BMCR 2008.10.04, Kate Cooper, The Fall of the Roman Household

Kate Cooper, The Fall of the Roman Household.  Cambridge:  Cambridge
University Press, 2007.  Pp. xvi, 319.  ISBN 978-0-521-88460-0.
$99.00.

Reviewed by Matthew J. Perry, John Jay College of Criminal Justice,
CUNY ([email protected])
Word count:  2197 words
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Table of Contents
(http://catdir.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0834/2008272821-t.html)

Kate Cooper's The Fall of the Roman Household is an ambitious and
valuable study of the cultural debates among clergy and lay elites
regarding the role of marriage and the household in an evolving
Christian world. The title of the work references Edward Gibbon's
famous (or perhaps infamous) assertions about the devastating effect of
Christianity upon the traditional civic values of the Roman Empire,
most notably the desire to adopt an ascetic lifestyle at the expense of
traditional household duties. In an attempt to understand precisely how
Christianity transformed the Roman household, Cooper explores the
cultural debate that took place regarding Christian standards and
ethics, placing this discussion squarely within the tumultuous social
and political context of the later Roman Empire during the "long fifth
century" (from the death of Theodosius I in 395 CE to the Justinianic
invasion of Italy in 535 CE). She investigates how the contemporary
state of affairs facilitated--and even necessitated--the transformation
of the household, as well as how clergy and lay members of the
senatorial order attempted to reconcile Christian beliefs governing
family and the household with classical aristocratic traditions. As a
result, this book is not a comprehensive description of the realities
of the late Roman household insomuch as it is an examination of the
various ideas and values that Christian writers used to elucidate, and
ultimately shape, this evolving institution.

To study the cultural debate and societal repercussions of this
transformation, Cooper focuses primarily on the condition of women in
their roles of bride, wife, and mother. In this respect, The Fall of
the Roman Household builds upon on many of the themes introduced in
Cooper's previous scholarship, especially The Virgin and the
Bride.[[1]] She examines a variety of primary source texts, the most
important of these to her analysis being the Ad Gregoriam in palatio,
an anonymous advice manual written for the aristocratic Gregoria
sometime in the late fifth or early sixth century. (Cooper also
provides a very readable English translation of the full text in an
appendix.)

Cooper identifies two developments that dramatically reshaped how
individuals in the Western Empire understood family and household as
social institutions. The first, a frequently mentioned argument that
reaches back to Gibbon, is that the Christian regard for asceticism
(and especially sexual continence) deterred Romans from marrying and
creating households, thus weakening the institutional cornerstone of
the classical civic sphere. Here, Cooper deftly analyzes a persistent
cultural debate among Christians to show that, while the vast majority
of lay and clerical writers did recognize the potential tension between
asceticism and marriage, many also attempted to reconcile the two by
classifying family life as a second-tier form of asceticism. The second
development, which has been less studied by previous scholars, is the
emerging theological perception of marriage as an eternal bond: not
simply a relationship that ideally should not be ended, but a spiritual
union that could not be dissolved. Cooper argues that these two
developments contributed to a distinctly Christian vision of marriage
as the creation of a new family unit founded on a unique conjugal bond
rather than as the manifestation of a reproductive contract between two
families.

On the one hand, I found this aspect of her argument concerning, as it
has the potential to efface the significance of the conjugal
relationship and the establishment of a new, discrete household wrought
by marriage in classical Roman society. Nonetheless, I ultimately found
Cooper's fundamental assertions about the existence of a transformation
to be persuasive, as she effectively mobilizes evidence to illustrate a
shifting perception in how individuals conceptualized and idealized
marriage. For example, Cooper attributes significance to the increased
emphasis placed on the subjugation of a wife to her husband's
authority. This proves to be a telling contrast to the prevailing
attitudes of the early Empire, where the common practice of marriage
sine manu deliberately kept wives outside of the potestas of their
husbands. Cooper's arguments about these new views on marriage emerging
in the later Roman Empire are also a response to academic theories
placing the development of a significantly distinctive "Christian"
marriage closer to 1000 CE and the Gregorian clerical reforms.[[2]]

Cooper contends that the "fall" of the Roman household was not simply
the result of theological developments, but was also the strategic
transformation of a critical civic institution. She argues that both
lay and clerical writers drew upon Christian ethics in developing a new
approach to marriage and family life that effectively reinvented the
household as a social institution capable of weathering the mounting
instability of the fifth and sixth centuries. For example, Cooper
suggests that the perceived permanence of the marital union would have
created more binding social relationships, especially between affines.
In turn, these household changes would help ensure a measure of
constancy in a politically tumultuous world by strengthening a vital
civic institution. While it is very difficult to conclusively prove
that changes in attitudes toward marriage and family were indeed the
result of social necessity, Cooper's thoughtful analysis definitely
suggests some correlation between context and ideology.

Chapter 1, "'The Battle of this Life,'" introduces the political and
cultural environment that helped to shape the transformation of the
Roman household. For Cooper, the key element of this transformation is
the decreasing emphasis placed on adherence to the authority of the
paterfamilias, which was the lynchpin of the traditional Roman
household. There are two issues in particular shaping this reinvention:
the changing political landscape of the later Western Empire, most
notably the ongoing crisis of civil war and the growing senatorial
participation in the imperial bureaucracy, and the increasing
Christianization of the aristocratic senatorial order. Cooper notes how
the evolution of the imperial bureaucracy effectively changed the
"balance of power" within Roman families (27), as sons in this service
would often have better information and political contacts than their
fathers, thus creating a precedent for the exercise of independent
judgment. Furthermore, as the senatorial order became increasingly
involved in this bureaucracy, traditional marriage alliances between
equally matched kin groups became less important. These political
developments coincided with the growing emphasis placed on the moral
independence of the individual by clerical writers, who urged young men
and women to serve God and their conscience rather than the commands of
their fathers. At the same time, these authors needed to make the
establishment of a successful household compatible with Christianity's
dynamic call to adopt an ascetic lifestyle. Cooper argues that there
was a widespread belief among the clergy that aristocratic men and
women could bring their ascetic aspirations in line with their
traditional household and civic duties, and texts that express this
view, such as the Ad Gregoriam in palatio, can be read as a response to
ascetic literature that categorized these duties as being at odds with
true Christian values.

In Chapter 2, "'The Obscurity of Eloquence,'" Cooper examines the
contribution made to contemporary Christian ethics by senatorial
Christianity, which she categorizes as an elite "sub-culture" (xiii)
that attempted to reconcile classical values with a religious tradition
heavily influenced by patristic teachings and ascetic beliefs. Cooper
asserts that to fully understand the emergence of a powerful and
influential clergy, one must understand the Christianity of the
senatorial elite that they replaced, and, more importantly, the
cultural negotiation by which this privileged elite accepted a new form
of religious leadership. Perhaps the best illustration of senatorial
Christianity discussed in this chapter is the Cento Probae, a verse
summary of biblical history crafted entirely from lines and phrases
borrowed from Virgil. Cooper then analyzes the Ad Gregoriam and a
variety of other texts written for a senatorial audience, including the
works of Prudentius, Boethius, and Cassiodorus, to illustrate not only
how authors expressed a vision of Christianity in the language of the
literate elite, but also how they associated the toils of daily life
endured by these elites with the spiritual struggles faced by ascetics
and martyrs.

Chapter 3, "Household and Empire," considers views on the ethical
responsibilities of the Christian aristocracy, particularly in their
role as landowners. Cooper argues that household manuals attempted to
reassert traditional senatorial values concerning the "moral burden of
authority" of wealthy elites in a Christian guise (96), displaying an
urgency and depth that reflected the economic downturn of the late
Roman Empire stemming in part from increasing absenteeism and the
employment of wage labor. Thus, she reads the emphasis placed on a
domina's obligation to her servile dependants as a possible critique of
the wage labor system. Late Roman authors strengthened this association
by depicting a domina's management of her household as being critical
to her spiritual salvation. Cooper offers the intriguing suggestion
that this Christianized reassertion of traditional household values may
have been an attempt to solidify and enforce a framework for proper
leadership and estate management that could endure the political
instability of the fifth and sixth centuries.

The final two chapters shift focus to investigate Christian writers'
attempts to create a spiritual world view inclusive of traditional
household roles and responsibilities. In Chapter 4, "'Such Trustful
Partnership': The Marriage Bond in Latin Conduct Literature," Cooper
explores the increasing emphasis placed on a wife's subordination to
the authority of her husband in Christian texts. Building upon existing
scholarship, especially the work of Judith Evans Grubbs, Cooper
analyzes how the changing political climate made the traditional system
of marriage based on face-to-face negotiation between families of equal
status less useful. The growing number of aristocratic men marrying
women from humbler social positions, in conjunction with the general
instability wrought by the military conflict in the fifth and sixth
centuries, increased the need to document marriage, which had
traditionally relied simply on the witness of kin and neighbors.
Furthermore, in these circumstances, a husband would have been less
reliant on the money and influence of his wife's family, thus making
her more vulnerable. At the same time, Cooper contends, Christian
writers attempted to strengthen these unions by establishing "the
husband-wife relationship as a newly central axis of loyalty and
reciprocity" (160). Moreover, authors depicted the vulnerability and
potential indignities created by a wife's subordination to her husband
as an opportunity for a woman to demonstrate her spiritual endurance,
and thus adhere to the ascetic ideals of the Christian martyrs.

Chapter 5, "'The Invisible Enemy,'" continues to explore the connection
between matron and martyr by analyzing how clerical authors attempted
to recast marriage and motherhood as a form of asceticism. Drawing
heavily from the language and imagery of warfare, both secular and
spiritual, these writers articulated precisely how the domina must
herself struggle with the same invisible enemies that plagued ascetics
and martyrs. For Cooper, what is particularly interesting is how these
authors used the idea of the reinvented Christian household as means to
help craft and express late Roman spirituality.

An appendix contains Cooper's translation of the complete text of the
Ad Gregoriam in palatio, which should help bring more attention to this
fascinating document. The translation also includes footnotes that
effectively serve as a minor commentary of sorts, mentioning key points
of translation and identifying important textual references.

In analyzing the debate regarding the relationship between Christianity
and household, Cooper attempts to untangle an intermeshed and
constantly evolving set of cultural and religious values, which are
expressed in a diverse variety of sources. Accordingly, perhaps the
most perplexing issue for the reader will be the organization of the
book (a potential difficulty that Cooper herself seems to anticipate).
While Cooper attempts to use the Ad Gregoriam in palatio as a
"narrative thread" that will help guide the reader through "the maze of
our evidence" (11), this thread is not always apparent. Occasionally it
is initially unclear why Cooper introduces a particular example or
element of analysis at a given point in the text, and what role this
information is serving in her larger arguments. Due to the book's
organizational structure, Cooper sometimes has to introduce ideas that
she will not address until later in the text. Compounding this
organizational complexity is the book's lack of formal introduction and
conclusion. While the work of an introduction is done by the preface
and the first part of Chapter 1, I found the lack of a discrete
conclusion to be unsatisfying. Given the nuance of Cooper's analysis, I
think that revisiting the individual strands of her intricate arguments
at the end of the text would have been helpful.

All primary source material quoted in the book appears in English. In
cases where Cooper believes the Latin or Greek to be useful, individual
words and shorter phrases are included parenthetically in the
translation whereas longer phrases and sentences are placed in
footnotes.

The Fall of the Roman Household is an absorbing and noteworthy study of
the aristocratic household at the end of the Western Empire. This
thought-provoking text will certainly be of interest not only to those
scholars interested in the study of household, family, and gender, but
also those interested in the more general interplay of classical and
Christian ideas in the later Roman Empire. Cooper does a tremendous job
bringing together aspects of religious belief with social history to
contribute to our understanding of the transformation of the Roman
household.


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Notes:


1.   Kate Cooper, The Virgin and the Bride: Idealized Womanhood in Late
Antiquity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996.

2.   E.g. Georges Duby, The Knight, the Lady and the Priest: The Making
of Modern Marriage in Medieval France, translated by Barbara Bray.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993 [1983].