Roman Empire

==Literacy, books, and education==
[[File:Meister des Porträts des Paquius Proculus 001.jpg|thumb|Pride in literacy was displayed through emblems of reading and writing, as in this portrait of [[Portrait of Terentius Neo|Terentius Neo and his wife]] (''c.'' 20 AD)]]

Estimates of the average [[literacy rate]] range from 5 to over 30%.<ref>{{Harvp|Harris|1989|p=5}}; {{Harvp|Johnson|Parker|2009|pp=3–4}}</ref><ref name="kraus">{{Cite journal |last=Kraus |first=T.J. |date=2000 |title=(Il)literacy in Non-Literary Papyri from Graeco-Roman Egypt: Further Aspects of the Educational Ideal in Ancient Literary Sources and Modern Times |journal=Mnemosyne |volume=53 |issue=3 |doi=10.1163/156852500510633 |pages=322–342 (325–327)}}</ref>{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|pp=89, 97–98}} The Roman obsession with documents and inscriptions indicates the value placed on the written word.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Mattern |first=Susan P. |title=Rome and the Enemy: Imperial Strategy in the Principate |date=1999 |publisher=University of California Press |page=197}}</ref><ref name="morgan">{{Cite book |last=Morgan |first=Teresa |title=Literate Education in the Hellenistic and Roman Worlds |date=1998 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |pages=1–2}}; {{Harvp|Johnson|Parker|2009|p=46ff}}; {{Harvp|Peachin|2011|p=97}}</ref>{{Efn|[[Clifford Ando]] posed the question as "what good would 'posted edicts' do in a world of low literacy?'.{{Sfnp|Ando|2000|p=101|loc=see also p. 87 on "the government's obsessive documentation"}}}} Laws and edicts were posted as well as read out. Illiterate Roman subjects could have a government scribe (''[[scriba (ancient Rome)|scriba]]'') read or write their official documents for them.<ref name=kraus/>{{Sfnp|Ando|2000|p=101}} The military produced extensive written records.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Phang |first=Sara Elise |chapter=Military Documents, Languages, and Literacy |date=2011 |title=A Companion to the Roman Army |publisher=Blackwell |pages=286–301}}</ref> The [[Babylonian Talmud]] declared "if all seas were ink, all reeds were pen, all skies parchment, and all men scribes, they would be unable to set down the full scope of the Roman government's concerns".{{Sfnp|Ando|2000|pp=86–87}}

[[Numeracy]] was necessary for commerce.<ref name=morgan/>{{Sfnp|Mattern|1999|p=197}} Slaves were numerate and literate in significant numbers; some were highly educated.{{Sfnp|Gagarin|2010|pp=19–20}} Graffiti and low-quality inscriptions with misspellings and [[solecism]]s indicate casual literacy among non-elites.<ref>{{Harvp|Harris|1989|pp=9, 48, 215, 248, 26, 248, 258–269}}; {{Harvp|Johnson|Parker|2009|pp=47, 54, 290ff}}</ref>{{Efn|Political slogans and obscenities are widely preserved as graffiti in Pompeii: Antonio Varone, ''Erotica Pompeiana: Love Inscriptions on the Walls of Pompeii'' ("L'Erma" di Bretschneider, 2002). Soldiers sometimes inscribed [[sling bullet]]s with aggressive messages: Phang, "Military Documents, Languages, and Literacy," p. 300.}}<ref name=curchin/>

The Romans had an extensive [[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#libri pontificales|priestly archive]], and inscriptions appear throughout the Empire in connection with [[votum|votives]] dedicated by ordinary people, as well as "[[Magic in the Greco-Roman world|magic spells]]" (e.g. the [[Greek Magical Papyri]]).<ref>{{Cite book |last=Beard |first=Mary |chapter=Ancient Literacy and the Written Word in Roman Religion |date=1991 |title=Literacy in the Roman World |publisher=University of Michigan Press |pages=59ff |author-link=Mary Beard (classicist)}}; {{Cite book |last=Dickie |first=Matthew |title=Magic and Magicians in the Greco-Roman World |date=2001 |publisher=Routledge |pages=94–95, 181–182, 196}}; {{Harvp|Potter|2009|p=555}}; {{Harvp|Harris|1989|pp=29, 218–219}}</ref>

Books were expensive, since each copy had to be written out on a papyrus roll (''volumen'') by scribes.{{Sfnp|Johnson|2010|pp=17–18}} The [[codex]]—pages bound to a spine—was still a novelty in the 1st century,<ref>{{Harvp|Johnson|2010|p=17|loc=citing Martial, ''Epigrams'', 1.2, 14.184–92}}; {{Harvp|Cavallo|Chartier|1999|pp=83–84}}</ref> but by the end of the 3rd century was replacing the ''volumen''.<ref>{{Harvp|Johnson|2010|pp=17–18}}; {{Harvp|Cavallo|Chartier|1999|pp=84–85}}</ref> Commercial book production was established by the late Republic,{{Sfnp|Marshall|1976|p=253}} and by the 1st century certain neighbourhoods of Rome and Western provincial cities were known for their bookshops.<ref>{{Harvp|Cavallo|Chartier|1999|p=71}}; {{Harvp|Marshall|1976|p=253|loc=citing on the book trade in the provinces Pliny the Younger, ''Epistulae'' 9.11.2; Martial ''Epigrams'' 7.88; Horace, ''Carmina'' 2.20.13f. and ''Ars Poetica'' 345; Ovid, ''Tristia'' 4.9.21 and 4.10.128; Pliny the Elder, ''Natural History'' 35.2.11; Sidonius, ''Epistulae'' 9.7.1.}}</ref> The quality of editing varied wildly,<ref>{{Harvp|Marshall|1976|p=253}}; Strabo 13.1.54, 50.13.419; {{Cite book |last=Martial |title=Epigrams |page=2.8}}; [[Lucian]], ''Adversus Indoctum'' 1</ref> and [[plagiarism]] or [[literary forgery|forgery]] were common, since there was no [[copyright law]].{{Sfnp|Marshall|1976|p=253}}
[[File:Table with was and stylus Roman times.jpg|thumb|left|Reconstruction of a [[Wax tablet|wax writing tablet]]]]
Collectors amassed personal libraries,{{Sfnp|Marshall|1976|pp=252–264}} and a fine library was part of the cultivated leisure (''[[otium]]'') associated with the villa lifestyle.{{Sfnp|Cavallo|Chartier|1999|pp=67–68}} Significant collections might attract "in-house" scholars,{{Sfnp|Marshall|1976|pp=257–260}} and an individual benefactor might endow a community with a library (as [[Pliny the Younger]] did in [[Comum]]).<ref>{{Cite book |last=[[Pliny the Elder]] |title=Epistulae |page=1.8.2}}; ''[[Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum|CIL]]'' 5.5262 (= ''[[Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae|ILS]]'' 2927); {{Harvp|Marshall|1976|p=265}}</ref> Imperial libraries were open to users on a limited basis, and represented a [[literary canon]].<ref>{{Harvp|Marshall|1976|pp=261–262}}; {{Harvp|Cavallo|Chartier|1999|p=70}}</ref> Books considered subversive might be publicly burned,<ref>Tacitus, ''Agricola'' 2.1 and ''Annales'' 4.35 and 14.50; [[Pliny the Younger]], ''Epistulae'' 7.19.6; Suetonius, ''Augustus'' 31, ''Tiberius'' 61.3, and ''Caligula'' 16</ref> and [[Domitian]] crucified copyists for reproducing works deemed treasonous.<ref>{{Cite book |last=[[Suetonius]] |title=Domitian |page=10}}; {{Cite book |author=[[Quintilian]] |title=Institutio Oratoria |page=9.2.65}}; {{Harvp|Marshall|1976|p=263}}</ref>

Literary texts were often shared aloud at meals or with reading groups.<ref>{{Harvp|Johnson|Parker|2009|pp=114ff, 186ff}}; {{Harvp|Potter|2009|p=372}}</ref> Public readings (''[[recitationes]]'') expanded from the 1st through the 3rd century, giving rise to "consumer literature" for entertainment.{{Sfnp|Cavallo|Chartier|1999|pp=68–69, 78–79}} Illustrated books, including erotica, were popular, but are poorly represented by extant fragments.{{Sfnp|Cavallo|Chartier|1999|pp=81–82}}

Literacy began to decline during the [[Crisis of the Third Century]].{{Sfnp|Harris|1989|p=3}} The emperor Julian banned Christians from teaching the classical curriculum,{{Sfnp|Gagarin|2010|p=19}} but the [[Church Fathers]] and other Christians adopted Latin and Greek literature, philosophy and science in biblical interpretation.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Numbers |first=Ronald |url=http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=978-0-674-05741-8 |title=Galileo Goes to Jail and Other Myths about Science and Religion |date=2009 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-03327-6 |page=18 |access-date=30 August 2022 |archive-date=30 August 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220830113508/https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=978-0-674-05741-8 |url-status=live }}</ref> As the Western Roman Empire declined, reading became rarer even for those within the Church hierarchy,{{Sfnp|Cavallo|Chartier|1999|p=86}} although it continued in the [[Byzantine Empire]].{{Sfnp|Cavallo|Chartier|1999|pp=15–16}}

===Education===
{{Main|Education in ancient Rome}}
[[File:Roman school.jpg|thumb|upright=1.5|A teacher with two students, as a third arrives with his ''loculus'', a writing case{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|p=95}}]]
Traditional Roman education was moral and practical. Stories were meant to instil Roman values (''[[mos maiorum|mores maiorum]]''). Parents were expected to act as role models, and working parents passed their skills to their children, who might also enter apprenticeships.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|pp=84–85}} Young children were attended by a [[Paedagogus (occupation)|pedagogue]], usually a Greek slave or former slave,{{Sfnp|Laes|2011|pp=113–116}} who kept the child safe, taught self-discipline and public behaviour, attended class and helped with tutoring.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|pp=90, 92}}

Formal education was available only to families who could pay for it; lack of state support contributed to low literacy.<ref>{{Harvp|Laes|2011|p=108}}; {{Harvp|Peachin|2011|p=89}}</ref> Primary education in reading, writing, and arithmetic might take place at home if parents hired or bought a teacher.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|pp=87–89}} Other children attended "public" schools organized by a schoolmaster (''[[ludi magister|ludimagister]]'') paid by parents.{{Sfnp|Laes|2011|p=122}} ''Vernae'' (homeborn slave children) might share in-home or public schooling.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|p=90}} Boys and girls received primary education generally from ages 7 to 12, but classes were not segregated by grade or age.{{Sfnp|Laes|2011|pp=107–108, 132}} Most schools employed [[corporal punishment]].{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|pp=93–94}} For the socially ambitious, education in Greek as well as Latin was necessary.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|p=89}} Schools became more numerous during the Empire, increasing educational opportunities.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|p=89}}

[[File:MANNapoli 124545 plato's academy mosaic (cropped).jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|Mosaic from Pompeii depicting the [[Academy of Plato]]]]
At the age of 14, upperclass males made their [[Sexuality in ancient Rome#Rites of passage|rite of passage]] into adulthood, and began to learn leadership roles through mentoring from a senior family member or family friend.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|pp=88, 106}} Higher education was provided by ''[[Grammarian (Greco-Roman)|grammatici]]'' or ''[[rhetor]]es''.{{Sfnp|Laes|2011|p=109}} The ''grammaticus'' or "grammarian" taught mainly Greek and Latin literature, with history, geography, philosophy or mathematics treated as explications of the text.{{Sfnp|Laes|2011|p=132}} With the rise of Augustus, contemporary Latin authors such as Virgil and Livy also became part of the curriculum.{{Sfnp|Potter|2009|pp=439, 442}} The ''rhetor'' was a teacher of oratory or public speaking. The art of speaking (''ars dicendi'') was highly prized, and ''eloquentia'' ("speaking ability, eloquence") was considered the "glue" of civilized society.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|pp=102–103, 105}} Rhetoric was not so much a body of knowledge (though it required a command of the [[literary canon]]{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|pp=104–105}}) as it was a mode of expression that distinguished those who held social power.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|pp=103, 106}} The ancient model of rhetorical training—"restraint, coolness under pressure, modesty, and good humour"{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|p=110}}—endured into the 18th century as a Western educational ideal.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|p=107}}

In Latin, ''illiteratus'' could mean both "unable to read and write" and "lacking in cultural awareness or sophistication".{{Sfnp|Harris|1989|p=5}} Higher education promoted career advancement.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Saller |first=R. P. |date=2012 |title=Promotion and Patronage in Equestrian Careers |journal=Journal of Roman Studies |volume=70 |doi=10.2307/299555 |pages=44–63 |jstor=299555 |s2cid=163530509}}</ref> Urban elites throughout the Empire shared a literary culture imbued with Greek educational ideals (''[[paideia]]'').{{Sfnp|Potter|2009|p=598}} Hellenistic cities sponsored schools of higher learning to express cultural achievement.{{Sfnp|Laes|2011|pp=109–110}} Young Roman men often went abroad to study rhetoric and philosophy, mostly to Athens. The curriculum in the East was more likely to include music and physical training.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|p=88}} On the Hellenistic model, Vespasian [[endowed chair]]s of grammar, Latin and Greek rhetoric, and philosophy at Rome, and gave secondary teachers special exemptions from taxes and legal penalties.<ref>{{Harvp|Laes|2011|p=110}}; {{Harvp|Gagarin|2010|p=19}}</ref> In the Eastern Empire, [[Berytus]] (present-day [[Beirut]]) was unusual in offering a Latin education, and became famous for its [[Law School of Beirut|school of Roman law]].{{Sfnp|Gagarin|2010|p=18}} The cultural movement known as the [[Second Sophistic]] (1st–3rd century AD) promoted the assimilation of Greek and Roman social, educational, and esthetic values.<ref>The wide-ranging 21st-century scholarship on the Second Sophistic includes {{Cite book |last=Goldhill |first=Simon |title=Being Greek under Rome: Cultural Identity, the Second Sophistic and the Development of Empire |date=2001 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |editor-link=Simon Goldhill}}; {{Cite book |title=Paideia: The World of the Second Sophistic |editor-first=Barbara E. |editor-last=Borg |publisher=De Gruyter |date=2004}}; {{Cite book |first=Tim |last=Whitmarsh |title=The Second Sophistic |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=2005}}</ref>

Literate women ranged from cultured aristocrats to girls trained to be [[calligrapher]]s and [[scribe]]s.<ref name="h122">{{Cite book |last=Habinek |first=Thomas N. |title=The Politics of Latin Literature: Writing, Identity, and Empire in Ancient Rome |date=1998 |publisher=Princeton University Press |pages=122–123 |author-link=Thomas Habinek}}</ref>{{Sfnp|Rawson|2003|p=80}} The ideal woman in Augustan love poetry was educated and well-versed in the arts.<ref>{{Cite book |last=James |first=Sharon L. |title=Learned Girls and Male Persuasion: Gender and Reading in Roman Love Elegy |date=2003 |publisher=University of California Press |pages=21–25}}; {{Cite book |last=Johnson |first=W.R. |chapter=Propertius |date=2012 |title=A Companion to Roman Love Elegy |publisher=Blackwell |pages=42–43}}; {{Cite book |first=Sharon L. |last=James |chapter=Elegy and New Comedy |page=262 |title=A Companion to Roman Love Elegy |publisher=Blackwell |date=2012}}</ref> Education seems to have been standard for daughters of the senatorial and equestrian orders.{{Sfnp|Peachin|2011|p=90}} An educated wife was an asset for the socially ambitious household.<ref name=h122/>

=== Literature ===
{{Main|Latin literature}}
{{See also|Latin poetry}}
[[File:Ovidiu03.jpg|thumb|upright|Statue in [[Constanța]], Romania (the ancient colony Tomis), commemorating [[Exile of Ovid|Ovid's exile]]]]
[[Augustan literature (ancient Rome)|Literature under Augustus]], along with that of the Republic, has been viewed as the "Golden Age" of Latin literature, embodying [[classicism|classical ideals]].{{Sfnp|Roberts|1989|p=3}} The three most influential Classical Latin poets—[[Virgil]], [[Horace]], and [[Ovid]]—belong to this period. Virgil's ''[[Aeneid]]'' was a national epic in the manner of the [[Homeric epics]] of Greece. Horace perfected the use of [[Greek lyric]] [[Metre (poetry)|metres]] in Latin verse. Ovid's erotic poetry was enormously popular, but ran afoul of Augustan morality, contributing to his exile. Ovid's ''[[Metamorphoses]]'' wove together [[Greco-Roman mythology]]; his versions of [[Greek mythology|Greek myths]] became a primary source of later [[classical mythology]], and his work was hugely influential on [[medieval literature]].<ref>''Aetas Ovidiana''; {{cite book|first=Charles |last=McNelis|chapter=Ovidian Strategies in Early Imperial Literature|title=A Companion to Ovid|publisher=Blackwell|year= 2007|page= 397}}</ref> Latin writers were immersed in [[ancient Greek literature|Greek literary traditions]], and adapted its forms and content, but Romans regarded [[satire]] as a genre in which they surpassed the Greeks. The early [[Principate]] produced the satirists [[Persius]] and [[Juvenal]].{{Citation needed|date=February 2024}}

The mid-1st through mid-2nd century has conventionally been called the "[[Classical Latin#Authors of the Silver Age|Silver Age]]" of Latin literature. The three leading writers—[[Seneca the Younger|Seneca]], [[Lucan]], and [[Petronius]]—committed suicide after incurring [[Nero]]'s displeasure. [[Epigram]]matist and social observer [[Martial]] and the epic poet [[Statius]], whose poetry collection ''[[Silvae]]'' influenced [[Renaissance literature]],<ref>{{Cite book |last=van Dam |first=Harm-Jan |chapter=Wandering Woods Again: From Poliziano to Grotius |date=2008 |title=The Poetry of Statius |publisher=Brill |pages=45ff}}</ref> wrote during the reign of [[Domitian]]. Other authors of the Silver Age included [[Pliny the Elder]], author of the encyclopedic ''[[Natural History (Pliny)|Natural History]]''; his nephew, [[Pliny the Younger]]; and the historian [[Tacitus]].

The principal Latin prose author of the [[Augustan literature (ancient Rome)|Augustan age]] is the [[Roman historiography|historian]] [[Livy]], whose account of [[founding of Rome|Rome's founding]] became the most familiar version in modern-era literature. ''[[The Twelve Caesars]]'' by [[Suetonius]] is a primary source for imperial biography. Among Imperial historians who wrote in Greek are [[Dionysius of Halicarnassus]], [[Josephus]], and [[Cassius Dio]]. Other major Greek authors of the Empire include the biographer [[Plutarch]], the geographer [[Strabo]], and the rhetorician and satirist [[Lucian]].{{Citation needed|date=February 2024}}

From the 2nd to the 4th centuries, Christian authors were in active dialogue with the [[classical tradition]]. [[Tertullian]] was one of the earliest prose authors with a distinctly Christian voice. After the [[conversion of Constantine]], Latin literature is dominated by the Christian perspective.{{Sfnp|Albrecht|1997|p=1294}} In the late 4th century, [[Jerome]] produced the Latin translation of the Bible that became authoritative as the [[Vulgate]]. [[Augustine]] in ''[[The City of God against the Pagans]]'' builds a vision of an eternal, spiritual Rome, a new ''[[#Geography and demography|imperium sine fine]]'' that will outlast the collapsing Empire.{{Citation needed|date=February 2024}}

In contrast to the unity of Classical Latin, the literary esthetic of late antiquity has a [[Tessellation|tessellated]] quality.{{Sfnp|Roberts|1989|p=70}} A continuing interest in the religious traditions of Rome prior to Christian dominion is found into the 5th century, with the ''Saturnalia'' of [[Macrobius]] and ''The Marriage of Philology and Mercury'' of [[Martianus Capella]]. Prominent Latin poets of late antiquity include [[Ausonius]], [[Prudentius]], [[Claudian]], and [[Sidonius Apollinaris]].{{Citation needed|date=February 2024}}