Roman Family Patria Protestia

orical scholarship dating back from the early 19th century. Ancient historians inferred the family was based solely on an extended family platform. Moreover, the 19th century interpretation of the Roman family was NOT the modern definition of nuclear family, but an extended multi-age and related family deeply rooted under strict patriarchal control. This conservative theme is derived from the “reintroduction of Roman law in the late Medieval Europe” where the “absolute legal power of the father” served as the foundation for the trending “absolute sovereign in the state” (G&S 151). As time went on, this patriarchal traditional rhetoric became universal lens for studying the Romans. Therefore, clearly ancient historical research on the family

There has been a long-term debate in the different ways historians have defined the Roman family because of the variable patria protesta has shaped the traditional belief. This concept is crucial to understand how families operated if they were nuclear or extended. Using our modern context, paternal power to harm children and maintain control of families is subjective to pin on the entirety Roman families. In Rome, the oldest male could be the grandfather, or great grandfather could be the head of the family where everything was controlled under his rule. An example of paternal control are marriages. In Rome, families were prearranged and not meant for love and affection, but to create a family connection. It was a form to form and alliances especially during the Principate where wealth and status became very important. Patrichiral fathers would marry off teenage daughters to significantly patronage and loyalty to older men. This meat that most marriages were by forced influenced and not a deep bond furthering the power of patria protestia. However, the greatest importance over the debate over the patria potestas, is the Latin definition, the father's power. That is the father's power had complete legal and financial control over males, females and other segments in the family. This concept agrees with the idea of head of the extended family which can defined by the father. This concept is derived by the original founder of Rome; Romulus who “granted

So, the argument that for most Romans the control of the father is not valid. Indeed, it was only was common for Senators and those who lived long. In a women's teens, “more than half had already lost their fathers, only a fifth or so of men at the time of their marriage in their late twenties or thirties were still in their father's power” (G&S 161). Moreover, the average life expectancy at birth for Romans was twenty to thirty years. Therefore the patria protestia was not nearly as an epidemic as historians depicted and only was detrimental to those with healthy gene pools, or demographic groups that lived long. It was unlikely to have a father living when so many were no longer part of the prosteia. Even though it was traditionally thought pateria was typical, patriarchal dominance did not nearly govern the Roman family and these facts undermine the strong control of paternalism in Roman