page_title: Women in ancient Rome
section_title: Religious life
hierarchical_section_title: Women in ancient Rome / Daily life / Religious life
caption_attribution_description: English: Theatre scene: two women making a call on a witch (the three of them wear theatre masks). Roman mosaic from the Villa del Cicerone in Pompeii, now in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale (Naples). Work of Dioscorides of Samos Deutsch: Besuch bei einem Zauberweib. Römisches Mosaik aus der Villa des Cicerone in Pompeji. Museo Archeologico Nazionale (Neapel). Español: Mosaico romano hallado en Pompeya. Italiano: "Scena tearale con due donne che consultano una fattucchiera: tutti e tre i personaggi indossano maschere teatrali. Mosaico dalla Villa del Cicerone a Pompei, oggi al Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, .
context_page_description: Freeborn women in ancient Rome were citizens, but could not vote or hold political office. Because of their limited public role, women are named less frequently than men by Roman historians. But while Roman women held no direct political power, those from wealthy or powerful families could and did exert influence through private negotiations. Exceptional women who left an undeniable mark on history range from Lucretia and Claudia Quinta, whose stories took on mythic significance; fierce Republican-era women such as Cornelia, mother of the Gracchi, and Fulvia, who commanded an army and issued coins bearing her image; women of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, most prominently Livia and Agrippina the Younger, who contributed to the formation of Imperial mores; and the empress Helena, a driving force in promoting Christianity.
  As is the case with male members of society, elite women and their politically significant deeds eclipse those of lower status in the historical record. Inscriptions and especially epitaphs document the names of a wide range of women throughout the Roman Empire, but often tell little else about them.
context_section_description: Women were present at most Roman festivals and cult observances. Some rituals specifically required the presence of women, but their participation might be limited. As a rule women did not perform animal sacrifice, the central rite of most major public ceremonies, though this was less a matter of prohibition than the fact that most priests presiding over state religion were men. Some cult practices were reserved for women only, for example, the rites of the Good Goddess (Bona Dea).
  Women priests played a prominent and crucial role in the official religion of Rome. Although the state colleges of male priests were far more numerous, the six women of the college of Vestals were Rome's only "full-time professional clergy." Sacerdos, plural sacerdotes, was the Latin word for a priest of either gender. Religious titles for women include sacerdos, often in relation to a deity or temple, such as a sacerdos Cereris or Cerealis, "priestess of Ceres", an office never held by men; magistra, a high priestess, female expert or teacher in religious matters; and ministra, a female assistant, particularly one in service to a deity. A magistra or ministra would have been responsible for the regular maintenance of a cult. Epitaphs provide the main evidence for these priesthoods, and the woman is often not identified in terms of her marital status.
  The Vestals possessed unique religious distinction, public status and privileges, and could exercise considerable political influence. It was also possible for them to amass "considerable wealth." Upon entering her office, a Vestal was emancipated from her father's authority. In archaic Roman society, these priestesses were the only women not required to be under the legal guardianship of a man, instead answering directly and only to the Pontifex Maximus. Their vow of chastity freed them of the traditional obligation to marry and rear children, but its violation carried a heavy penalty: a Vestal found to have polluted her office by breaking her vow was given food, water, and entombed alive. The independence of the Vestals thus existed in relation to the prohibitions imposed on them. In addition to conducting certain religious rites, the Vestals participated at least symbolically in every official sacrifice, as they were responsible for preparing the required ritual substance mola salsa. The Vestals seem to have retained their religious and social distinctions well into the 4th century CE, until the Christian emperors dissolved the order.
  A few priesthoods were held jointly by married couples. Marriage was a requirement for the Flamen Dialis, the high priest of Jupiter; his wife, the Flaminica Dialis, had her own unique priestly attire, and like her husband was placed under obscure magico-religious prohibitions. The flaminica was a perhaps exceptional case of a woman performing animal sacrifice; she offered a ram to Jupiter on each of the nundinae, the eight-day Roman cycle comparable to a week. The couple were not permitted to divorce, and if the flaminica died the flamen had to resign his office.
  Like the Flaminica Dialis, the regina sacrorum, "queen of the sacred rites," wore distinctive ceremonial dress and performed animal sacrifice, offering a sow or female lamb to Juno on the first day of each month. The names of some reginae sacrorum are recorded by inscriptions. The regina was the wife of the rex sacrorum, "king of the sacred rites," an archaic priesthood regarded in the earliest period as more prestigious than even the Pontifex Maximus.
  These highly public official duties for women contradict the commonplace notion that women in ancient Rome took part only in private or domestic religion. The dual male-female priesthoods may reflect the Roman tendency to seek a gender complement within the religious sphere; most divine powers are represented by both a male and a female deity, as seen in divine pairs such as Liber and Libera. The twelve major gods were presented as six gender-balanced pairs, and Roman religion departed from Indo-European tradition in installing two goddesses in its suprem
caption: Mosaic depicting masked actors in a play: two women consult a "witch" or private diviner
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