Power and Eroticism in Imperial Rome

This book explores how Roman imperial power was constructed and contested through the representation of sexual relations.

Caroline Vout (Author)

9780521867399, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 22 February 2007

300 pages
24.4 x 17 x 1.7 cm, 0.68 kg

'… represent[s] an increasingly popular alternative emphasis in the study of ancient art. … sure to do much to shift the parameters of Roman 'art history' even further and to enrich its discussion.' Art History

The relationships between Roman emperors and their objects of desire, male and female, are well attested. The salacious nature of this evidence means that it is often omitted from mainstream historical inquiry. Yet that is to underestimate the importance of 'gossip' and the act of thinking about an emperor's private life. In this book Dr Vout takes the reader from Rome, and Martial's and Statius' poems about Domitian's favourite eunuch, to Antioch and dialogues in praise of Lucius Verus' mistress, to the widespread visual commemoration and cult of Hadrian's young male lover, Antinous. She explores not the relationships themselves but rather the implications of their description. Such description provides a template with which to examine the relationship between emperor and subject, gods and mortals, East and West, centre and periphery. It thus contributes to the fields of imperial representation, court society and the imperial cult.

1. The erotics of imperium
2. Romancing the stone: the story of Hadrian and Antinous
3. Compromising traditions: the case of Nero and Sporus
4. A match made in heaven: Earinus and the emperor
5. Mistress as metaphor: a dialogue with Panthea
6. And so to bed...

Subject Areas: Classical Greek & Roman archaeology [HDDK], Interdisciplinary studies [GT], History of art: ancient & classical art,BCE to c 500 CE [ACG]