Keynote - Gendering Violence in the Ancient Past - Ancient Rape Cultures Conference - 27-28.10.2022 (original) (raw)
Related papers
Rape in Antiquity: 20 Years On - 22-23 June 2017, Conference Booklet
2017 marks the 20th anniversary of the first edition of *Rape in Antiquity*, edited by Susan Deacy and Karen F. Pierce, a book that after twenty years still remains as an example of an innovative approach to a classical topic. To mark this anniversary and to emphasise the importance of this line of research in the last decades, a new conference, like the 1994 original one in Cardiff from which the book resulted, was held at the University of Roehampton, London. The aim of this event was to promote a rich discussion on the subject of sexual violence in antiquity, by having in the same place a mixture of renowned scholars and newest generations of researchers which would result in the presentation and debate of new theories and points of view. *Rape in Antiquity* was the result of a 1994 conference dedicated to the same topic, and this book still holds importance today, even after twenty years. http://rapeinantiquity.weebly.com/uploads/7/0/3/5/70359899/booklet.pdf
Introducing Rape in Antiquity: Twenty Years On
What follows is a written-up version of a presentation I gave to open the conference Rape in Antiquity: 20 Years On based on the notes I prepared for this paper. What I actually said, springing out of these notes, can be viewed in the video of the presentation. I hope to use this text as I move towards drafting an introduction to a book emerging out of the conference - *if* such a book emerges - so feedback would be very welcome
Considering Rape in Ancient Rome and Greece
This paper seeks to answer the question: what consisted 'rape' for the Ancient Greek and Romans. Primary sources used feature: For Rome, Livy’s account of the abduction of the Sabine’s and demoralization of Lucretia will be analyzed. For Greece, the myth of Persephone and the seduction of Euphiletos’ wife.
Gender and violence intersected in ancient Egypt in many ways. In general, the ancient Egyptian gender system privileged men and the masculine. Exceptions to this were status dependent. Gendered patterns of violence are evident in cases of mistreatment of women through beating and rape. War-related royal texts used gendered language to frame enemies as feminine and place them lower on the hierarchy vis-à-vis the pharaoh. Enemies were also feminized in visual representations such as temple reliefs. The symbolic violence of gendered language also served to establish indigenous gender hierarchies. Although there is evidence that some Egyptian queens and female rulers organized military operations, there is no evidence for the participation of women in war. In contrast, some goddesses had a strong affiliation with war and violence and were frequently associated with the pharaoh in this regard.
Recent historiography on early modern interpersonal violence continues to assume that men were most often the culprits and women, when they appeared, were usually victims. The few women who committed violence did so in "female" ways such as infanticide, poisoning, or sorcery. Nevertheless, the trial records for the first decades of the seventeenth century of the Tribunale criminale del governatore, the main criminal court in Rome, yield a number of cases of women accused of murder in other forms. A detailed analysis of the stories that emerge from the trials will pose questions about the motives and the means attributed to the accused women. They were really moved by passionate impulses, by the need of react against physical assaults, or there were other wilful reasons? They actually used to kill mainly poison, or they also used, as men generally did, bladed weapons? Did the community and the judicial process applied different standards to murderesses than to violent men? Our paper will show how some of these women's crimes resembled the violent patterns of men.