MOECHA vs. MERETRIX

A Roman wife could be put on trial for adultery.

• The punishment, if convicted, was a divorce for the husband, loss of her dowry, being barred from wearing the garments of a matron (the stola, palla, & vitta), and having to wear a toga instead
• At some periods during the Empire, the punishment for a convicted adultress could include banishment and/or execution

Under Roman law, adultery and prostitution were essentially the same thing. An adulteress *was* a whore.

• A husband who did not prosecute his wife for adultery was guilty of pimping without a license and could be prosecuted for it.
• Prostitutes & pimps had to register with the Aediles (magistrates charged with the maintenance of public buildings, regulation of public festivals, and maintaining public order.

In practice, it is likely that whores/adulteresses were not *forced* to wear the toga on a daily basis, but it was one of the garments they were permitted to wear.

• It is also noted that it was *illegal* for them to wear the stola, but many did wear it when out in public to keep from being molested and bothered by men in public areas.
• Just as exemplary matrons were designated “stolata,” sexually licentious women were designated “togata” even if they never actually wore a toga.
• In all likelihood, they did wear the toga in the early days of Rome, but the actual practice of wearing the toga fell away leaving just the term. This parallels the way wives stopped wearing the stola but were still described as “stolata.”

Commentary on Adultresses & Whores in Roman Literature:

• Horace – “The togata has the advantage over the matrona when it comes to satisfying sexual urges, as there is no husband to fear.” (Satires 1.2.63)
• Martial berated a friend for gifting a notorious adultreress (famosa moecha) with tunicas of purple and scarlet. “Do you want to give her the present she has deserved? Send her the toga.” (Epigrams 2.39)
• Juvenal complains about the gauzy, effeminate toga worn by a young advocate: “Fabulla is an adulteress; condemn Carfinia of the same crime if you wish; but however guilty, she would never wear such a gown as yours.” (Satires 2.68-70)
• Martial criticizes a man as being the son of a woman who wore the toga – “mater togata”. (Epigrams 6.64.4)
• Cicero said to Mark Antony “you assumed the toga virilis and at once turned it into the muliebrem togam [toga of a woman]. At first you were a common whore [scortum], with a fixed price for your favors, nor was it small.” (Phillippics 2.44)
• One of the characters in Poenulus (The Little Carthaginian, a Latin comedic play) by Plautus admires a prostitute’s appearance: “but the way she was dressed, bejeweled, ornamented – so charmingly, so tastefully, so stylishly!”
• Seneca describes a whore who was “adorned for the public” and “dressed in the clothes her pimp has provided.” He also talks about “whore’s colors,” which were probably heavy makeup and/or ovvery brightly colored clothing. He further states that these would nver be worn by decent women.
• Tacitus also describes the clothing of prostitutes as being very colorful.
• Nonius states that in “olden times” the whores wore short tunics which were “girded up from below”
• Afranius states “A prostitute in a long gown? When they find themselves in a strange place they tend to wear it for self-protection.”
• Evantius mentions a saffron-colored pallium (small palla) as the distinguishing mark of a prostitute in comedic plays. He also mentions that some prostitutes would wear foreign clothing or headgear, such as turbans, to attract notice, and that they do not wear the strophium (bust band). He observes that one of Catullus’ prostitutes suddenly bares her naked breasts to passersby on the street in a bid for attention.
  • By inference then, matrons *do* wear the strophium
• Public nudity was the mark of the lowest level of common prostitute, but “nudity” didn’t necessarily mean fully naked, but rather not entirely or properly clothed.

Ancient authors across all genres insisted that it was easy to tell matrons and whores apart:

• When one of Plautus’s prostitutes is required to disguise herself as a matron, she is orderd to be “dressed in the matron’s way, with hair combed and tied with woolen bands so she can pretend to be your wife” (Miles gloriousus 790-93)
• Advocate M. Antistius Labeo (d.10-22 CE) said that “If someone accosts virgins, even those in slaves’ garb [ancillary veste vestitas], his offense is regarded as venial (slight or pardonable), even more so if women are in prostitutes’ dress [meretricia veste] and not that of matrons [matrum familiarum vestitae]. Still, if a woman is not in the dress of a matron and someone accosts her or abducts her attendant, he will be liable to the action for insult.” (Digest of Justinian 47.10.15.15) This suggests that, although matrons and whores were supposed to be visibly distinct from one another, it was not always the case in practice.
• In the late 2^nd century CE the Christian writer Tertullian claimed that noblewomen were going about in public without the stola for the purposes of practicing prostitution more easily – to indulge in low class pleasures, to walk abroad, to see and be seen, and to field sexual advances. (De pallio 4.9) Of course, the stola had already fallen out of fashion by this time and was rarely worn or depicted.

Noted similarities between matrons and whores:

• Both classes of women wore makeup and liked colorful clothing.
• They both liked to wear the diaphanous Coan silk that supposedly left little the viewer’s imagination if they could afford it.
• It is uncertain whether it was truly transparent, or merely extremely thin fabric that outlined the body.
• Ideally the color and weight of a woman’s clothing was a reflection of her morality, but in reality women on both ends of the spectrum took delight in the same things.
• Anything that was designed to attract male attention was therefore equated with low morals.