Introduction

Abstract

Abstract The aim of this book is to give some basic information on women’s lives in late antiquity, and to make a start on answering some basic questions: to what extent could women choose what to do? What social, practical, or legal constraints limited their choices? What options were available besides (or within) marriage and housekeeping? What was housekeeping like? What level of education or of health care was available? What conduct and ideals were women taught to admire? Questions like these have been asked for the last twenty years, but most writing on women in antiquity focuses on the ‘classical’ periods of Athens in the fifth and fourth centuries bc and Rome in the late Republic and early empire; it is comparatively rare to find a book or paper which ranges beyond the start of the third century ad. There are good reasons why the second century ad tends to be a cut-off point, after which we enter what historians call ‘late antiquity’ and theologians ‘the patristic period’.