ABSTRACT
Terentia, her daughter Tullia and her husband’s second wife, Publilia, who was young enough to be her granddaughter, were born into wealth, position and power, when the Roman Republic was relatively secure in its dominance of the Mediterranean, although domestic problems were intensifying. They were free, when others were slaves; they were Roman citizens; they shared in Graeco-Roman high culture. Since their socio-political status depended initially on that of their parents and later on that of their husbands, and since Terentia and Tullia at least were deeply involved in their husbands’ politics, the context in which their men functioned is essential background. Apart from biology, they had less in common with women of lesser status than with men of their own class. Some six hundred senators and their families were at the vertiginous peak of a social pyramid, formed of tens of millions of inhabitants of the Roman Empire and a million in Rome itself.
