Criterios Básicos de Diseño 122

INTRODUCTION

Children may have been the expected result of élite Roman marriages, but the responsibility for producing these children did not lie equally with both spouses. This chapter begins with an assessment of the paradox of élite Roman attitudes towards childbearing: even though the Roman understanding of infertility included at least some awareness that male infertility was not limited to impotence, Roman social mores insisted that all responsibility for conceiving and carrying a pregnancy to term rested with the woman. Her fecunditas was crucial and left her open to praise or censure according to her success in achieving the ideal family. These attitudes removed any blame from a husband who found himself childless, even one such as Pliny the Younger who remained childless after three marriages, but they also left no room to praise men, like Germanicus, who were the fathers of large broods. It was this need to find a means of praising men that led to the treatment of fecunditas as a recognized female virtue, one that a husband could safely be praised for taking advantage of, without ever implying that the virility of another man, less fortunate in his number of children, was suspect. This chapter examines the construction of fecunditas as a virtue, its association with pudicitia, and the benefits it offered both to wives who demonstrated it and husbands who were seen to have made such a fortunate choice of spouse. More official rewards that came with parenthood, such as the ius trium

liberorum, will be discussed in Chapter Three. In this chapter I focus instead on the less easily

quantified benefits, such as a husband’s use of his wife’s fecunditas to increase his own social capital.

There was more to excelling at fecunditas than just giving birth to several children. It was considered entirely possible to possess too much of a good thing: women could be criticized for producing too many children as much as for producing too few. Thus, in the latter sections of the chapter, I turn my attention to how a woman could be considered a reproductive failure even if she was proven not to be barren, examining gender preferences, hyper-fertility and those rarest of demographic outliers, multiple births. Throughout the chapter there runs a common thread. While a woman’s fecunditas was a most important virtue, second, I would argue, only to

guarantees. It was thought that proven fecunditas ought to protect a woman from divorce and other poor treatment, but social expectations could not always trump political and dynastic preoccupations. A woman’s fecunditas made her vulnerable when she did not produce children, when she produced too many children, or when the children she did produce proved to be a disappointment. Giving birth to a child proved a woman fertile, but much more was required before she could truly be said to excel in the Roman virtue of fecunditas.

PARTNERS IN CONCEPTION? THE ROMAN UNDERSTANDING OF INFERTILITY While the Romans were well aware that not all marriages would bear fruit, they assumed, with very few exceptions, that the blame for such barrenness lay with the female spouse. A failure to conceive immediately is, of course, not necessarily indicative of physiological impediment: in modern societies healthy and fertile couples who have intercourse during the woman’s fertile period have only a twenty to twenty-five percent chance of conceiving each month.227 But the vast majority of couples, as many as eighty-five to ninety percent, will conceive within a year of trying.228 The likelihood of conception for the Romans may have been hindered by the unsound medical advice that the best time to conceive was just as the woman’s menstrual period was ending.229 Even so, a newly married couple, eager to start a family, may well have begun to harbor doubts concerning their fertility if a year or longer had passed without any sign of pregnancy.

Male infertility was primarily associated with impotence. As late as the sixth century A.D., when the Christian emperor Justinian was restricting access to divorces, he included the impotence of the husband in the few accepted grounds. If the husband was impotent continuously for the first two years of their marriage, the wife’s family had the right to request a divorce and keep her dowry.230 Earlier in the Principate, impotent men invited ridicule and were a favourite target of the satirists. Martial criticizes a certain Fabullus for requesting the ius trium

liberorum as a special favour from the emperor. Fabullus, we are meant to understand, is

currently childless, but he has a wife who is “beautiful, virtuous and a young woman” (formosa,

pudica, puella). Martial tells Fabullus that he ought to be able to grant himself the rights for

227 _{Twenty percent: Montville and Thomas 2008: 118; Twenty-five percent: Wilcox 2010: 132.} 228

Montville and Thomas 2008: 118.

229 _{Discussed above, Chapter One, p. 63.}

230 _{Cod. Iust. 5.17.10, see also Nov. Iust. 117.12. There appears to have been no recourse for either women or men if}

which he is petitioning, “if you can get it up” (si potes arrigere) (9.66). Martial also disparages a certain Almo: “[He] owns a full set of eunuchs and he doesn’t get it up himself; and he complains because his Polla gives birth to nothing” (Omnes eunuchos habet Almo nec arrigit

ipse: / et queritur pariat quod sua Polla nihil) (10.91). Almo’s lack of children is entirely his

own fault, suggests Martial. Not only is he himself incapable of sexual intercourse, but he has not even provided an acceptable substitute within his household. We cannot know whether Polla is meant to be Almo’s wife, or merely one of his slaves. Either way, it is interesting that Martial imagines the possibility of another individual taking Almo’s place to father the children he cannot. Another substitute father is found in 10.102, where Martial tells his reader, a certain Avitus, “You’d like to know how Philinus, who never has sex, became a father? Let Gaditanus answer that, Avitus, who writes nothing and who nevertheless is a poet” (Qua factus ratione sit

requiris, / qui numquam futuit, pater Philinus? / Gaditanus, Avite, dicat istud, / qui scribit nihil et tamen poeta est.). Gaditanus’ verses are written by others. In the same vein, Philinus, who

either is incapable of intercourse or just refuses to engage in it with his wife, has turned to another’s talents to make himself a father.

Juvenal, in his ninth satire, represents the same situation. Juvenal’s authorial persona holds a conversation with a disgruntled male prostitute named Naevolus.231 Among other complaints, Naevolus is bitter because his most excellent service is not appreciated: not only does Naevolus penetrate his patron, who is construed as effeminate to the extreme, but Naevolus has even sired children on his patron’s wife in order for his patron to reap the benefits of fatherhood:

nullum ergo meritum est, ingrate ac perfide, nullum quod tibi filiolus uel filia nascitur ex me?

tollis enim et libris actorum spargere gaudes argumenta uiri. foribus suspende coronas:

iam pater es, dedimus quod famae opponere possis. iura parentis habes, propter me scriberis heres, legatum omne capis nec non et dulce caducum. commoda praeterea iungentur multa caducis, si numerum, si tres impleuero.

Does it count for nothing, nothing at all, you ungrateful swindler, that, thanks to me, you possess a little son and daughter?

You rear them as yours, and you like to proclaim in the daily gazette the proofs of your manhood. Hang a garland over your door;

now you’re a father! I’ve given you the means of silencing gossip. Thanks to me, you have parent’s rights; you are listed as heir,

you receive whole legacies, and juicy bequests which celibates forfeit. As well as bequests, you’ll enjoy many another advantage,

if I bring your family up to three.

(9.82-90, trans. Rudd) It is not clear whether Naevolus’ patron is physically incapable of impregnating his wife, or just very unwilling given his other sexual proclivities. That he could well be impotent is perhaps implied by Naevolus’ earlier assertion that “had I not been / a loyal and devoted client, your wife would still be a virgin” (ni tibi deditus essem / deuotusque cliens, uxor tua uirgo maneret) (9.71- 72, trans. Rudd). Indeed, Naevolus claims that the wife was on the verge of abandoning the marriage before he stepped in, for she had “torn up the contract and was moving out” (tabulas

quoque ruperat et iam signabat) (9.75, trans. Rudd). This should be read with caution.

Juvenal’s sly take on the matter implies that the wife’s sexual frustration had reached such a peak that she found the situation no longer tolerable, as Naevolus then confides that it took him all night to salvage matters.232 It should not, therefore, be read as proof that a wife would use her husband’s inability or unwillingness to engage in sexual intercourse with her as a valid reason for divorce. What it does show is that husbands could be targets of ridicule if their new wives remained virgins for too long. In these situations the blame for childlessness sat squarely on the man’s shoulders.

Given the generally negative attitude found in our sources concerning the impact of and adherence to the Augustan marriage legislation, it is perhaps unexpected that the need for children is considered to be so great that the unidentified father is willing to go to such lengths to achieve them. Interesting, too, is the idea that the father’s lot has been significantly improved by the births of his ‘children’: Naevolus, disgruntled and dismayed at his lack of financial recompense for his services, points to the father’s new ability to be named as an heir and to accept legacies and other bequests, a direct reference to the penalties imposed on the unmarried and childless by Augustus’ marriage legislation. Naevolus further adds that the father’s position in life will improve even more if Naevolus gives him a third child, a reference to the ius trium

liberorum. His description of the prizes which go only to fathers stands in direct contradiction to

the many assertions in Juvenal’s other satires, and in the works of other authors, that

232 _{9.76. See, too, Mart. 11.71 where an elderly husband who is no longer capable of sexual intercourse brings in}

childlessness is endemic in Rome because the best presents go to orbi.233 Naevolus admittedly is bound to put a positive spin on the father’s situation, since the better the father’s outlook, the more deserving Naevolus is of his anticipated rewards. Regardless, Naevolus’ assertions about the benefits that come to parents, and the father’s supposed desperation to produce children, do act as a reminder that we cannot take the usual claims concerning the benefits and popularity of voluntary childlessness at face value. They serve an artistic purpose for Juvenal just as the exact opposite assertion does here, and are subject to the same level of exaggeration and manipulation.

Juvenal’s depiction of Naevolus and the willingly-cuckolded husband and Martial’s witty criticisms of Almo and his eunuchs should never, of course, be interpreted as suggesting that one means of coping with male impotence was to invite another man to sire children on one’s wife. In the first place, the very action would make all three parties liable under the Augustan laws on adultery.234 Secondly, Juvenal’s treatment of the situation makes it clear that the husband has done nothing admirable. By allowing another man to impregnate his own wife, he may have won the superficial benefits allotted to parents, but he has sacrificed something much more important: his own virtus.235 What the situation does do is offer some indication of the social pressure that may have been felt by couples who remained childless for what was thought to be too long. Naevolus states that now the husband has the “means of silencing gossip” (famae

opponere possis) (9.86), suggesting that the couple’s childless state has been a source of

comment.236

Although male infertility was usually assumed to be as a result of impotence, it would be a mistake to suggest that Roman medical understanding was so limited. At the end of Book Four of his De Rerum Natura, the Roman poet and philosopher Lucretius turns his attention to matters of reproduction. His treatment of infertility is brief, but it begins with a powerful image:

233 _{See above, Chapter One, pp. 37-40.} 234

Ulpian (Dig. 48.5.2.2 and 48.5.2.6) claims that a husband who is aware of his wife’s adultery but does not prosecute is liable to a charge of lenocinium (pandering), but see Dig. 48.5.2.3 and 48.5.30.4 which suggest the husband could only be prosecuted if he were guilty of neglegentia (negligence). Generally scholars have argued that a husband would only be convicted if he had caught his wife in the act and had not prosecuted, or if he had made a profit from the adultery, which would certainly apply in this case. See Corbett 1930: 142; Gardner 1986: 131; Treggiari 1991: 288-89, although Edwards (1993: 39) allows for multiple interpretations.

235 _{See, too, Mart. 5.41, where he claims that an effeminate and emasculate man named Didymus has no right to sit}

at the seats in the theater reserved for husbands.

236 _{Friends could also be expected to take an interest in the birth of a new child: Statius reproaches Menecrates for}

not sending him a message upon the birth of his third child, but leaving him to learn the news from others (Silv. 4.8.32-42).

nec divina satum genitalem numina cuiquam absterrent, pater a gnatis ne dulcibus umquam appelletur et ut sterili Venere exigat aevom; quod plerumque putant et multo sanguine maesti conspergunt aras adolentque altaria donis, ut gravidas reddant uxores semine largo; ne quiquam divom numen sortisque fatigant; nam steriles nimium crasso sunt semine partim, et liquido praeter iustum tenuique vicissim. tenve locis quia non potis est adfigere adhaesum, liquitur extemplo et revocatum cedit abortu. crassius hinc porro quoniam concretius aequo mittitur, aut non tam prolixo provolat ictu aut penetrare locos aeque nequit aut penetratum aegre admiscetur muliebri semine semen.

And divine powers do not withhold a reproductive sowing from anyone, so that he may never be named father by sweet children and spend the rest of his life in a barren union – as most men think, and mournfully sprinkle the altars with much blood and heap up the flaming altar tops with offerings, in order that they, with copious seed, might render their wives pregnant. They harass the will of the gods and the sacred lots to no effect. For some of them are sterile from excessively thick seed and others from seed which is abnormally runny and thin. The thin seed, because it is unable to adhere firmly to the right places, immediately trickles and being withdrawn falls short and fails to fertilize. The thicker seed, moreover, because it is discharged denser than it ought to be, either does not fly out with so wide-ranging a thrust, or is unable to equally penetrate the right places or, after penetration, mixes feebly with the woman’s seed.

(4.1233-1247)

In lines 1233-1239, Lucretius describes men who devote considerable energy and, perhaps, expense in failed pleas to the gods, begging them to alleviate their childlessness.237 Lucretius is far from sympathetic to their plight, stating bluntly that the men’s entire approach is misguided: it is not the gods who are responsible for their unwanted childlessness, but some physical fault of their own.

Lucretius’ rather haughty dismissal of the men’s actions should be read as just one of several examples of his efforts to guard against superstition.238 But his matter of fact portrayal of the men appealing to the gods suggests that a belief that infertility could be a result of divine displeasure was alive and well when he was writing in the mid-first century B.C. Lucretius’

237 _{For a commentary on this section see Bailey 1947: 1316-1319; Brown 1987: 336-352.} 238 _{cf. 5.110-112.}

image of the men soaking the altars in blood and causing the altar tops to flare up from the number of their offerings is a striking one; Brown writes that the passage “gives a vivid sense of the anxiety and despair engendered by childlessness, particularly in Roman society”.239

Notably, there is no sign in this passage of what so many other Roman authors claim were the attitudes of the élite towards child bearing: that children were an unwanted burden, that voluntary childlessness was endemic in Rome, and that the élite had to be pressured and coerced into reproducing. Instead, we are given a picture of vulnerable, desperate men. Lucretius, I would argue, intentionally targets areas of extreme vulnerability, such as his attack on the fear of death in Book Three, because these fears are most likely to lead men to seek comfort from the gods. It is in precisely these areas of vulnerability that he must convince his audience of the foolishness of their appeals to the gods.

Although few commentaries on the passage have noted it, this is a very rare example of men actively seeking to overcome their own suspected infertility.240 The hapless men Lucretius imagines are not causing mild infernos with their burnt offerings in order to request that the gods make their wives fertile: they are begging the gods to make them fertile. This passage stands as a clear outlier in the face of overwhelming evidence that the Roman élite believed, or chose to believe, that if a couple remained childless, it was the woman’s fecunditas that was at fault. Our sources also suggest that it was deemed the woman’s responsibility to investigate and to take the necessary steps to overcome the problem. Men for the most part were portrayed as passive observers of this process. This passage suggests that such a clean division of responsibility is an oversimplification. The men’s wives are barely mentioned, except as vessels to be made “pregnant” (gravidas) by “copious seed” (semine largo).

Unlike Juvenal’s satires, the passage in Lucretius must reflect real actions by real élite men in Rome. Lucretius may maintain a distanced stance as an observer, but his work is Roman to the core.241 Indeed, Bailey notes in his commentary that, since Epicurus spoke against marriage and child-bearing, in this passage Lucretius speaks “more as the Roman paterfamilias than as the Epicurean philosopher”.242

Lucretius’ audience had to be élite Roman men: no one else could be expected to have the philosophical background and level of literacy required to

239

Brown 1987: 337.

240 _{Ignored by, e.g., Bailey 1947: 1316-1317; Brown 1987: 336-346.} 241 _{See above, Introduction, p. 6.}

fully appreciate his work. Nor should his arresting image of the men at the altars be read as poetic license or authorial fantasy. Lucretius wanted his readers to reject their mistaken ideas about religion – what he calls superstitio – and embrace instead the philosophy he was