Imperial Women within the Imperial Family

Starting with Faustina the Younger, whose fecundity and imperial ties suggest her as a model imperial woman, this chapter explores the imperial domus—house, household, family—and women’s roles within it from Augustus through the Severans. That domus was a cornerstone of Augustus’ new principate, becoming ever more important during the principate. Flavian dynastic emphasis is noted, as is the growing attention to family in the motherless imperial families of Nerva, Trajan, and Hadrian. A high point comes with Faustina the Elder and Faustina the Younger, but familial emphasis continues under the Severans. The chapter also discusses nontraditional imperial families, including “concubines” and the same-sex relationship of Hadrian with Antinous, and various terms for the imperial house such as domus divina. The chapter reveals both that “the imperial family” was a cornerstone of the principate, but that it was hard for imperial women to gain individual visibility within that construct.