Roman Women Essay

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Throughout history, women were viewed less valuable as their male counterpart. In the Roman society, it reinforces the notion of women being the homemaker and fulfilling the needs of the family. Roman society is similar to the global south, where women are still seen as property. Realistically speaking, women are important to our society, but every society has their different cultural norm. In this paper, I will be discussing to what degree women are important to the Roman society.

A Roman girl had a very quick childhood. She grew up very fast and received little or no education, since they had to shoulder the duties of a Roman matrona and become a wife or even a mother at a very early age. (Shelton 1998, 288) According to Shelton (1998, …show more content…

So do not reject such a husband, little girl. It is not right to reject the man to whom your father and mother gave you. You must obey them. Your virginity is not entirely yours. One-third of it belongs to your father, one-third to your mother, and only one-third to yourself. Don’t fight against your parents who have surrendered to your husband a dowry and their rights over you. (Catullus, …show more content…

Although it has been proven that majority of Roman women were housewives, but there were also some women who would not only required to be a matronae. A handful of women were also involved in professional activities such as business, sales, and skilled trade where they were midwives, nurses, or even doctors. These handful of women were generally from upper-class families and were given the permission to excel something in life. (Shelton 1998, 303) As my thesis believes, women were not given importance in the society for their role. The Roman society view men as being the bread winners, but women were never given credit for what they did. In fact, they were not allowed to become something other then a housewife, which eventually doesn’t make them important. Majority of the women who were housewives, would only be given credit if they did their household work properly, but that importance was not equal to a man’s

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