Petronius and Egalia’s Daughters

Petronius in Ancient Rome

• Gaius Petronius c.27-66 CE

• Author of the satire, “The Satyricon”

• Vulgar abuse of wealth

• Pretension

• Religious Superstition

• Satirizes characters who are on the lower rungs of Roman social hierarchy as well as possibly poking fun at Nero

• Dinner Host: Trimalchio

• First-person narrator: Encolpius

• His companions: Ascyltus and Giton

• The rhetoric teacher: Agamemnon

The Millionaire’s Dinner Party

• Trimalchio’s house has wall paintings which depict his life story along with scenes from Greek myth. An elite audience sees a lack of good taste

• Trimalchio’s appearance is half senatorial (holds a purple-bordered napkin) and half equestrian (fake gold rings) but he is really a freedman

• Status and appearance are extremely important in this culture. This story is based on the real excesses of the Roman elite, but Trimalchio takes the excess to fantastic extremes.

Egalia’s Daughters

• While the concept of gender is modern, in the Roman world, clothing, gesture and behavior (all associated with modern gender concepts), determine power and status in the Roman World.

• Egalia’s Daughters creates a society where men are forced to wear restrictive, uncomfortable clothing, are expected to be content to be “housebounds” and are encouraged to be gentle, not strong. Again, the excessive behaviors of a culture are taken to extremes.

Life in Egalia

• “That’s exactly the way that all signs of ancient patriarchy are explained away by the experts. . . the ancient sculptures represent fele figures even though any child can see it is a manwom’s body and without any basis except the assumption that all cultures are necessarily dominated by wim .” (p.156).

Food for Thought

• What are the values of the elite?

• What are the social norms?