Livy's Treatment Of Women In The Rape Of Lucretia

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Rape of Lucretia is one of the many works of Livy, a Roman historian. Many of Livy’s works detailed the rise and fall of the Roman Empire. True or not, the story of Lucretia provides significant evidence regarding the gender roles that existed in Roman society, and how Livy saw these as detrimental to Roman society. Perhaps the most shocking part of the story was when Lucretia felt so overwhelmed with guilt, that she took her own life (58). This event is particularly shocking due to the fact that her guilt arose from being raped. Lucretia felt as though she should be chastised for being raped. This brings to light the fact that women in Roman society were consumed with the thought that their self-worth depended solely upon being virtuous to their husbands. Lucretia questioned how she would live the rest of her life as a woman who “lost her honor” (58). She didn’t feel as though her life was worth living anymore, now that her body was “greatly soiled” (58.) Without her virtue, she saw herself as no longer valuable. In today’s society, one of the first things that is made clear to rape victims is the fact that they are in no way, shape, or form to blame for what happened to them. This goes to show the change in the role of women throughout …show more content…

In chapter 57, the men sat around and compared their wives as if they were possessions, making it a competition to see who had the best wife. They gauged this upon which wife was doing the most honorable thing while the husbands were away. Since Lucretia was “still working on her spinning” instead of having fun with her friends, she was the best wife. (57) This suggests that women basically are not expected to have lives outside of their life at home with their husband and their children. This blatant double standard shows that it was seen as inferior that the other wives were out enjoying themselves in the exact same manner that the men

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