanwhile, back in Rome, his supporters might be turned against him. Someone has to watch out for his interests and make sure Octavian doesn’t take all the glory. And Fulvia’s just the gal for the job.

Octavian’s got his hands full in Rome at the moment, and things have gotten off to a rather rocky start. He’s tasked with trying to settle the 40,000 vets who fought in Caesar’s wars, as they were promised. But there just isn’t enough good land to go around for them. And he has to hop to it, before those unhappy veterans decide to break out their spears. So he decides he’s going to have to displace some people, and those people kicked off their land are distinctly unhappy about it. Thing is a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation, and Octavian is making enemies in Rome. But he’s also winning over a lot of soldiers with his efforts, and that’s bad for Fulvia’s husband, because he’s not around to keep his men from defecting. So canny, all-about-that-offence Fulvia does what she can to rectify the situation. She and Mark’s mother Julia dress all in black and brings their children before his soldiers, imploring them not to forget their beloved general and to give credit where credit is due.

But more must be done. In 41 BCE, she and Antony’s brother, Lucius, one of Rome’s consuls, raise eight legions to Antony’s banner. Setting up her headquarters in Praeneste, 20 miles east of Rone, she corresponds with the Senate, sends orders to checkpoints, harangues some troops. She even wears a sword around. Whether or not she’s actually using that sword of hers, the fact that she’s so involved and acting almost as a commander is pretty wild. She isn’t leading this army, per se, but…I mean, kind of. Dio describes Fulvia as the sole commander during the occupation of Praeneste. Appian says that she goes to Gaul, where she rallies generals and secures reinforcements. 

How involved is Antony in any of this? We don’t know. He could have asked Fulvia to do this, or she could have been taking the initiative herself, which doesn’t seem all that out of character. But we do know that at some point in here Antony has some coins commissioned. They feature Fulvia pictured as the goddess Victoria, and they’re the earliest known coins bearing the image of a living Roman woman. GET IT, Fulvia! 

Fulvia is the first living Roman woman that has been found on a coin. This coin is from Eumeneia in Phrygia, a small Greek city that changed its name to “Fulvia” to honor her and Antony. Wikicommons.

Fulvia is the first living Roman woman that has been found on a coin. This coin is from Eumeneia in Phrygia, a small Greek city that changed its name to “Fulvia” to honor her and Antony. Wikicommons.

The ancient sources, of course, claim that Fulvia instigates the Perusine War because she’s jealous of her husband’s extramarital activities. Because of course women only do things because they’re driven wild by emotion! But she also could be doing it out of loyalty to her wayfaring husband, and because she knows that if she doesn’t, her family will lose their grip on power. Octavian will make sure of it.

Speaking of which, Octavius decides to break his engagement with her daughter Clodia and sends her back, saying he never even touched her. He’s also credited with writing the following little poem, which comes from Martial, and involves a word I have never before said aloud on this podcast, but which I feel demands quoting:

"Because Antony fucks Glaphyra, Fulvia fixed this punishment for me, that I should fuck her too.… 'Either fuck me or we fight,' she says. What about my prick being dearer to me than life itself? Let the charge sound!" 

This poem turns Fulvia into an aggressive, masculine figure. And while I think Fulvia might take it more as compliment than slur, she’s not overly impressed. If he did write it, it goes to show that men in management positions have always been threatened by ambitious women: in that, if nothing else, we can identify with Fulvia’s plight.

Lucius’ forces skirmish with Octavian’s in what’s now called the Perusine War, driving him out of Rome for a time. Eventually, Lucius gets surrounded at the Etruscan city of Perusia. We’ve found evidence there of lead sling bullets, also referred to as glandes, a common weapon used in ancient Roman warfare. They were often inscribed with words, like the name of the bullet’s maker, and sometimes racy insults. If the Romans are anything, it’s unafraid to be lewd. These show that even the common soldier knows who the big players are in this conflict, including our girl Fulvia. Some say “Salve Octavi felas” (“Octavian performs fellatio”). Others say “Fulviae landicam peto” (I seek Fulvia’s clitoris”). This is, in fact, one of the earliest surviving uses of the Latin word landica, or clitoris. A fact that I think would make Fulvia quite proud.

He and Fulvia both hope that Antony’s friends will rally around them, but that doesn't happen. Lucius is driven out and Fulvia has to flee with her children. She travels to Brundisium, then rides a warship to Athens, where she finally meets up with her wayward husband. Apparently he’s pretty upset about the whole ‘starting a war without him’ thing. It seems the fight, and her defeat, takes the wind out of Fulvia’s sails at last. She dies in Greece of some unknown illness. Does she die of a broken heart, as some sources claim? Maybe. Is she poisoned to ensure she never interferes in Roman politics again? Possibly. Or is the ancient world a place where people die of illness all the time? Very likely. Either way, it’s an unfortunate end for Fulvia. She fought for so long, beside so many men, to find her way to greatness. And in the end, her husband washes his hands of her, telling Octavian that Fulvia and Lucius acted completely on their own. 

She goes down in ancient history as Rome’s #1 Nasty Woman: the epitome of everything a woman isn’t supposed to be. But now, we can look past some of her more ruthless actions and appreciate her for what she was: amazingly unconventional.

We can admire her ingenuity, her drive, and her absolute badassery. In a world that didn’t like or trust women in power, Fulvia was just as much a gangster as her famous husband. Maybe even more so.

CONCLUSION 

As the Roman Republic careened toward being an Empire, there were plenty of big male egos and their big personalities. But their lives and stories wouldn’t have been the same without the strong, crafty, resilient women who loved and supported them. With so little to go on, we can only really imagine what it was like to be these women: to live during such tumultuous times, but it’s easy to see they left their mark on the ancient Roman political landscape, paving a way for the ladies to come.

Soon we’ll be diving headlong into the early days of the Empire, meeting the imperial women who became its first and most influential first wives, mothers, and daughters. Livia, Octavia, Antonia, Julia, both Agrippinas: get ready! But first, at last, we’re going to hop back to Egypt and spend some time with the indomitable Cleopatra. Her story runs parallel to the events we’ve just covered, and I can’t wait to explore them all through her eyes. 

Until next time.

Music

  • All music by Michael Levy, who composes music on ancient-style lyres to give us a glimpse into the ancient world.

Voiceovers

  • Julius Caesar = Phil Chevalier

  • Mark Antony = Andrew Yurgold

  • Plutarch = Avery Downing

  • Cornelia = Kaitlin Seifert

  • Servilia = Amie Kaufman

  • Fulvia = Rae Reynolds

  • Other Roman men = John Armstrong (Clodius, etc), Brendan Cousins, Paul Gablonski (Cassius Dio)

  • Cicero = Shawn from Stories of Yore and Yours podcast



ancient RomeStephanie FoleyCornelia