ABSTRACT
This chapter develops a gender-based interpretation of several works of classicizing public art and shows how they communicated ideas about social order through their representation of female sexuality. The classicizing imagery of gender is functional not only because it describes the socialization of women to moral conduct but also because it explains the relations between Self and Other, be tween insider and outsider, between ruler and ruled. The two scenes that are most important for discussion of gender ideology represent the Rape of the Sabine Women and the Punishment of Tarpeia, the only known monumental images of these central themes in Roman art. The presence of the Imperial family not only demonstrates dynastic aspirations but also reminds the populace of its duty of responsible sexuality; the court is the ultimate model of this responsibility, which was framed in the Augustan marital laws and sanctions of the period.
