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4 - Elite Marriage and Adultery in the Camp

Pliny Epistles 6.31.4–6 and Tacitus Histories 1.48

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2024

By
Sara E. Phang
Edited by
Lee L. Brice  and
Elizabeth M. Greene
Lee L. Brice
Affiliation:
Western Illinois University
Elizabeth M. Greene
Affiliation:
University of Western Ontario
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Summary

This chapter examines how the episode in Pliny Ep. 6.31.4−6 relates to Roman concepts of gender and warfare. The emperor Trajan judged the case of Gallitta, a military tribune’s wife who had committed adultery with a centurion. Since the reign of Augustus adultery had been criminalized. The Augustan legislation on marriage and adultery has received much scholarly attention, but relatively little has been paid to cases involving military officers. This study argues that the repression of adultery and the control of officers’ wives culturally maintained military discipline, in particular the hierarchy of command. Adultery in this instance subverted military hierarchy; the young officer’s cuckolding of his senior and his failure to display self-control vitiated his fitness for command. The stability of the imperial order depended on the reinforcement of normative gender roles on the frontiers as well as in the city of Rome.

Keywords

WomenRoman armyofficersdisciplineadulterymarriage legislationgender norms,
Type
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Women and the Army in the Roman Empire , pp. 84 - 109
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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