In Ancient Rome, when it comes to sex, many doubts arise. And, one of them refers to how it was before, at the time of Ancient Rome. That's because, people tend to think it's something current, without keeping in mind how things were before.
Source: BBC
In Ancient Rome, sex played a fundamental role. This is true for both political and historical issues. There is even a case that became more than famous, which was called the Abduction of the Sabines.
It was a strategy, which aimed at kidnapping both the daughters and the wives of the Sabine peoples. And the objective was precisely to use them for sexual reasons, such as reproduction and also for this same use.
The then end of the monarchy also brought great relevance in the sexual part, as well as the restoration of the republic.
It is necessary to understand sex, at the time, as something that influenced people to act in certain ways, as well as, it was as if it were an exchange, in which those who got it provided structure to those who submitted, in some cases.
Source: BBC
As women they were still seen as an object to which man wanted access. Rape, for example, just thinking it's recent, it's not. It already happened and a lot at this stage.
Often it just wasn't called that or still, it was, but as it ended up being little publicized, people believed it wasn't something they had to worry about.
Since we're talking about rape being rare in those days, I want to bring up the issue of suicide now. Lucrezia, a well-known figure in Ancient Rome, committed suicide in 510 BC. W. . The reason? She was raped by a figure also known historically: Sextus Tarquínio.
What did that mean for the moment? The end of all Roman monarchy. It was time to end a type of government that was only hurting the people and not encouraging them to ask positive questions.
Source: Illustration s'il vous plaît
As Tarquinius, at the time of the rape, was king of Rome, this ended up causing an uproar all over the place. And also, in the question of passage from Roman Kingdom to Republic.
Now one can imagine how much this caused and cost for a period that still believed a lot and was mirrored in the king's attitudes, which, it was as if he was the example for that generation.
Him raping Lucrécia and, worse than that, driving her to suicide, things didn't turn out the way he imagined. That's why more and more people decided to want to fight for their rights and not submit to what was imposed on them, especially in the case of women in relation to the sexual side.
Source: BBC
The decemvirate was an institution that was then created in 449 a. C., aiming not to allow conflicts between citizens, since with the defense of the republic, among the rulers having behaviors similar to the monarchs, patricians and commoners began to confront each other. In the decemvirate, ten men discussed solutions to this question.
But what is the relationship of sex with this movement? It turns out that, the president of the decinverate at the time, ended up falling obsessively in love with Virginia. She was the daughter of a Roman centurion and was betrothed.
As the president of the decemvirate had a lot of power, he ended up using it to force the girl to stay with him. Her father, afraid that her daughter would end up being raped, murdered her beforehand.
Of course, after these issues a revolt arose and then, the decemvirate, which was intended to solve problems, but which ended up generating one, ended.
Yes! Also known as the one who preserves the well-known sexual virtue, for the ancient Romans, Puritanism was the basis of sexual ethics.
That is why the lives of both Lucrécia and Virgínia ended in this way: with their deaths. Thus, making them heroines, because it was sex or the possibility of it that led them to this end.
The problem was that, as sex was seen as something negative, even married women should not understand the act as something pleasurable, but as an option that leads to procreation.
Unfaithful husbands? They needed to be accepted. That is, the man should feel pleasure and still have access to any woman, while the woman should accept everything that was imposed on her.
For what reason? Because at that time, betrayal was proof that her husband really had the much-dreamed virility.
Most betrayals happened with prostitutes and also dancers, but many men even had sex with themselves.
BBC source
In the latter case, the idea was for the man to penetrate another, who was considered to be without virility or even deficient. Thus, these were later called effeminate, for allowing the act.
It took a while, but when the Roman Republic was already more evolved, then the sex that happened outside of marriages started to be questioned.
So, some values related to the family were established, this by the leader Augustus, first of the Roman Empire.
But, as not everything is perfect, there was a serious problem: Augusto's daughter, Júlia. She practiced the act often and in the most unusual places possible.
Therefore, everything that Augustus defended was done in the opposite way by his own daughter. The leader then chose to exile her and sent her to Pandataria, a remote island where there were no men.
Later, Julia ended up marrying her half brother, Emperor Tiberius. The same ended up becoming a transvestite and living as a woman in court.
The whores and their imperial queen
When it came to prostitutes, one of them stood out and was called the queen of imperial prostitutes. Her name was Messalina and she was the empress.
Every night, she ended up sneaking out of her husband's bed and then frequenting a brothel.
To get an idea of her sex life, at one point, she challenged another prostitute to a sex marathon that lasted a full day. The winner was Messalina, after having sex with twenty-five men.
Several Roman emperors were homosexuals, as already mentioned. One of them even offered a reward to whoever found the biggest penis to satisfy their desires. Even, to give you an idea, who held the best administrative positions at the time, held the position because of the size of their penis.
Heliogábalo, on the other hand, really wanted to have female genitals and offered fortunes to the doctor who fulfilled his wish. But the Guard and the Senate ended up revolting with the situation and this ended up causing his grandmother to kill him when he was eighteen.
As early as 525 AD, things haven't changed much. Sex remained important to Roman life.
So much so that the Empress Teodora, one of the protagonists in the sexual aspect, before getting married, presented plays in a brothel. To get an idea, she, during the presentations, called actors to have sex with her on the stage itself.
But, assuming her new position, she fought for women, creating laws that would protect them from any type of violence or sexual abuse.
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