At Leicester I have had two brilliant supervisors, Lin Foxhall and Graham Shipley, both of whom have retained their faith in me, despite my seeming inability to finish. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Mlģ Acknowledgements I have to thank the British Academy for granting me a studentship which, with hindsight, made the first three years of research, relatively stress free. ProQuest LLC 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. This work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. Dissertation Publishing UMI U Published by ProQuest LLC Copyright in the Dissertation held by the Author. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted.
These diverse sources produce a set of images that reflect the various thinking of the late antique world on one of the most fundamental of institutions.Ģ UMI Number: U All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. So, while the patristic discourse may undermine the status of a mother, the law makers are according her more privileges than ever before. The growing acknowledgement of the mother-child bond is recognised and mothers acquire certain legal rights they had not previously held, particularly with regard to the disposition of their own property and in the guardianship of their children. Finally, to balance the patristic and medical writings, the law codes of the period are examined for their effect on mothers both in terms of status and inheritance. The relationship between discourse and reality is a central underlying theme of this thesis and is discussed in close detail in a chapter that examines the effect of this ascetic discourse on mothers using well known case studies. The patristic writers developed a discourse that denigrated maternity in favour of virginity and thus displaced mothers from their traditional place of high status in Roman society. The image of the Virgin Mary and the development of interest in her as Virgin Mother is considered within the parameters of the ascetic debate. Using 'medical' writings to examine the origin of assumptions about the female body, it then considers how this information was reinterpreted by patristic writers to suit their new image of the ideal body, and particularly to explain the Virgin Birth.
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Using a series of interlinked discourses it builds a composite image of the social ideals and expectations of mothers during a time when Christians were re-examining the cultural assumptions that underpinned family and gender relationships. 1 ABSTRACT Images of Motherhood In Late Antiquity by Mary Harlow This thesis examines the nature and role of motherhood as an institution in the later Roman Empire in the west.
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