Works
This is the TEXT that has come down to us:
“As was appropriate for women like ourselves when addressing a petition to you, we rushed to your womenfolk. But we did not get the treatment we were entitled to from Fulvia, and have been driven by her into the forum. You have already stolen from us our fathers and sons and husbands and brothers by your proscriptions, on the grounds that they had wronged you. But if you also steal from us our property, you will set us into a state unworthy of our family and manners and our female gender. If you claim that you have in any way been wronged by us, as you were by our husbands, proscribe us as you did them. But if we women have not voted any of you public enemies, if we did not demolish your houses or destroy your army or lead another army against you; if we have not kept you from public office or honour, why should we share the penalties if we have no part in the wrongdoing? Why should we pay taxes when we have no part in pubic office or honours or commands or government in general, an evil you have fought over with such disastrous results? Because, you say, this is a time of war? And when have there not been wars? and when have women paid taxes? By nature of their sex women are absolved from paying taxes among all mankind. Our mothers on one occasion long ago were superior to their sex and paid taxes, when your whole government was threatened and the city itself, when the Carthaginians were pressuring you. They gave willingly, not from their land or their fields or their dowry or their households, without which life would be unlivable for free women, but only from their own jewellery, and not with a fixed price set on it, nor under threat of informers and accusers or by force, but they gave as much as they themselves chose. Why are you now so anxious about the government or the country? But if there should a war against the Celts or Parthians, we will not be less eager for our country's welfare than our mothers. But we will never pay taxes for civil wars, and we will not cooperate with you against each another. We did not pay taxes to Caesar or to Pompey, nor did Marius ask us for contributions, nor Cinna nor Sulla, even though he was a tyrant over this country. And you say that you are reestablishing the Republic!”
López, Aurora (2014 ) "Las matronas romanas ante la vida pública: utilización de la palabra", en Revista Internacional de Culturas y Literaturas, 15, (retrevied on 14/04/2022), <https://idus.us.es/bitstream/handle/11441/61807/15.lopez_.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y>
Information about the work and context of creation
Although Appian presents it as a textual speech of Hortensia, what he reproduces, however, is but a brief summary of the one she must have delivered. Nevertheless, it seems beyond suspicion that the Greek historian based his synthesis on the original of Hortensia, which had been published.
Historical and social context of the discourse
After the death of Julius Caesar and the formation of the second triumvirate, the triumvirs, wishing to avenge his death, fought against the republicans. At the same time that they published the names of those who had been declared outlaws for participating in the assassination, they drew up a list of 1,400 matrons (mostly relatives of the outlaws) who were to contribute money to pay for the imminent war that would pit the triumvirs (who had a deficit of some 200 million sesterces) against the republicans.
Appian informs us that Mark Antony, Lepidus and Octavian had fixed penalties for those who hid a part of their goods or made a false estimate of them. On the contrary, they established rewards for those who informed on these facts and it made no difference whether the informers were free people or slaves, since both would receive what they were promised.
The response of these 1400 women was immediate and the first thing they did was to make a plea to the female relatives of the triumvirs. Octavian's sister, Octavia, and Mark Antony’s mother, Julia, showed their solidarity with this group of women but, on the other hand, Fulvia, wife of the triumvir Mark Anthony, rudely rejected them and it was this rejection that opened Hortensia's speech.
The next step taken by the matrons was to present themselves in the Forum; the people and the guards cleared the way for them, and they placed themselves in front of the triumvirs' tribune. Once there, Hortensia spoke on behalf of this group of matrons and she acted as an advocate to prevent this group of Roman women from having to pay the tax that had been imposed on them by the triumvirs.
In a context in which women were not allowed to speak in public (not even to defend their own interests) or to make speeches in the courts in defense of others or for access to public office, Hortensia made a speech in the forum in defense of the interests of the Roman matrons, being one of them herself. The speech was a great success and several authors echoed it in later times. According to Appian (Roman History II), Hortensia's speech was so successful that the number of women was reduced from 1,400 to 400.
Cicero in Brutus, a story of Roman oratory, provides examples of women (Lelia, her daughters -the Mucias- and her granddaughters -the Licinias-) who possessed an education and oratorical ability with which they could have become excellent orators, as it used to happen with men of the same social status, if the exercise of judicial and political oratory had not been vetoed for Roman women. Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi, also enjoyed an excellent preparation to pass it on to her children. Well into the first century BC, in an area of clear expansion of women's rights, three Roman matrons (Hortensia, Maesia and Gaia Afrania) practiced law.
Indications
-Classical Culture: Block Classical roots of today's world. Everyday life; Block Continuity of cultural heritage. Literature, art and science.
-Latin 4th ESO: Block The Latin text and translation; Block Legacy and heritage; Block The present of Latin civilisation.
-Latin Baccalaureate: Literary Education Block.
-Universal Literature 1st Baccalaureate: Interpretation of fragments from the Roman period of different genres and themes.
-Spanish Language and Literature ESO: Literary Education Block.