What interests me mostβand is the question I posed to my Roman law students todayβis whether the legalization of prostitution would, in fact, serve to decrease violence and discrimination towards sex workers.
However, these marginal people are often disturbing mirrors, reflecting the elite fears and anxieties within a society. Both male and female prostitutes were frequently mistreated and abused in Roman antiquity, all within a society wherein prostitution was legal. Marginalization took the form of exclusion from cultic activities such as the Bona Dea festival, and the relegation of meretrices prostitutes to their own cult for Venus Erycina.
These women were even spatially separated during certain religious rites. In regard to the physical vulnerability of these women, there could be great danger in being a prostitute. Pimps and prostitutes had less legal redress than those of higher status, and it appears that violence against those perceived as sexual deviants may have been more regularized.
Even dressing as a prostitute could have violent repercussionsβa defense all too familiar and still just as ridiculous even today. The jurist Ulpian noted:. Still if the woman be not in the dress of a matron and someone accost her or abduct her attendant, he will be liable to the action for insult.
One was the alleged rape of a mimula, a mime-actress, when he was young. Cicero defends Plancius not only by mentioning his youth, but also by saying that this was a common act against such actresses Read: It was customary to rape such lowly actresses! No big deal! As individuals that bore the legal stigma of infamia disrepute , Roman prostitutes were often dependent on pimps and those of higher status for physical protection.
