ABSTRACT
These texts, Plutarch’s portrait of Cornelia (Pompey’s last wife) and Sallust’s portrait of Sempronia, show us two women of leading senatorial families during the late republic who had a similar education but were judged quite differently.1
Whatever the historical truth of these portraits, literary education, supplemented with music and, in the case of Cornelia, with geometry and philosophy, seems to have been a regular element in it. Are we allowed to conclude from such examples that upper-class girls, as a rule, received a thorough education in Greek and Roman literature, and perhaps in music, mathematics and philosophy, or were such women exceptional and was that the reason why they attracted the attention of our sources? So far the education of Roman girls and women has not been treated as a separate subject of study. Since the ancient sources usually do not speak of the education of girls or are prejudiced when the education of women comes up for discussion, even the most basic facts are hard to establish. Childhood as such did not much interest Roman authors and, whereas boys were cherished for their promise of a future career, girls did not figure prominently in public life and were simply omitted from record.2 Since our sources hardly speak of the education of girls, we have to gather
