Roman guardianship of women served the guardians’ own inheritance interests.

Evidence

Once woman is dethroned by the advent of private property, her fate is linked to it for centuries: in large part, her history is intertwined with the history of inheritance. The fundamental importance of this institution becomes clear if we keep in mind that the owner alienated his existence in property; it was more important to him than life itself; it goes beyond the strict limits of a mortal lifetime, it lives on after the body is gone, an earthly and tangible incarnation of the immortal soul; but this continued survival can occur only if property remains in the owner’s hands: it can remain his after death only if it belongs to individuals who are extensions of himself and recognized, who are his own. Cultivating paternal lands and worshipping the father’s spirit are one and the same obligation for the heir: to ensure the survival of ancestors on earth and in the underworld. Man will not, therefore, agree to share his property or his children with woman. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 182 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

In particular, when he acquires ownership of land, he also claims woman as property. Formerly he was possessed by the mana, by the earth: now he has a soul, property; freed from Woman, he now lays claim to a woman and a posterity of his own. He wants the family labor he uses for the benefit of his fields to be totally his, and for this to happen, the workers must belong to him: he subjugates his wife and his children. He must have heirs who will extend his life on earth because he bequeaths them his possessions, and who will give him in turn, beyond the tomb, the necessary honors for the repose of his soul. The cult of the domestic gods is superimposed on the constitution of private property, and the function of heirs is both economic and mystical. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 167 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

We can read Quintilian, after Perpetua, with the recognition that the schoolmaster’s authority operated against actual mothers whose interiorities looked something like Perpetua’s. We can read Augustine, after Perpetua, with the recognition that the bishop’s doctrine of original sin operated in the world of actual mothers whose investment in their children was as substantive and physically grounded as Perpetua’s. We can read patria potestas, after Perpetua, with the recognition that the paterfamilias’s legal authority operated against actual women whose intellectual capacity and emotional investment matched her father’s, even when their legal standing did not. — , The Rod and the Child, 2184 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: The institution of inheritance causally produced woman’s subordination to man’s property — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 182; Roman paternal authority operated against mothers with equal investment — , The Rod and the Child: A Global History…, 2184; The advent of private property converted woman from sacred being into owned property — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 167

Broader Connections

• The institution of inheritance causally produced woman’s subordination to man’s property #corroborates (0.82) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 182
• The advent of private property converted woman from sacred being into owned property #corroborates (0.78) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 167
• Roman paternal authority operated against mothers with equal investment #expands (0.75) — , The Rod and the Child, 2184