DI: Cultural Lesson - Roman Families

Roman Families

There are two majors categories when discussing families in ancient Rome: the household and the family. 

Familia and Gens - definitions

• The familia (household) was a social unit that contained every related person in the house, along with the household slaves.
• The gens was a collection of broadly related households, including all those who had shared male lineage and thus shared a common nomen.  Large gens would meet and coordinate, but this was a less cohesive group than the familia.

Pater Familias

Within the familia, the eldest male, called the pater familias, held full control over his familia. This power was called patria potestas - the power of the father, and it extended to matters of life and death.  Marriages, business arrangements, and all other aspects of the family’s life were decided by the pater familias. Even adult children, except for married daughters (who fell under the control of their husband's pater familias), were beholden to the pater familias. One of the primary responsibilities of the familia was to pass on to the children all of the important ceremonies and traditions of the mos maiorum, which were the major Roman traditions. The image depicts a bas relief showing a father and older brother instructing a younger child in the mos maiorum.

Familia - Components

The social unit known as the familia consisted of a pater (father), mater (mother), filii et filiae (sons and daughters), servi (slaves) and any other related family members living in the house (uncles, aunts, grandchildren, spouses of children, etc.). The pater familias could hand over his power to his eldest son, if he so chose, but usually it was only passed on after death.

The Effect of Marriage on a Familia

When a daughter was old enough to be married, she would be given, for a dowry, to another family, and leave her birth family. This was called manumission. N.B. This is still included in some modern wedding ceremonies, as the father of the bride “gives away” his daughter at the start of the ceremony. 

In Rome, the new wife would join her husband’s familia and be under the control of her husband’s father, unless the man she was marrying was the eldest male in his household. The woman married to the pater familias was known as the familia’s matrona - a matron. In the Augustan household, Livia was the matrona. Occasionally, a particularly powerful matrona would take on the role of mater familias on the death of her husband, having the same duties and powers as her deceased husband.

Social Structure

Roman families were carefully ordered social structures: a clear hierarchy. There is some debate on the emotional closeness of the unit: some scholars point to examples in Roman history demonstrating the closeness of parents to their children, but others point out that a father was able to choose to expose (place outside to die) an unwanted or disabled infant, or even to sell children into slavery if they could not care for them.

Adoption

A man could not pass on his nomen to a daughter and so a male child was highly desirable. The Romans were always willing, if there happened to be no male heir, to adopt a male child into their familia. Adoption was a way of continuing the gens and an adopted son was looked on as an equal to a naturally born child. There were various ways to adopt: if a poor family could not afford to feed or house their children, they might attempt to find a rich patron to adopt one of their sons. In the highest realms of society, a powerful father without a son might adopt his closest male relative to guarantee the succession of his power. Octavius (who was later called Augustus) was famously adopted posthumously (after death) by a decree in Gaius Julius Caesar's will.

Testamentum

A large part of the modern concept of a will comes from the Roman practice of creating a testamentum. Originally, a Roman will was made orally, in the presence of seven witnesses, but soon it became clear that the more practical method was to write out the will. The purpose of the will was similar to the purpose of adoption: cementing the future of the familia and insuring that it would continue as an organization moving forward.

Wills were devised to split not just belongings and property, but also to assign roles and to divide power, if needed. Roman law established many protections for the heirs, including the right to take possession of the deceased's property. A will was considered invalid if the document skipped family members without cause. In other words, one could not omit a direct relative without providing proper justification, which had to be included in the text of the will. 

The Vestal Virgins, a set of special priestesses of the goddess Vesta, were charged with protecting the sanctity of wills.