Table of Contents
Acknowledgements 7
Part 1 In Bed with a Roman
Introduction: Whose Bed Is It Anyway? 10
1 Love, and Being a Matrona 13
2 Marriage, Divorce and Adultery 36
3 'The Incomplete Woman' and Sexual Medicine 50
4 Birth Control, Aphrodisiacs and Love Potions: the Need (or Not) for Venus 79
5 Buggery, Beasts and Brothels: the Need for Virtus 92
6 Sex in the Afternoon: the domina and Her Love Slave 127
7 Cross-Dressing, Transsexualism and Same-Sex Marriage 139
8 Bacchanalian Orgies and Vestal Virginity 144
9 Raping the Romans 157
10 The Power of Sex: In Bed with a Soldier 163
11 Gladiator Adulator 168
12 Bad Language: Roman Sexual Vocabulary 174
Part 2 In Bed with the Emperors, and an Empress or Two
13 Augustus' Women: Flawless, Faithful and Fornicating 182
14 Capricious Depravity with Tiberius 188
15 'The "Whore Augusta', Incest with Caligula and Claudius, and Nero's Necrophilia 191
16 Hadrian and Antinous: A Man Worth Dying For 214
17 Faustina and the Gladiator's Bloodbath; the Vile Corruption of Commodus 219
18 Elagabalus: 'An Unspeakably Disgusting Life' 223
19 Theodora: Slut or Saint? 229
Primary Sources Cited 234
Abbreviations 258
Bibliography 260