Messalina : empress, adulteress, libertine : the story of the most notorious woman of the Roman world / Honor Cargill-Martin.
Edition:
First Pegasus Books cloth edition.
Publisher:
Pegasus Books,
Copyright Date:
2023
Description:
xxix, 402 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (chiefly color), maps, genealogical tables ; 24 cm
Notes:
Includes bibliographical references (pages 352-363) and index.
Contents:
Epilogue : the Messalinas. A wedding and a funeral -- A marble stage -- An education -- Eavesdropping on Tiberius -- A bad year for a wedding -- The bridge over the bay -- The king is dead, long live the king -- Domina -- Madonna Messalina -- The court of Messalina -- The triumph of Messalina --Intrigues and anxieties -- Political perversions -- Adulteresses have more fun -- A garden to kill for -- Re-reading an ending -- The whore empress -- The tragedy of Octavia and Britannicus -- Epilogue : the Messalinas.
Summary:
The story of Messalina, third wife of the emperor Claudius and one of the most notorious women to have inhabited the Roman world. The image of the empress Messalina as a ruthless, sexually insatiable schemer, derived from the work of Roman historians such as Tacitus and Suetonius, has taken deep root in the Western imagination. The stories they told about her included nightly visits to a brothel and a twenty-four-hour sex competition with a prostitute. Tales like these have defined the empress's legacy, but her real story is much more complex. In her new life of Messalina, the classicist Honor Cargill-Martin reappraises one of the most slandered and underestimated female figures of ancient history. Looking beyond the salacious anecdotes, she finds a woman battling to assert her position in the overwhelmingly male world of imperial Roman politics--and succeeding. Intelligent, passionate, and ruthless when she needed to be, Messalina's story encapsulates the cut-throat political maneuvering and unimaginable luxury of the Julio-Claudian dynasty in its heyday. Cargill-Martin sets out not to 'salvage' Messalina's reputation, but to look at her life in the context of her time. Above all, she seeks to reclaim the humanity of a life story previously circumscribed by currents of high politics and patriarchy.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.