Pod Insights Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society Who Were The Vestal Virgins? About this episode What happened if a Vestal Virgin broke their pledge of virginity? How would a woman be chosen for the role? And were there any benefits to taking it?
Kate is finding out in this episode with Peta Greenfield, co-author of ‘Your Cheeky Guide to the Roman Empire’ and co-host of ‘The Partial Historians’, with her colleague Dr Fiona Radford.
This episode was edited by Tom Delargy and produced by Sophie Gee. The senior producer was Charlotte Long.
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0:00 Kate Lister? Do you want even more shocking and scandalous history? Like why the ancient Greek statues had such small manhoods? Or what went on behind closed doors in the Georgian era? Well, sign up to History Hit, where you can see me discover the scandalous side of history, as well as hundreds of hours of original documentaries, plus new releases every week, covering everything from prehistoric Scotland to the Treaty of Versailles. Sign up to join me in locations around the world and explore the past. Just visit historyhit.com/subscribe.
0:35 Kate Lister? Hello, my lovely betwixters. It's me, Kate Lister. You are listening to Betwixt the Sheets, and I'm so glad that you are. Welcome back, dear friends. But before we can go any further together, I have to tell you once again, as I will be telling you from now until the end of time, this is an adult podcast spoken by adults to other adults about adulty things in an adulty way, covering a range of adult subjects, and you should be an adult too. And we call that the fair do's warning, because if you listen to that, and then you keep listening, and you get upset, that one's on you, because fair do's, you were warned. Right on with the show.
1:09 Kate Lister? Amongst the spectacular architecture of the Roman Forum, a small circular building sticks out. Just 15 metres in diameter, the curved walls and the Corinthian columns encircle and enclose a sacred space. The inside of the temple remains out of sight to the hordes of Roman citizens and senators bustling through the streets under the hot Mediterranean sun. Smoke rises silently from a hole in the temple's roof, like steam from a kettle. This and the faint smell of wood smoke that grows stronger the closer you draw are the only signs of a fire within. Out of sight, robed priestesses are at work, devoted to their task of tending the eternal flame. These are some of the most powerful women in the Roman world, because the story goes
1:54 Kate Lister? that if that flame goes out, Rome will fall. There's only one catch.
2:05 Speaker 01 What do you look for in a man?
2:06 Speaker 02 Oh, money, of course.
2:08 Speaker 01 You're supposed to rise when an adult speaks to you.
2:10 Speaker 02 I make perfect copies of whatever my boss needs by just turning a knob and pushing the button.
2:22 Speaker 03 Yes, social courtesy does make a difference.
2:25 Speaker 04 Goodness, what beautiful time. Goodness has nothing to do with it, d'ry.
2:33 Kate Lister? Hello and welcome back to Betwixt the Sheets, the history of sex scandal in society with me, Kate Lister. It goes without saying that for an awful lot of history, being a woman was crap. I can't sugarcoat that for you. And ancient Rome was no different. In fact, they seemed to excel at it. If you were a woman then, it meant that you were under the legal control of a male family member, you couldn't own your own property, and you were unable to attend political assemblies. But what if I told you there was a way that you could own your own property? You could have your very own security garden, you could vote, and, Betwixters, you could get premier seats at the Colosseum. What would you say then? Would you say, yes, Kate, that sounds good, sign me up? Well, be very careful, because there's a catch. There's always a catch. You have to remain a virgin.
3:18 Kate Lister? This is the job of the vestal virgin. And if at any point that virginity was compromised, or if the flame goes out, there's only one person that they're blaming. Would you do it? Well, today I'm joined by Peter Greenfield to enter the world of the vestal virgin. What was their day-to-day role and what happened to them if they broke their pledge of virginity? Or if the Romans just thought that they had, quite frankly? I'm not sure it's quite the role for me, but let's go and find out more.
3:52 Kate Lister? Hello and welcome to Betwixt the Sheets. It's only Peter Greenfield. How are you doing?
3:59 Speaker 05 I am excellent. Thank you so much for having me.
4:02 Kate Lister? I'm thrilled to have you here. For anybody who doesn't know you, and they should, you are the co-host of the podcast, The Partial Historians, where you look at ancient Rome a lot. So I suppose my first question has got to be a bit about your origin story. Why ancient Rome? Why? Where did the love of it come from? And then I'm going to steer you gently into, why do men think about Rome once every day? Do you think about Rome once every day as well? And that whole conversation.
4:31 Speaker 05 Of course, of course. So I didn't end up in Rome because I chose it, I don't think, at least not initially. I was pretty sure I loved ancient Egypt. And then I was pretty sure I loved ancient Greece.
4:44 Kate Lister? Yeah.
4:44 Speaker 05 Yeah, the gateways. And then I was pretty sure I was going to study the Incas. And then I turned up to a history lecture with Professor Tom Hillard at Macquarie University. And he started the lecture by coming in with a statue head in a wheelbarrow. And that was the moment I was like, I think Roman history might be the place for me.
5:08 Kate Lister? Oh, I love that.
5:09 Speaker 05 Way more exciting than anywhere else I've been.
5:12 Kate Lister? I love that. So do you actually think about ancient Rome at least once every day?
5:18 Speaker 05 At least, if not more. Today, for instance, I've thought about it a lot, knowing that we were going to be having a chat. But yeah, I can't help it. I do love history and eventually you specialise in something. So ancient Rome is what I've ended up specialising in, but I would say that on any given day, I would think about the Romans quite frequently, but also lots of historical figures and lots of periods of history. I'm kind of interested in all of it. So here I am.
5:48 Kate Lister? And thank God you are here. So we talk about the Vestal Virgins. That's who we're here to talk about primarily today. They are a sort of a group of virgins that sort of entered the public consciousness. And you might hear people referring to them sort of casually, oh, not a Vestal Virgin. But I'm not sure many people actually know what the hell they are. So shall we start with a real basic page one question? What is a Vestal Virgin, Peter?
6:18 Speaker 05 All right. So to understand a Vestal Virgin, we first need to understand the goddess Vestal. Vestal is one of the most ancient goddesses associated with Rome. And she's primarily concerned with the element of fire. So we think that the origin of Vestal comes from the hearth fire that would be in every household. And that this blooms into a public cult where they have a very particular hearth associated with Vestal herself.
6:48 Speaker 05 And that gets located very close to the centre of Rome.
6:52 Kate Lister? Wow.
6:52 Speaker 05 And the Vestal Virgins are the women who tend to that public hearth fire to make sure that Vestal is looked after and by extension, all of Rome and all of the fires contained within it.
7:05 Kate Lister? Okay, so there was always a fire burning in Rome?
7:10 Speaker 05 Always. Sometimes out of control. That temple burnt down a number of times.
7:14 Kate Lister? Well, do we know where this was, where this temple was? Does it survive?
7:17 Speaker 05 We certainly do. So Rome is most famous for the Forum, that big central area that's a public gathering space. And there is a particular road that leads right into the Forum called the Via Sacra. And it is at the intersection of the entrance to the Forum and the end of the Via Sacra that we have the building that contains Vestal. It's called the Ades Vestal.
7:42 Kate Lister? Wow.
7:42 Speaker 05 It's not strictly a temple in the Roman way of thinking about it, but it is a very sacred spot. And it's a circular building, which is also highly unusual for Roman architecture.
7:52 Kate Lister? Wow. So Vestal is a goddess of the hearth. What's her story then? I mean, they've got so many gods and goddesses, but why did this one particularly take off? I mean, I can see fire is important, but like, why her? What was her story?
8:07 Speaker 05 Hmm. And this is where things get really interesting because we're not entirely sure. So some Roman scholars, you know, like in the ancient world posited that Vestal is a correlation with the Greek goddess Hestia, who also has an association with the hearth fire. And if you say Hestia really quickly and you say Vestal really quickly.
8:29 Kate Lister? Yes.
8:29 Speaker 05 You can see how they might, may have come from the same origin. Hestia, Vestal, Hestia, Vestal. But we're not really entirely sure. It could be the case that when we're talking about central Italy, that Vestal is not just particular to the Romans, but she is a goddess of all of the Latin people. Because we do have stories of Vestal being worshipped prior to the foundation of Rome itself.
8:54 Kate Lister? Wow.
8:55 Speaker 05 So there's these interesting connotations, but definitely the sacred nature of fire, the significance that fire has in the everyday lives of people. Obviously, this promotes Vestal as a really important and unique goddess. But we rarely see. Any statuary of her, which is very unusual. And she's considered one of the 12 major gods, but she's often left out of that list as well in place of others.
9:21 Kate Lister? Oh, she's a female.
9:23 Speaker 05 And that's partly to do with the fact that we don't have a lot of physical evidence for her. She's contained solely in the flames, so she's not meant to be represented in a statue or other iconography, which is really fascinating. So super central to Rome and its story, but also she's invisible in many ways when we think about physical evidence.
9:44 Kate Lister? Wow. Oh, she'd be livid about that, wouldn't she?
9:48 Speaker 05 Potentially, yes. She might start some fires of her own.
9:51 Kate Lister? She might do. So was she worshipped in other cities or is this very much a Roman thing? Were there other Vestal hearths to be tended to in other cities?
10:00 Speaker 05 We think there were, but we also don't have a lot of evidence to confirm that. So the big origin story for Vestal in terms of the Latin region is the story of a woman called Rea Silvia. And sometimes she's also known by another name, Ilya. And she is a virgin, the daughter of a king of a town that is nearby called Alba Longa, which is a precursor to Rome in many respects. And she is placed into the Vestal Virgin priesthood of Alba Longa by her uncle, forcibly placed there. She's then raped.
10:42 Kate Lister? Oh.
10:43 Speaker 05 By either Mars or her uncle. Yep, now I get into it. And she gives birth to Romulus and Remus, famously.
10:51 Kate Lister? I've heard of them.
10:52 Speaker 05 The fratricidal brothers that, yeah, they found, they found Rome. And so we have a story of the origin of Rome coming from the unusual birth of a Vestal Virgin.
11:03 Kate Lister? Wow, that's absolutely fascinating. So where does the virginity thing come from then? Is it from this virgin girl that was sort of forced into her service or are there different origins of this? I can understand fire, fire is very important, and then somebody's gone, and virgins.
11:21 Speaker 05 And virgins.
11:22 Kate Lister? What? It's like an odd job share.
11:24 Speaker 05 Together at last. You know, those two things are completely inseparable. So part of what we think might be going on, because the Romans weren't too sure about this either. So they had a few different stories for it. One was that Vestal herself was a virgin. So by virtue of being a virginal goddess, she required her priestesses to also match her in that facet of her being. The other potential is that the ritual duties of the Vestals never end. So they always have to be watching the fire. They can't let it go out because it is the embodiment of Vestal.
12:03 Speaker 05 And because as time goes on, the Romans imbue that fire with the health of their own city, the safety of themselves and the continuation of Rome. Anything that could compromise that fire is a problem. So the Vestals are on the job every day, all day, year after year. And this means that they can never be outside a situation of ritual purity. They must always be ready to serve the goddess. And for other priests, they go through processes of having to abstain because they're in the lead up to a special ritual occasion. But the Vestals are always in a ritual process.
12:42 Kate Lister? Right.
12:42 Speaker 05 So this might be part of it as well for them.
12:45 Kate Lister? So it's the idea that they've always got to be on the job. So obviously they can't be having any other distractions because men are just too tempting. Like they're, they're just like, how could it be possible? Oh, they're just too delicious and lovely. We can't help ourselves. So the only way they can deal with that is by saying you have to be a virgin all of the time.
13:05 Speaker 05 All of the time. Absolutely.
13:07 Kate Lister? What did they do? So they hung around the temple? Were they just being virgins in the temple? Like, what, did this finish every day? It's like, are you still a, I'm still a virgin. Excellent work, everybody. We will retire for the night.
13:20 Speaker 05 High fives. Nice job, everyone.
13:22 Kate Lister? High fives, everybody.
13:23 Speaker 05 I've tried to think about this because I'm like, what would the, like, the day to day life be? And I feel like there's got to be a schedule. You can't be the only one watching the fire for 24 hours a day. That would be exhausting. So it would make sense to have shifts. Somebody, one person at least, always has to be inside the temple, looking after the flame for sure, if not more. Otherwise, they'll be living next door in the house of the Vestals, the atrium. Not a circular building sadly, but right next door, very close. So there will be other things that they need to do as vessels. It's not just watching the flame. They've also got to cleanse the temple every day. So they've got to go out and fetch water.
14:08 Speaker 05 And then if there is a public ritual happening of any kind, they're likely to be present if not involved.
14:17 Kate Lister? Like royalty?
14:18 Speaker 05 Well, they're very special. One of the things that they do that affects just about every public ritual that takes place, whether they're directly involved or not, is that they are in charge of creating a purification kind of flower. Ultimately, it ends up being, it's called molus osa. And it's a combination of ground up spelt, which they've dried out near Vestal Flame, combined with some salt. And so they create this powder essentially that is for ritual purification, which gets tossed over all animal sacrifices before the moment that they're sacrificed. So even if the Vestals aren't present, they will have contributed to the ritual outcome
15:03 Speaker 05 of every public sacrifice that happens in the city. They're busy ladies.
15:07 Kate Lister? Busy, just girl bossing it. The more I learn about the Romans, the more I realise there's bad stuff going on. And even if you think it's a good situation, there's something nasty that is coming your way. This cannot have been a gig where you just hung around a temple with some light baking duties, some cleaning duties and some fire tending, and just make sure that you're still a virgin. I bet there's a downside to this.
15:31 Speaker 05 Uh, yeah, there's plenty of downsides to this. They do tend to tout the benefits of being a Vestal, but there are some problems. First of all, you get removed from your family at an extraordinarily young age. So to become a Vestal, you have to be chosen between the ages of six and 10. So this is to make sure that you definitely are a virgin. In the Roman way of thinking about things, which is unpleasant, you could be contracted to marry as a young woman as early as 12. So choosing young girls below that age is very important because you can hopefully, fingers crossed, be sure that they're a virgin.
16:14 Speaker 05 Over the age of six, usually in the ancient world, children are thought to have gotten through the worst of childhood. It's very risky between ages zero and five. So if they've lived to six, that's pretty good. But yes, as young as six, you could be taken from your family and placed in the cult. So that'd be a shock to the system, I dare say.
16:34 Kate Lister? God, that really would be, wouldn't it? So you're just a six-year-old kid. So I think of them as being like nuns in their, their nunnery kind of, and nobody really knows what's going on inside this place, but like the age of six.
16:48 Speaker 05 Yes.
16:49 Kate Lister? Wow.
16:49 Speaker 05 It's not like being a nun in the sense that it's not a calling or a vocation. This is not something that they've chosen. It's been chosen for them before they've gone through puberty, before they know what they might be interested in or anything like that. And the vow of chastity has to last a minimum of thirty years.
17:08 Kate Lister? Wow, all right. So, so what are the qualifications? Because no six-year-old is saying, I want to do this. Like, were they sold into it? Were they given to the temple? Was this considered an honour? Like, what is the criteria that you'd have to go through?
17:22 Speaker 05 It's very particular. It relates primarily initially to being from one of the elite families. So the Romans have a, a broad division between their people, between patricians and plebeians. How that works out in the wash really depends on what time period of Roman history you're in. But the most elite families tend to be the ones that will go into priesthood. That's part of the mechanism for controlling the state. At that point, it's very important for any vestal candidate that both their parents still be alive.
17:54 Kate Lister? Okay.
17:54 Speaker 05 We're not sure why that is necessarily, but maybe that's a demonstration of their fitness to live through the process.
18:00 Kate Lister? Yes.
18:01 Speaker 05 They also need to be inspected to make sure that there is no blemish to their body, that they do not have a speech impediment and no problems with their hearing.
18:11 Kate Lister? Right, okay.
18:12 Speaker 05 These things are really important, partly because rituals involve speaking. And if you can't speak well. Your words will not be transmitted to the gods appropriately and then the relationship will break down. That's a big problem. If you can't hear properly, likewise. But yes, the no blemish on the body is a pretty common requirement for most priesthoods in the sense that it's a determination of your ritual purity as well.
18:45 Kate Lister? I'll be back with Peter after this short break.
19:01 Speaker 06 Land a Viking longship on island shores, scramble over the dunes of ancient Egypt, and avoid the Poisoner's Cup in Renaissance Florence. Each week on Echoes of History, we uncover the epic stories that inspire Assassin's Creed. We're stepping into feudal Japan in our special series Chasing Shadows, where samurai warlords and shinobi spies teach us the tactics and skills needed not only to survive, but to conquer. Whether you're preparing for Assassin's Creed: Shadows or fascinated by history and great stories, listen to Echoes of History, a Ubisoft podcast brought to you by History Hits. There are new episodes every week.
19:56 Kate Lister? Was it considered like an honourable thing to do? I mean, I'm trying to, because if it was poor kids that were being offered up to this, you can kind of understand that there might be like very poor parents going, oh no, we definitely think she should be a vestal virgin. Off you go, off you go. You can look after her now. But like, which families offering up their kids for this? It's like, was it considered a good and honourable thing to be?
20:20 Speaker 05 Definitely. This doesn't mean it was necessarily popular, though.
20:24 Kate Lister? Yeah.
20:24 Speaker 05 So one of our sources talks about how ideally there'll be 20 candidates put forward from elite families in the case that a new vestal needs to be selected and that they would be chosen by lot. So all of those 20 names would go into a little pot and whoever got pulled out would be the next vestal.
20:42 Kate Lister? Wow.
20:43 Speaker 05 Usually it doesn't seem to have happened that way. And particularly as we get further into the historical record of the late Republic and the early principate under Augustus, we do have a wave of elite families not wanting to send their daughters. And Augustus getting a bit mad about that, being like, it's a very honourable thing. And if my daughter was eligible, I'd put her in. People are like, nah, it's not incentive enough, really. Our daughters are more valuable to us as marriage commodities than as priestesses being separated from their legal family. So that becomes an increasing issue. But there are certain advantages for the individual vestal.
21:26 Speaker 05 She's legally separated from her family, but that doesn't mean she's no longer connected with them. She also has the capacity to now own property on her own, which is not usually true for women. She's also allowed to conduct business without requiring a legal guardian to oversee the process. So she can become a bit of an independent operator.
21:49 Kate Lister? Okay.
21:49 Speaker 05 And she is allowed to make her own will, which is usually not true for women as well. So that's nice.
21:56 Kate Lister? Yes.
21:56 Speaker 05 And she is allowed to provide testimony in court. So she has the legal right to speak in court and that's usually not something granted to women either for a very long time. So there are certain advantages that come with being a vestal. One that is often talked about is the seats in the theatre where they get to sit much closer to the action in the gladiatorial combats and things like that than other ladies. Most ladies are stuck right up the back with a pretty poor view, but the vestals get to be down the front.
22:26 Kate Lister? That's such a shit trade off. Do you want to go and live in this house?
22:32 Speaker 05 No sex for 30 years.
22:34 Kate Lister? Awesome theatre seats.
22:35 Speaker 05 But you can watch the gladiators up close.
22:39 Kate Lister? Such a crap trade off. But it must have been important for them, if they're mentioning this, that this was a good incentive for them.
22:46 Speaker 05 Well, whether it is an incentive or not, I'm not sure that, like, obviously they're chosen so young, I'm not sure that they're aware of what advantages they might be gaining. But definitely they're singled out in the public space in particular ways. So it's really obvious when a vestal is around, they're dressed differently from every other woman. They're really clearly visually delineated by their hairstyle, the clothes that they wear. And they also ultimately get offered one of the bodyguards, these people called lictors, that go around with clubs and beat people up and move them out of the way to look after them in the public space as well.
23:27 Kate Lister? It's starting to sound not too bad.
23:30 Speaker 05 Have your own personal bodyguard.
23:32 Kate Lister? Yeah, like, these are big things for the Romans to be doing because, again, because the more I learn about them, the more I realise it was not a great time to be a woman, but they allow them to have a voice in the senate, they could own their own property, I suppose they had a kind of income, they could speak up in legal cases, and they have excellent seats at the gladiators. These are quite big deals for the Romans.
23:54 Speaker 05 It's huge. And particularly also the idea of having a bodyguard. This was something that seems to be a late innovation for the Vestals. One night, a Vestal was coming home from a dinner party and she was insulted on her way home. And this caused an outrage and was apparently the thing that led to them being assigned their own lictor each, just in case.
24:19 Kate Lister? Wow. I'm seeing an issue potentially here. They're supposed to be Vestal virgins, like, they're not having sex at all, and they have a hunky bodyguard with them at all times called a lictus. Is that right?
24:33 Speaker 05 Well, yeah.
24:34 Kate Lister? Did this cause any problems?
24:36 Speaker 05 That old chestnut. Look, we don't have any, any records of Vestals losing their virginity to their bodyguards, but certainly most of the evidence that we have for Vestals relates to things having gone wrong in the virginity department, for sure.
24:55 Kate Lister? You had one job, ladies, one job. I suppose an important question to ask here is, what would be their definition of losing virginity? Because even today, there's a lot of small print. Fingering doesn't count, or giving head doesn't count. It's actually, you have to put a penis in a vagina. Like, what was their definition of losing your virginity?
25:17 Speaker 05 Like most things with the Romans, it was weird. They made a determination via visual inspection. Uh, I would say that that's probably not a good basis for making a decision about something like that.
25:30 Kate Lister? No.
25:31 Speaker 05 And we know that virginity is a social construct. It's not a biological reality anyway. So problematic on all levels. But usually a determination would be made either through a process of trial where arguments would be put forward about, yes, she did lose her virginity, or no, she didn't lose her virginity. And if required, a visual inspection would be made.
25:56 Kate Lister? Okay, so it's penetration. That's what they're looking for then.
25:59 Speaker 05 Yeah.
25:59 Kate Lister? Right, okay. So who got caught out there? My actually, you just raised a really interesting point because you can't tell if someone's a virgin just by looking at their genitals. It's, it's an absolute nonsense. So that is a very faulty test. So if someone said a vestal virgin has lost their virginity, and the test is just someone looking between their legs and going, yep, nope. But the error margin is quite substantial for that.
26:23 Speaker 05 It is. I would say that's pretty unreliable. The other way that the Romans went about this was that what we see in the stories, early on in particular, and less so as we get into the imperial period, is that stories about vestals losing their virginity are accompanied by stories of prodigies from the gods. So signs being offered to suggest that the Romans' relationship with the gods was out of sync in some way, and that some sort of investigation needed to be made in order to determine the cause. And sometimes that cause was thought to be a vestal having lost her virginity.
27:05 Speaker 05 So that opens up the door for then the trial and all of the things that could follow from that.
27:11 Kate Lister? So if something goes wrong in ancient Rome, just something, their solution is one of the vestal. Oh, no. Oh, this isn't good.
27:22 Speaker 05 This is bad times. Bad times to be a vestal virgin.
27:25 Kate Lister? So they, and like, we're talking like, so like, natural floods, fires, like, anything that bad crop, like, and then the citizens would go, the vestal must have been getting some.
27:35 Speaker 05 Yes. So Rome has various layers for dealing with this. And there'll be augers, the people who look at the signs of the birds. There'll be soothsayers who like to open up small animals and look at their entrails. And those are the kind of people who tend to make the determination that it's probably related to the Vestals. Brilliant. So for instance, we have a terrible case, a case in point. Let me give you an example. In one hundred and fourteen and one hundred and thirteen B C, we have a situation where three Vestals end up on trial for the crime of incastum.
28:17 Speaker 05 The crime of incastum relates to anything from, oops, I did something a little bit naughty, all the way up to I've lost my virginity. It's a real problem. And the reason why they come up for this trial in the first place is because of a prodigy that is so severe that the soothsayers are convinced that the Vestals have to be involved somehow. And what has happened is that there's been a thunderstorm. A young woman is riding her horse across a field in a thunderstorm and she's struck by lightning. Terrible. And she dies. The force of the lightning strike is such that her shoes, her headdress, her jewellery are all scattered through the field.
29:01 Speaker 05 She has ended up in a situation where she's been killed and the manner in which her body is found, her tongue is protruding from her mouth and her tunic has been drawn up, revealing her genitalia. And this appearance of the dead body is so shocking. And particularly the genitalia being revealed is so problematic for the Romans. They can't handle this at all. They have an aversion to the female genitalia most of the time. So to see it in this situation is particularly egregious for them. And they're immediately like, we have to look at what is happening with the Vestal virgin cult. God.
29:44 Speaker 05 So they ask the Roman people, do you have any information? Does anybody want to come forward and tell us anything? A slave comes forward and says, yes, pretty sure that at least three of them are involved. They've all been compromised for a while. And the reason why I know is that they've been having sex with my master. Snitch. And that just opens the floodgates.
30:08 Kate Lister? That is a mad, so some poor lass gets fried in a field, terrible. The Romans can't cope with the fact, not so much that she's dead, but that her genitals are on show. And now some slaves come forward. This is just, wow. Okay, please continue the story, please. I'm just trying to get my head around it. It's so mad.
30:32 Speaker 05 It's a challenging time. Being a vestal means that you have to be ready for these sorts of unusual scenarios. And then what do you do? Then you have to defend yourself. And initially, the trial takes place with the Pontifex Maximus, the chief priest of Rome. He's normally the guy that's in charge and oversees the vestal order. So it makes sense that if something goes on, they have to appear before him. So they appear before him and he puts together the trial with the other lesser pontifices. So that whole group of priests is there and they go through the process. The vestals get up and say their piece and he decides that one of them, Amelia, is guilty of encastum.
31:14 Speaker 05 But the other two, Licinia and Marcia, they're acquitted. They've been accused, but he doesn't find them guilty of encastum. This would be fine. This would probably be the end of it usually. But the Roman public gets really worked up about that whole prodigy. And it seems like there might be some other political things going on in the background. Because one of the Tribune of the Plebs comes forward and starts to rile up the people and says, this is not good enough. This has been a miscarriage of justice. The other two are guilty and the Pontifex Maximus is letting them off. And it's going to be a problem. And so the idea of the peace of the gods is hanging in the balance.
31:55 Speaker 05 People are getting worked up and they decide that they need to have a second trial. Not led by the Pontifex Maximus this time, but led by another senior senator outside of that structure. So it's a highly unusual affair to have a second trial. It also not to be contained within the priesthood. And the second trial obviously finds the other two guilty as well. So then all three of them are found guilty of encastum. Which means that the next step is the inevitable live burial.
32:27 Kate Lister? The inevitable what? Sorry?
32:29 Speaker 05 The inevitable live burial.
32:33 Kate Lister? This just keeps getting madder. Why are they being buried alive?
32:37 Speaker 05 Well, the Romans don't want to have the blood of a vestal virgin on their hands. They also want to trust that the gods are going to make the best decision. So on the off chance that the Romans have been incorrect in the outcome of the trial, if they bury the vestals alive, that means the gods get to decide whether the vestals live or die.
33:01 Kate Lister? That is some mental gymnastics.
33:03 Speaker 05 It becomes an issue for the gods.
33:04 Kate Lister? Right. Okay.
33:06 Speaker 05 It's pretty horrifying.
33:07 Kate Lister? When you say buried alive, what do you mean? Do you mean like a hole is dug in the ground and then they're chucked in it and soil's thrown back on top of them? Like, what are we talking about here?
33:17 Speaker 05 It's a bit more sophisticated than that, actually. So what we have is a sequence of events that are followed pretty precisely, but are also horrifying as we go along.
33:29 Kate Lister? Okay.
33:29 Speaker 05 So if a vestal is found guilty of encastum, they are immediately stripped of the visual insignia of their position. So this means that their headdress is removed. Normally, they're no longer a vestal. They're then packed into a cart and they're taken through the city as if it is a funeral procession. People start to line the streets to watch. That's the kind of thing that happens. They always get taken to the same spot. So there is a place called the Colonnade Gate, which if you went to Rome today, it's near Termini Station. They get taken to this area and there is an underground chamber that they use for this process.
34:14 Speaker 05 So it's basically an underground room where the vestal is either lowered down on a wooden or rope ladder. And once she's down there, they lift that out. They close the door and then they cover it up with dirt. In that chamber, there are a few things. There's a bed, there's some water, there's some milk, there's some bread, there's a lamp, there's a little bit of oil. So they're given all of the things that would allow them to survive, the things that are considered the necessities of life. And then they leave it up to the gods. Now, my suspicion is, and I can't confirm this because we haven't been able to do the archaeology under the ground, but I suspect there might have only been one chamber. So that over time, not only are you being buried alive in a chamber where you're being
34:59 Speaker 05 left for dead, but ultimately there'd be other vestal skeletons down there as well, I suspect.
35:05 Kate Lister? Oh my god.
35:06 Speaker 05 That's just my speculation. We don't know for sure. That would be pretty gross, though. I wouldn't put it past the Romans.
35:12 Kate Lister? No, no, neither would I. Like, how often did this happen then, that a vestal was, was put to death?
35:19 Speaker 05 Every sort of few generations.
35:22 Kate Lister? All right, okay. So it's not like a weekly thing?
35:24 Speaker 05 No, no, thank goodness. And the example that I just described with this triple case of in Kestum, it's pretty unusual for three to be buried alive at the same time. That's half the vestal order gone, just like that. So then they're going to need three replacements. So that's pretty devastating. But we do get one, like, sort of every 100 to 200 years.
35:50 Kate Lister? Wow. And was it just sex that they could be tried for? Could they, were there other behaviours that they could be put on trial for?
35:58 Speaker 05 They definitely could be put on trial for lesser crimes that also relate to being unchaste in the Roman view, because this covered everything from losing your virginity to having a good sense of humour.
36:12 Kate Lister? Oh, no, right.
36:13 Speaker 05 Don't be funny. Nobody's asking you to be funny. So definitely one vestal was hauled onto trial for having too good a sense of humour, and she was told to behave with more sanctity. A couple of them get charged within Kestum, but then are later acquitted because they dress fashionably. Even within the confines of what a vestal can wear, they're sort of doing something that's a little bit hip and groovy. And people aren't into that.
36:44 Kate Lister? No, that's not what we want from our Vestals.
36:46 Speaker 05 Exactly. Anything that could be construed as slightly immodest behaviour is the sort of thing that could get a Vestal into trouble. And if she wasn't found guilty of incastum, she still could be punished. And usually what this would involve is that the Pontifex Maximus would stand on one side of a sheet, the Vestal Virgin would stand on the other side of a sheet, and then he'd whip her with the sheet interposed between the two of them.
37:22 Speaker 05 I'll be back with Peter after this short break.
37:38 Speaker 06 Land a Viking longship on island shores, scramble over the dunes of ancient Egypt, and avoid the Poisoner's Cup in Renaissance Florence. Each week on Echoes of History, we uncover the epic stories that inspire Assassin's Creed. We're stepping into feudal Japan in our special series Chasing Shadows, where samurai warlords and shinobi spies teach us the tactics and skills needed not only to survive, but to conquer. Whether you're preparing for Assassin's Creed Shadows or fascinated by history and great stories, listen to Echoes of History, a Ubisoft podcast brought to you by History Hit. There are new episodes every week.
38:33 Speaker 05 If you managed to make your way through this, that you were recruited at the age of six, you have spent 30 years making flour and looking after a flame and not being funny or dressing too fashionably, and you've managed to survive the whole thing. Was there a cut-off date where they were like, well, you're done now. Off you go. We no longer need you to be... Like, how did you retire from this? And what was your life post-Vestaling?
39:02 Speaker 05 These are the things that we kind of wish we knew. So the evidence suggests that the thirty years is the thirty years. So as long as you have done that, you're allowed to leave. What we don't have is any good evidence to suggest that any vestal did leave after the thirty years. And if they did what they did with their life after that. So we can speculate a little bit. So your minimum age for leaving would be thirty six. Let's say you got picked up as a six year old, became a vestal, did your thirty years. You're out before you're forty. Great news. You could still get married if you wanted to.
39:41 Kate Lister? Yeah.
39:42 Speaker 05 You could still maybe return to your birth family if you wanted to. But we don't have any evidence to suggest that those things happened. You did have an independent property portfolio, so maybe you would be a catch for some elite man who's a little bit down on his luck.
39:59 Kate Lister? Why would you want to though? As if you see this happening quite a lot throughout history is that when women are in a position, when they've got property and money and they can look after themselves. They seem to quite a lot go, nah, you're all right. Actually, lads, no, I'm I'm not really interested in getting married. Maybe that's what they did.
40:18 Speaker 05 I I think you might be on the money there because all the evidence that we have suggests that once women got through that whole process, they stayed. And they lived out the rest of their life as a vestal. They don't retire. They just stay in the order. We've got an example of a lady who is serving in the late republic. So she. She's at least a vestal virgin by thirty eight BCE. So at that point, Mark Antony and Octavian are still mad at each other and they're both still running around trying to have fights. And she lives all the way into the rule of Tiberius.
40:54 Kate Lister? Wow.
40:55 Speaker 05 And she had served for at least fifty seven years, if not longer.
41:00 Kate Lister? Wow.
41:01 Speaker 05 So we have these sort of incredible stories of longevity as well of vessels who just keep going.
41:07 Kate Lister? As a final question to this then, why was it punished so harshly if the virgins lost their virginity or if the flame went out? Or like, what was it believed that would be the impact on Rome if they didn't keep to their sacred duties?
41:24 Speaker 05 The problem for the Romans and ultimately for the Vestals within this is that the flame was seen as a crucial symbol of the continuity of Rome.
41:34 Kate Lister? Right.
41:34 Speaker 05 So without that flame, Rome itself was at risk. And that was a risk not just on a physical level, but in that spiritual sense that is the state capable of still having the support of the gods? And if it's not capable of having that divine support, is it even possible for the state to continue? And I think a lot of people tend to think that the Romans are mostly this military outfit of gung ho masculinity. But at their core, they're incredibly religious people. And everything is determined by the way that they see their relationship with the gods functioning or not functioning. And the
42:18 Speaker 05 Vestal Virgins become a real window into how that operates at a really fine granular level, because day to day, they have to be looking after that flame. If that flame accidentally goes out on somebody's watch, that's a cause for suspicion. If something happens outside of the city that appears to involve female genitalia, immediately the Vestals are suspected. There are also other objects that are held inside the temple that are considered to be sacred to the safety of the city as well. So it's not just about the flame. There is also an object called the Palladium.
42:58 Speaker 05 Which is a small statue of Pallas Athena, which was thought to have been brought to Rome by Aeneas after the Battle of Troy.
43:07 Kate Lister? Oh, wow. Okay.
43:08 Speaker 05 Going back a long way. The Romans do like to believe that they are the inheritors of that Greek world. And Aeneas's bringing of the Palladium all the way from Troy to Rome is seen as a signifier of Rome carrying that torch and having the right to rule in Italy, if not elsewhere. So that's in there. There is also a group of objects that we're not really sure what they are, but they're referred to as the symbols of Imperium, the symbols of power. And they're also held in this temple. So whenever somebody is watching the flame, those objects are also being guarded. And whenever the flame goes out,
43:53 Speaker 05 the veracity of what those objects are capable of is also called into question. And this idea of the safety of the state being bound up in the Vestals bodies and the flame at the same time, it's also intertwined for the Romans, so they can't seem to separate it out. And it's not until we get really far into the Imperial Period, where Rome basically has to change its whole religious outlook to become Christian, that this idea of the Vestal starts to dissipate in terms of its potency.
44:21 Kate Lister? It's like that if I don't turn the light switch on and off 50 times, my, my family will die. But on a national scale, isn't it? It's like, we can't let this fire go out in case the world is gonna end.
44:32 Speaker 05 Everything is interconnected for them as well. So the Vestals are involved in particular religious rites, which don't relate to Vestal, but very much relate to things that they need to have in order to do other things. The things that they hold in their temple tend to be connected with other rituals. People come to them for particular things that they've acquired through other rituals as well. They sort of mine them for a little while and then pass them on to somebody else. So they're not just standalone figures. They're part of a broader religious nexus that the Romans are constantly engaged with. They're part of it. And it feels like there's a lot of pressure on the Vestals.
45:16 Speaker 05 But they are also engaged in a much broader web of interconnected things. And any one of those things going wrong is a problem for the Romans.
45:25 Kate Lister? So a final, final question then. Let's say that I can take you back in a time machine to the ancient Roman world at peak Vestal time. Another thing I've learned about the Romans is that it's just not a great time to be a woman. But if I could say to you, you can be any kind of woman you want to be. You can't be an academic historian anymore, I'm afraid, because they, I don't think they let women do that. So that's out for you, I'm afraid.
45:48 Speaker 05 Rude.
45:50 Kate Lister? Would you be a Vestal? Do you think it's a good gig?
45:52 Speaker 05 I'd be really fascinated to at least give it a try. I'd be a terrible Vestal, I already know this, but I'd be interested, very interested. I mean, they've held my attention for at least 15 years now. I find them incredibly fascinating, partly because it is not a vocation. I think the idea of any woman being selected before she's had a chance to really know what that choice means is
46:25 Kate Lister? I agree.
46:25 Speaker 05 such a hard road to follow. So if you found yourself in that situation, how would you navigate it? To me, that's a real question because I feel like the nuns, in a way, have it a little bit easier. They're like, you know, I've chosen this life for myself. I, you know, I have this devotion to a greater being and it is a choice that I've made. That's not what's going on with Vestals. They're just ordinary young women from wherever they're from and all of a sudden find themselves in a very strict set of parameters in which like guides their day to day life. There's the whole ritual calendar of the year.
47:07 Speaker 05 They're doing something at least twice a month that relates either to their cult or somebody else's. So they're very busy. But what is it like to wander around for 30 years being like, I wonder what it would be like to have sex? I just wonder. And You'd be seeing people all the time and it wouldn't matter what your sexuality was, I don't think. It would be the idea that would be driving you crazy, I would imagine. And how they navigated that, I find really, really interesting.
47:38 Kate Lister? Peter, you have been wonderful to talk to. I knew that you would be. And if people want to know more about you and your work and your books, where can they find you?
47:46 Speaker 05 You can find me online at The Partial Historians. I run a podcast with my great friend, Dr Fiona Radford. We are exploring ancient Rome in all of its facets. We're in the middle of the Republic right now, but we've also written a couple of books. We've written a book on the Roman kings called Rex: The Seven Kings of Rome, and recently published Your Cheeky Guide to the Roman Empire, which is full of the salacious stories that will make you the funnest person at dinner parties.
48:18 Kate Lister? I love it. I love it. Thank you so much for dropping by to talk to me. You've been absolutely fascinating.
48:23 Speaker 05 Thank you so much. You too.
48:31 Kate Lister? Thanks for listening and thank you so much to Peter for joining us. And if you like what you heard, don't forget to like, review and follow along, whatever it is you get your podcasts. Coming up, we're exploring the final debauched days of Rome and Tudor aphrodisiacs. If you'd like us to explore a subject or if you just wanted to say hello, then you can email us at [email protected] . This podcast was edited by Tom Delargy and produced by Sophie G. The senior producer was Charlotte Long. Joining me again, Betwixt A Sheet, History of Sex, Scandal and Society, a podcast by History Hit. This podcast contains music from Epidemic Sound.
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