B Tutela mulierum in non-legal sources
Though nowhere in the Latin-speaking west preserves documentation comparable in quantity or variety to that found in the papyri of Roman Egypt [cf.
Part C below], some documentary evidence for women's transactions involving tutors does survive from the towns around the Bay of Naples destroyed by the eruption of the volcano Vesuvius in 79 C.E. Two very fragmentary wax tablets from Herculaneum record the assignment of tutors to women by a duovir [Arangio-Ruiz 1956; Modrzejewski 1974, 271—2]. They appear to follow the same pattern as the documents assigning tutors to Roman citizen women in Egypt in Part III.C [P.Oxy. XII.1466; SB III.6223; other examples can be found at Modrzejewski 1974, 265-71]. They show that in municipalities, the duovir was responsible for the granting of tutors, as in the Spanish municipia which received the Flavian Municipal Law [see Part III.A.3], and that assignment of tutors was carried out in accordance with the Julian and Titian law, as in the provinces, rather than the Atilian law, as at Rome [Arangio-Ruiz 1956; Modrzejewski 1974, 287—8; cf. Gaius Inst. I.185 in Part III.A.1]. Another tablet from Herculaneum records that a woman, Calatoria Themis, provided bail for appearing in court on the authority of her tutor, who was her former slave (for freedmen as tutors, see inscriptions below).17Wax tablets have also been found at Murecine, near Pompeii, though they were written at Puteoli (Pozzuoli). These Murecine tablets record business dealings of a group of moneylenders, the Sulpicii, all either freedmen or the sons of freedmen. Among the 170 tablets found (which date between 26 and 61 C.E.) are a few in which women figure as borrowers or creditors — generally, with their tutors authorizing the transaction.
The women include a non-Roman citizen, Euplia from the Greek island of Melos, who appears as borrower in several transactions, also accompanied by her tutor. “What does emerge clearly from the tablets is that the tutela system, in the first half of the first century AD, is actively functioning in the daily commerical transactions of townsfolk around the Bay of Naples, without seeming to offer any particular hindrance to women's dealings” [Gardner 1999, 27]. Other references to tutela mulierum are found on Latin inscriptions from Rome, both epitaphs and inscriptions recording transactions, as the following selections will show.It was customary for wealthier Romans, who owned slaves and set up imposing funeral monuments, to include their freedmen and freedwomen (and the descendants of their freedmen and freedwomen) in their tombs. Former slaves took the family name (nomen) of their former owner upon manumission, and could therefore perpetuate the cult of the bearers of the nomen — which is clearly what their former owners intended for them to do. In these inscriptions, women commemorate their tutor along with family members and former slaves.
In the following epitaph from Rome, Furfania Saturnina identifies her tutor as the freedman of her husband, and names him in her dedication among other former slaves.18 Furfania herself is freeborn, as her filiation indicates.19 M. Valerius Hesychus was clearly below Furfania Saturnina socially, and as her husband's libertus could be expected to be a “rubber-stamp” for any transactions requiring a tutor's authorization.
CIL VI.2650, 1st-early 2nd c. C.E.
Furfania Saturnina, daughter of Lucius, made (this tomb) for herself and for her son, A. Manneius Celsus son of A(ulus),20 of the tribe Collina, a soldier of the Seventh Praetorian Cohort, and for M.
Valerius Ismarus her husband, and for M. Valerius Semnus, her home-born slave,21 and for M. Valerius Hesychus, freedman of Ismarus, her tutor, and for Saturnina Veneria, her home-born slave, and for her freedwoman Epicharis and for Secunda Veneria her home-born slave and for her freedmen and freedwomen and their descendants. [added later?] To Natalis Veneria her home-born slave.The next epitaph, also from Rome, probably illustrates a similar situation. Ostoria Acte and her tutor have the same nomen. Conceivably she is his freedwoman, rather than the other way around (recall that a liberta s former owner would be tutor legitimus to her; see Part A above), but in that case we would expect her to call him patronus as well as tutor. His inclusion in her family tomb along with her freedmen and freedwomen slaves suggests that he is also her former slave.
CIL VI.7468, 1st-2nd c. C.E.?
To the Spirits of the Dead
To Isidorus who is also called Hermias Lintiarius, Ostoria Acte (set this tomb up) for her well-deserving husband and for herself and for her son, T Calestrius Herminus, and for her tutor, M. Ostorius Lamyrus, and for her freedmen and freedwomen and their descendants of either sex.
The next inscription is not from a tombstone, but records the donation of land outside Rome by a woman named Julia Monime.22 The donation was effected by the ancient procedure of mancipation (mancipatio) [see further at CIL VI.10247 in Part III.D below], a form of conveyance used when the item being transferred from one owner to another was res mancipi (“property subject to mancipation”): urban or rural land in Italy, slaves, certain beasts of burden, and “rustic praedial servitudes,” that is, access through rural properties such as right of way, the right to drive cattle, the right to draw water.
As both Gaius [Institutes II.80] and the Rules of Ulpian [11.27] tell us, women needed the authorization of their tutor in order to alienate res mancipi.It is not clear who the “associates” (socii) of Julia Monime are, but perhaps they are joint owners with her of the land in question. The recipients of the gift are a collegium, a club devoted to the cult of the Italic rustic god Silvanus. Evidently the land donated by Julia Monime was already being used by the collegium, since a building for the cult of Silvanus already existed. The collegium was primarily a funerary association, which assured proper burial and commemoration for those not included in the funerary monuments of the wealthy [Hopkins 1983, 211—17]. The schola is the place where the group met, and the curator mentioned is presumably the group's manager.
The inscription is on a marble cippus (small stone pillar, either a gravestone or a boundary-marker) found in 1773 on the outskirts of Rome. At the top of the inscription were relief carvings of a dog, a boy wearing a pallium (a sort of cloak), a tree trunk, and another dog. The text contains several grammatical errors, and the stone is broken off at the bottom, so the inscription becomes fragmentary near the end. (In my translations of inscriptions,... indicates where letters have been lost; words within [ ] are possible restorations.)
CIL VI.10231 = ILS 7313, 2nd-3rd c.
The place, or field, which is on the Via Appia between the second and third milestone for those going away from Rome, on the right side, in the land of Curtianus Talarchianus on the estates of Julia Monime and her associates, the place in which has been built a schola beneath a porticus, consecrated to Silvanus and to his collegium, the members of the fellowship received by mancipation, free of burden, and the curator and the whole people of this collegium (received) from Julia Monime and her associates for one sestertius coin for the sake of donation, with the tutor of Julia Monime, C.
Memius Orion (giving his consent). And to this place the right of way, the right of driving cattle, going around, making sacrifice, feeding and banqueting thus shall be permitted as long as that collegius (sic) shall stand. But if it should be done otherwise, that which pertains to the collegium of Silvanus, this sanctified place shall be restored... [to Julia Monime and her associates?] without any argument. These things. have been [stipulated?].There are surprisingly few references to a woman's tutor in Roman literary sources, which supports the assumption that the role of the tutor mulierum was insignificant in most women's everyday lives. One of the few surviving references is found in the Apology of the North African intellectual and writer Apuleius of Madaura, best known for his novel, the Metamorphoses (also called The Golden Ass).23 The Apology is a very long defense speech given by Apuleius when he was on trial before the governor in the province of Africa Proconsularis. All the parties are Roman citizens and Apuleius makes frequent reference to Roman laws in his speech.
Apuleius' accusers had charged him with using magical means to inveigle his wife, Pudentilla, into marrying him. This was a serious charge; conviction under the lex Cornelia de sicariis et veneficis (which dealt with murder, poisoning and magic) would carry the death penalty. Pudentilla was a wealthy widow probably a good ten years (or more) older than Apuleius, and his opponents not surprisingly suspected him of being a gold-digger [see further Chapter 2, Parts I.D.2 and E.2 and Chapter 5, Part I.B]. One of the criticisms made against Apuleius was that he had purchased some property for himself with money given him by Pudentilla. Apuleius counters by saying that Pudentilla bought it herself, and he calls as witness her tutor, who had to authorize the purchase that Pudentilla made. It is not clear where this estate was located; since Pudentillla needed her tutor's authorization to buy it, it was presumably res mancipi. 24