Study Questions for LIFE, DEATH, and ENTERTAINMENT

Chapter 1: Roman Family
1. How does the Roman concept of "familia" differ from our (common) notion of what constitutes a family?

2. What are the three parts of the name of a male Roman citizen? What names were given to citizen women? What names were given to male slaves, and how did this change upon manumission?

3. What is "patria potestas"? What are the idealized qualities expected of elite Roman men (p29)? How are patresfamilias (fathers of families) treated in Roman comedy?
4. How does a marriage with "manus" differ from one without? (read p31-33 carefully)? What was the purpose of Roman marriage? How was fertility both encouraged and limited?

5. What were the idealized qualities of matresfamilias (mothers of families; p35-36)?
6. Who typically raised and educated Roman (elite) children? How involved were the biological mothers and fathers in this process? How did the education of elite boys and girls differ?

7. Describe three kinds of evidence for Roman families and family life discussed by Hanson (43-47). What PROBABLY typical experiences or aspects of the Roman family do the letters of Cicero and Pliny illustrate? What do papyri from Egypt tell us that these letters do not?

8. What kind of family life, if any, did slaves have? How did this change upon manumission?

9. Describe what the following rooms in an elite Roman "domus" were used for:
atrium, tablinum, triclinium, peristyle, balnea, cubiculum.

Chapter 3: Roman Demography
1. How does Frier define "demography"? What does he say is the goal of this chapter (p86, second to last paragraph).

2. What "demographic transition" separates Rome's population from that of modern Western nations? What is Frier's estimate (p88-89) of average Roman life expectancy at birth? at age ten?

3. Why is the relatively low life expectancy of Rome's population of major historical importance (89)?

4. What Rome a "delayed marriage" or "early marriage" population? When did women and men typically marry (for the first time)? What factors led to frequent remarriage?

5. How are Roman ways of controlling fertility different from those found after the "fertility transition" (95-100)?

6. What estimate does Frier give of the total population of the Roman empire?

7. What was the "Antonine Plague"? How many people did it kill, and how might it have affected the general welfare of the empire?

Chapter 4: Roman Religion
1. According to Potter, what is the difference between the "passive" and the "active" religious practice of the Romans?

2. How were new gods "officially" admitted into the Roman pantheon (118-119)?

3. How did the Romans define "impietas" in the republic (126-129)? How did this change under the empire? How does "impietas" differ from "vitium"?

4. Define the following: "flamines", "pontifices", "augurs", "quindecimviri", and "haruspices" (134-151).

5. Briefly describe the Roman calendar (152-53).

6. Describe the "standard" procedure for Roman animal sacrifice.

7. Into what 3 types are Roman festivals divided by Potter (159-160)?

Chapter 5: Feeding the City
1. List three items imported to Rome in large quantities. What was the role of the Roman gov't in these imports, small and disorganized, or large and organized?

2. How many tons of "foodstuffs" (grain, olives, wine) had to be imported annually to support Rome's population (173)?

3. How significant was the food supply (its reliability, prices, etc) to political life in Rome? (174) How did most of the foodstuffs reach Rome?

4. From where did early imperial Rome get most of its grain? Olives and oil?

5. How did Clodius' law (58 BCE) change the distribution of grain? By the Augustan period, roughly what percentage of the city's population was eligible for the grain dole?

6. Briefly describe the process that brought a load of grain from a large ship off the coast at Ostia to a distribution point in the city of Rome. Describe three kinds of guilds involved in this process.

7. Who were the merchants and shippers responsible for transporting grain from the provinces to Ostia?

8. Describe the career of Sextus Julius Possessor. What does his career illustrate about the administration of the grain supply by the Roman imperial gov't?

9. How many shiploads of grain, olive oil, and wine (into Ostia) were necessary each year to meet the demand in Rome? What is the absolute minimum labor force necessary simply to unload the ships (197)?