A paper by Christian Bagger, University of Melbourne, for the Ancient World Seminar at 1:00 on Monday 8 April in Arts West North Wing 556 and via Zoom.
To receive the Zoom link please email Dr Edward Jeremiah (edwardj@unimelb.edu.au).
Throughout the Late Republic, elite senatorial women played an increasingly active role in Roman socio-political life. With C. Julius Caesar lying dead in the Theatre of Pompey on the Campus Martius, an internal struggle threw the Republic into a turmoil like never before, giving birth to the Triumvirate r.p.c. of M. Antonius, Lepidus, and Young Caesar. In the narratives of Plutarch, Appian, and Cassius Dio two women step onto the stage of Triumviral politics, surpassing all others in fame, notoriety, and exemplarity. Fulvia, damned for all posterity, rose to fame with her alleged role in the proscriptions and her very visible and active role in the Perusine war. Octavia, the exemplary matrona, became the ideal for all elite matronae to follow. However, these two women also came to represent the clash between the old “traditional” Republican female roles and the new possibilities offered by the profound changes in the Roman political landscape. As the emerging Imperial domus and the ideology of the emperors took shape, so too did the narratives which describe this pivotal time in Roman history. Through the narratives of Plutarch, Appian, and Cassius Dio, this paper will reconstruct and reappraise the roles Fulvia and Octavia played in Triumviral politics in the years 47-31 BCE.
Christian is a PhD Candidate in Ancient History at the University of Melbourne. Christian’s research focuses on elite senatorial women in the Late Roman Republic (ca. 133-27 BCE) and their perceived and real influence on the socio-political environment in the times of civil wars, political unrest, internecine strife, socio-economic changes, and transitions. Christian is a former fellow of the Danish Institute in Rome and is currently a junior editor and contributor to the Danish online encyclopedia on the topics of Ancient Civil War, The Late Roman Republic, and Women and Power in Ancient Rome.
Classical Association of Victoria 