Violenza psicologica contro le donne: casi di studio nella Roma repubblicana

This article examines psychological violence against women in Republican Rome (5th–1st century BCE), an aspect of gender-based violence that has received far less scholarly attention than physical or sexual violence. While the 1993 UN Declaration and subsequent European legal instruments formally defined psychological violence, we argue that Roman sources reveal an implicit awareness of this phenomenon and its emotional consequences long before its modern legal codification. By adopting Margherita Carucci's categories developed for Imperial-era domestic violence—fear, humiliation, verbal aggression, threats, and social isolation—the article examines a range of case studies spanning legend and history: the archetypal rape of Rhea Silvia; the trials of Vestal Virgins Postumia and Licinia, the latter subjected to what resembles modern stalking by Crassus; the physical and psychological abuse endured by Virginia and by Terentia, Cicero's wife; and instances of purely psychological violence, including threats made against Fulvia in the context of Catiline’s conspiracy and the humiliation inflicted on another Fulvia, wife of Mark Antony, by her husband's reproaches. Through close lexical analysis of Latin and Greek sources (Livy, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Sallust, Cicero, Plutarch, Valerius Maximus, Appian), the contribution traces how ancient authors registered victims' emotional reactions—fear, shame, exhaustion, psychosomatic illness—even in the absence of visible physical harm. The scrutiny expands Carucci's framework by identifying new forms of psychological abuse, such as social (rather than merely physical) isolation, and oppression directed at women by other women. We conclude that psychological violence was pervasive and morally condemned in Roman society, particularly against upper-class women, despite lacking any formal legal sanction.