The Ideal of Lucretia in Augustan Latin Poetry
Date
2013-05-07
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Abstract
This study concerns the figure of Lucretia as she is presented by the Roman historian Livy in the first book of Ab Urbe Condita, where she is intended as an example of virtue, particularly in terms of her attention to woolworking. To find evidence for this ideal and how it was regarded at the time, in this study a survey is made of woolworking references in the contemporary Augustan poets Vergil, Tibullus, Propertius and Ovid. Other extant versions of the Lucretia legend do not mention woolworking; Livy appears to have added Lucretia’s devotion to wool, a tradition in keeping with Augustan propaganda. Woolworking has come to be thought of as a praiseworthy concern of Roman matronae, with Lucretia often cited as an example. Evidence for the laborious nature of the task makes it seem unlikely that high status matronae would willingly work wool. The poets studied here do not in general present woolworking in a positive way. References to wool, especially those of Ovid, are more humorous than respectful. In the Heroides Ovid presents the task as a laborious reality. He also casts doubt on the possibility of distinguishing matronae by ideal costume. Ovid appears to suggest a possible “new” woman, neither matrona nor meretrix. A return to the ideal is seen in Vergil’s Aeneid. Here, after civil upheaval, Dido with her gold weaving is presented as the opposite of the desired Roman matrona who, like Lucretia, is associated with plain wool. Such wool by its nature is in keeping with the surroundings found by Aeneas at his true destination, Pallanteum. The ideal matrona with her wool and costume seems implicit in the Aeneid, though she might well remain an ideal rather than a reality in Augustan society.
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Language and Literature, Literature--Classical
Citation
Waters, A. (2013). The Ideal of Lucretia in Augustan Latin Poetry (Doctoral thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/28172