Calpurnia (wife of Pliny the Younger)
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Calpurnia (61 AD-c. 113 AD) was an Ancient Roman woman of the late 1st Century and early 2nd Century AD who was the third and final wife of the writer, jurist, and senator Pliny the Younger, suffect consul in 100 AD. She was a member of the gens Calpurnia and was the granddaughter of Lucius Calpurnius Fabatus, an equestrian from Comum, Pliny's own hometown.[1][2]
Little is known of her childhood, though she seems to have been orphaned at a young age and then raised primarily in the care of her aunt, Calpurnia Hispulla, with her grandfather acting as her legal guardian.[3]
She was Pliny's third wife, whom he married some time after 96 AD, and was probably significantly younger than him at the time of their marriage. Their union appears to have been arranged, or at least suggested, by Calpurnia Hispulla. She had known Pliny since he had been a young boy and had been very close to his mother and the two families were among the most prominent at Comum.[4]
Only three letters from Pliny to Calpurnia are preserved in his collection of epistulae, all written while he was at Rome and she was recovering from an illness in Campania.[5][6][7] The letters seem to reveal deep feelings for his young wife, though scholars have noted that the descriptions of Calpurnia are idealized and clearly influenced by the model of the puella docta, or 'learned girl', who appears as the love object of Roman elegiac poets like Propertius.[8][9][10] Calpurnia was well-educated and, according to Pliny, took a keen interest in his literary and legal work.[11]
At some point Calpurnia suffered a very painful and serious miscarriage, which very nearly killed her. In letters to her grandfather and aunt, Pliny blames her "inexperienced age" and "girlish ignorance" for the loss of the child, suggesting that she was unaware that she was pregnant.[12][13] We know of no other surviving children from their marriage.
When Pliny traveled to the province of Bithynia and Pontus in 110 AD to serve as governor, it appears that Calpurnia accompanied him. In a letter to the Emperor Trajan, Pliny explained that he had allowed Calpurnia to use the transport system normally reserved for Imperial officials to return to Italy as quickly as possible to be with her aunt after the death of her grandfather Fabatus.[14] It is not clear whether she was still in Italy or had rejoined her husband by the time he died in Bithynia in 112 or 113 AD and nothing is known of her life after his death.[15]
References[edit]
- ↑ "Epistulae, v, 11". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "CIL 5, 5267". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "Epistulae, iv, 19". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "Epistulae, iv, 19". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "Epistulae, vi, 4". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "Epistulae, vi, 7". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "Epistulae, vii, 5". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ Challet, Claude-Emmanuelle Centlivres (2018). "Pliny the Lover: By the Book". Museum Helveticum. 75: 155–68 – via JSTOR.
- ↑ Smith, Mariah Elaine (2020). "Composing the puella: Pliny the Younger's Elegiac Experimentation". Illinois Classical Studies. 45: 132–157 – via JSTOR.
- ↑ Carlon, Jacqueline (2009). Pliny's Women: Constructing Virtue and Creating Identity in the Roman World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 157–174. ISBN 978-0-521-76132-1. Search this book on
- ↑ "Epistulae, iv, 19". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "Epistulae, viii, 10". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "Epistulae, viii, 11". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "Epistulae, x, 120". Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ Hurley, Donna (2011). Suetonius The Caesars. Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company. pp. x. ISBN 978-1-60384-313-3. Search this book on
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