ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This book has been more than five years in the making, and has been helped along by many individuals and institutions. The idea for a sourcebook on women and the law in the Roman Empire first occurred to me while I was a Jessie Ball Dupont Fellow at the National Humanities Center in 1993—4, completing my book on Constantine’s marriage legislation and beginning a project on the rescripts in the Code of Justinian.

This book includes not only selections from Roman law, but also from epigraphical and papyrological sources, areas of classical studies in which I have little expertise and experience. Fortunately I was able to take a few steps toward remedying these deficiencies by attending two summer programs. The first was an NEH Summer Seminar held in 1995 at the American Academy in Rome on “Death and Commemoration in ancient Rome” led by John Bodel and Richard Saller, and the second was the International Summer School in Papyrology held at Christ Church College, Oxford in July 1997, under the direction of Dirk Obbink. I would like to express my appreciation to the NEH and to Sweet Briar College’s Faculty Grants Committee for making my participation in these programs possible.

Most importantly, I have benefited from the advice and suggestions of colleagues who read various pieces of this book in draft, answered my queries, and corrected errors in my interpretation of the sources.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

McGinn read the final draft of the Introduction and Chapter 1; his knowl­edge and understanding of Roman law are truly amazing. Ann Hanson read a draft of Chapter 5 and the papyrological selections in Chapters 1, 2, and 4, which she improved immeasurably by her advice and corrections. Needless to say, any errors and misunderstandings that remain (and undoubtedly there are some) are mine alone. Thanks also to Jane Rowlandson, who allowed me to see a pre-publication diskette of the sourcebook she edited, Women and Society in Greek and Roman Egypt (Cambridge University Press, 1998), a book which has been extremely helpful to me both for information on women and marriage in Roman Egypt and as a model for this book.

I want also to acknowledge all my Sweet Briar students, past and present, who have read parts of this book as course selections in classes on the Roman Empire, the Roman family, and gender and sexuality in the Roman world. My inspiration for writing this sourcebook arose from teaching, when I real­ized that there were no reliable translations with commentary on women in Roman law which were available and appropriate for such courses. In partic­ular, I want to express my thanks to the six students who took my Honors Seminar on “Women and the Law in the Roman Empire” in fall 1995: Katherine Carr, Laura Lamb, Laura Myers, Rebecca Moats, Katherine Rinehart, and Laurel Shay. All of these women have long since graduated and gone on to careers outside of classics, but they too contributed to the making of this book.

Finally, I want to thank Richard Stoneman of Routledge and his editorial staff for their patience in waiting for me to complete this book and their promptness (in such contrast to my tardiness!) in bringing it forth. Thanks especially to Catherine Bousfield, Lauren Dallinger, and Carol Baker for all their hard work.

Amherst, Virginia January 2, 2002