Gender Identity and the Elegiac Hero in Propertius 2.1

Abstract

The elegiac lover's well-known stance of sexual servitude and his charac- terization of both himself and his verse as mollis establish a feminine persona for the male lover that becomes one of the chief topoi in elegiac poetry. 1 Of the elegiac poets, Propertius is often considered to be the inventor of the image of servitium amoris. Throughout the first three books of the Elegies, the Propertian lover appears hopelessly enslaved to a mistress he describes as domina. The elegiac enterprise in general, especially in Propertius' amatory texts, seems to subvert Roman conventions of mascu- linity by assigning to the male narrator traits typically associated with women: servitium, mollitia, and levitas. The male lover thus presents him- self as devoted, dependent, and passive and, in turn, often depicts his mistress as dura. The gender inversion implicit in the narrator's stance ostensibly allows the Propertian lover to embrace a philosophy of life that overturns traditional gender roles and violates the principles under which women are subject to male authority. 2