note that this freedom of the Roman woman was prior
to the introduction of Christianity, and that under its influence
their position began to suffer.[305] I cannot follow this question,
and can only say how entirely mistaken is the belief that the Jewish
religion, with its barbaric view of the relationship between the
sexes, was beneficial to the liberty of women.

The Roman matrons had now gained complete freedom in the domestic
relationship, and were permitted a wide field for the exercise of
their activities. They were the rulers of the household; they dined
with their husbands, attended the public feasts, and were admitted to
the aristocratic clubs, such as the _Gerousia_ is supposed to have
been. We find from inscriptions that women had the privilege of
forming associations and of electing women presidents. One of these
bore the title of _Sodalitas Pudicitiae Servandrae_, or "Society for
Promoting Purity of Life." At Lanuvium there was a society known as
the "Senate of Women." There was an interesting and singular woman's
society existing in Rome, with a meeting-place on the Quirinal, called
_Conventus Matronarum_, or "Convention of Mothers of Families." This
seems to have been a self-elected parliament of women for the purpose
of settling questions of etiquette. It cannot be said that the
accounts that we have of this assembly are at all edifying, but its
existence shows the freedom permitted to women, and points to the
important fact that they were accustomed to combine with one another
to settle their own affairs. The Emperor Heliogabalus took this
self-constituted Parliament in hand and gave it legal powers.[306]

The Roman women managed their own property; many women possessed great
wealth: at times they lent money to their husbands, at more than
shrewd interest. It appears to have been recognised that all women
were competent in business affairs, and, therefore, the wife was in
all cases permitted to assume complete charge of the children's
property during their minority, and to enjoy the _usufruct_. We have
instances in which this capacity for affairs is dwelt on, as when
Agricola, the general in command in Britain, shows such confidence in
his wife as a business woman that he makes her co-heir with his
daughter and the Emperor Domitian. Women were allowed to plead for
themselves in the courts of law. The satirists, like Juvenal, declare
that there were hardly any cases in which a woman would not bring a
s