Bitchy ladies: domestic violence against ornatrices in Latin poetry—protest femininity, toxic femininity?

Abstract

In a revisionist historical environment in which scholars are increasingly invited to reconsider readings of classical texts from a philological perspective, or from an approach that privileges strict historicity, numerous interpretative possibilities present themselves. Working within such an environment, this study aims to delve into several literary expressions of domestic violence meted out to female slaves—explicitly, ornatrices—by female mistresses—particularly, elegiac dominae and satirical matronae—by combining the traditional methodologies of classical studies with theories of both protest femininity and toxic femininity. In so doing, it considers words and their meanings—notably the language of legalese as well as violence—and gender theories of the late twentieth century and early twenty-first century—to read domestic violence among women as a cultural dynamic underpinned by patriarchal institutions that not only institutionalize the abuse of slaves but both initiate and permit it at the hands of disempowered females.