Women in Ancient Rome - Daily Life - Attire and Adornment - Body Image

Body Image

Based on Roman art and literature, small breasts and wide hips were the ideal body type for women considered alluring by Roman men. Roman art from the Augustan period shows idealized women as substantial and fleshy, with a full abdomen and breasts that are rounded, not pendulous. Prostitutes depicted in Roman erotic art have fleshy bodies and wide hips, and often have their breasts covered by a strophium (a sort of strapless bra) even when otherwise nude and performing sex acts. Large breasts were mocked as humorous or a sign of old age. Young girls wore a strophium secured tightly in the belief that it would inhibit the growth of breasts, and a regimen of massaging the breasts with hemlock, begun while a woman was still a virgin, was thought to prevent sagging. Breasts receive relatively minimal attention in erotic art and literature as a sexual focus; the breast was associated primarily with nursing infants and a woman's role as a mother. In times of extreme emotional duress, such as mourning or captivity in wartime, women might bare their breasts as an apotropaic gesture.