Real Examples of “Titus 2 Women” in the Roman World

Introduction

In his letter to Titus, who was temporarily stationed in Crete, Paul wrote that the older women[1] should,

“… train younger women to love their husbands and love their children,
to be self-controlled and pure,
to be busy at home [or workers at home], to be kind [or good],
and to be submissive to their husbands,
so that no one will malign the word of God” (Titus 2:4b–5 NIV).

… σωφρονίζωσιν[2] τὰς νέας φιλάνδρους εἶναι, φιλοτέκνους,
σώφρονας, ἁγνάς,
οἰκουργούς, ἀγαθάς,
ὑποτασσομένας τοῖς ἰδίοις ἀνδράσιν,
ἵνα μὴ ὁ λόγος τοῦ Θεοῦ βλασφημῆται.

Some Christian women today use these words as a template for their lives, thinking that the qualities mentioned in this list are Christian virtues. However, Paul’s instructions in Titus 2:4-5 are similar to instructions written by non-Christian (pagan) authors of the time.

Paul’s instructions directly reflected the cultural values of his day and there is nothing especially Christian about them. He wanted the young women in first-century Crete to abide by social conventions of respectable Roman society so that the word of God would not be maligned.

In this article, I quote from several inscriptions that celebrate virtuous Roman women and which contain identical and similar words to those used in Titus 2:4-5.[3] These words are about real women who lived in Roman society about 2000 years ago, and none of them appear to have been Christians.[4]

The purpose of this article is simply to show that the virtues listed in Titus 2:4 are Roman virtues. My main article on Titus 2:4-5, which looks at the context and application of this passage, is here.

Ancient Inscriptions of Virtuous Women

VALERIA

On the coffin cartonnage of a pagan Roman woman, who died around the same time as the letter to Titus was written, are inscribed these words:

Here lies Valeria, daughter of Marcus, of free-born status from Caesarea in Mauritania. She was kind, affectionate, dignified (semnē) [as in 1 Tim. 3:8, 3:11; Tit. 2:2], blameless, she loved her husband (philandros) [Tit. 2:4], loved her children (philoteknos) [Tit. 2:4], kept the marriage bed chaste. Out of respect and love for what is good, her husband Lucius Dexios from Herculaneum buried her. (Horsley’s translation.)

Οὐαλερίαν · Μάρκου · θυγατέρα · ἰνγένουαν ἀπὸ Καισαρείας · τῆς Μαυρειτανίας εὔνουν φιλόστοργον · σεμνὴν · ἄμωμον · φίλανδρον · φιλότεκνον εὐνοῦχον εὐσεβείας καὶ φιλαγαθίας εἵνεκε (or ἕνεκα) ὁ ἀνὴρ Λούκιος Δέξιος Ἡρκουληειανὸς ἐκήδευσε
AE 828; SEG 1536

This epitaph for Valeria is discussed by G.H.R. Horsley in “11. A Woman’s Virtue,” New Documents illustrating early Christianity, Volume 3 (1983), 40–43. In the same article, Dr Horsley provides more examples of epitaphs of wives that use the words philandros and philoteknos such as the following epitaph for Damostrata found in Nicomedia (Northern Turkey).

DAMOSTRATA

Here lies Damostrata.
Here, for her sake, I engraved and erected a stele.
She was modest/ moderate (sōphrosunēs) [1 Tim. 2:9 & 15; cf. Tit.2:5], good (agathēs) [Tit. 2:5],
but she especially loved her husband (philandrias) [Tit. 2:4].
She lived with me twelve full years.
She lived 32 years in all. Farewell. (My translation)

ἐνθάδε κεῖται Δαμοστράτα
ᾗ ἕνεκ’ αὐτῆς στήλλην [στήλην] γράψας ἀνέθηκα
σωφροσύνης ἀγαθῆς
φιλανδρίας δὲ μάλιστα
συνζήσασαν ἐμοὶ πλήρη δυώδεκα ἔτη
ζήσασα ἔτη λβʹ. χαίρετε.
TAM IV, 1 124: Inscriptions.Packhum.org; Deutsches Archäologisches Institut

EUTYCHIANE 

This epitaph, also found in Nicomedia, is cited by Horsley in “11. A Woman’s Virtue” in New Docs 3, p. 42.

O, instigator of miseries and the one jealous of the light of life!
You took away the woman I long for, Eutychiane is her name.
I placed here a stele in her memory from my own means,
I, her husband, Eutychios is my name.
Modestly (sōphronōs) [cf. 1 Tim. 2:9, 15; Tit. 2:5], she lived with me eight years and left me two small children―
she who was above reproach (akatgnōstos) [Tit. 2:8] and who loved her husband (philandros) [Tit. 2:4].
Dead at 25, her own allotted time complete,
her years were tragically cut short and she did not get to fully enjoy them. Farewell.
(My translation with contributions from Dr Lyn Kidson.)

[ὦ] πημάτων ἀρχηγὲ [κ]ὲ ζόης φθόνε, | φωτὸς
[σ]τερήσας τὴν ἐμοὶ ποθου[μέ]νην, | Εὐτυχιανὴν τοὔ[ν]ομα·
ἔνθα ἐθέμην στήλην [μν]ήμης χάριν εἰδίας
γαμετῆς [Εὐ]τύχιος τοὔνομα,
σω[φρ]όνως συνζήσασαν μετὰ ἐμοῦ [ἐν]ιαυτοὺς ὀκτώ,
<ἔ>λιψε δέ μοι [νή]πια δύω ἡ ἀκατάγνωστος [κὲ] φίλανδρος·
θνῄσκι δὲ ἐνι[αυ]τῶν κεʹ τὴν εἰδίαν μοῖραν [τ]ελέσασα,
ὧν ἔκαμε [μη]δ’ ἀπολαύσασα. χέρετε.
TAM IV, 1 130: Inscriptions.Packhum.org

DAMOSTRATEIA

The following excerpt is from a Roman inscription that dates to the late third century. It was published by Horsley in volume 4 of New Docs (1987): “10. A Judicial Career Cut Short,” p. 35. The inscription is about a deceased man named Rufinus and it was written by his grieving wife Damostrateia who takes the opportunity to commend herself.

… And the mother of twin children, a fine woman (semnē)[1 Tim. 3:8, 3:11; Tit. 2:2] who loved her husband (philandros) [Tit. 2:4], sailed across the ocean and brought his body over the deep, and endured difficulties and continued in her grieving and laid him down in this tomb and bequeathed him to eternity. This monument is (testimony to) the wifely devotion (philandria) of Damostrateia.
(Notes and Horsley’s translation of the full epitaph can be here.)

… Ἡ δὲ τέκνων δισσῶν μήτηρ, σεμνὴ ⌜ἡ⌝δὲ φίλανδρος,
καὶ πέλαγος διέπλευσε καὶ ἤγαγε σῶμα βυθοῖσιν
καὶ καμάτους ὑπέμεινε καὶ ἐν θρήνοις διέμεινε
καὶ τύνβῳ κατέθηκε καὶ αἰῶσιν παρέδωκε.
Δαμοστρατείας ταῦτα τῆς φιλανδρίας
Eagle: Epigraphic Database Roma

HERO

The following inscription for a woman named Hero may have been created to honour her while she was still alive. (Her husband and son are also honoured with similar inscriptions.) This inscription is from Hierapolis-Kastabala east of Tarsus in Cilicia, Paul’s hometown, in the Roman province Asia Minor.

The people (demos) [honour] Hero the Athenian and the wife of Arzybios the son of Lukios, who is living respectably (kosmiōs) [cf. 1 Tim. 2:9] and moderately (sōphronōs) [cf. 1 Tim. 2:9, 12; Tit. 2:5]. She loves her husband (philandros) [Tit. 2:4] and loves her children (philoteknos) [Tit. 2:4]. Erected [in her] honour. (My translation with contributions from Dr Lyn Kidson.)

ὁ δῆμος Ἥρω Ἀθηναίου γυναῖκα δὲ γενομέν[η]ν Ἀρζυβίου τοῦ Λουκίου κοσμίως καὶ σωφρόνως ζῶσαν, φίλανδρον καὶ φιλότεκνον, τειμῆς ἕνεκα.
See Journal of Hellenic Studies (JHS) Volume 11 (1890): 250, 25.

EUANASSA

Like Hero, Euanassa is celebrated in an inscription that was funded and erected by the people in her community, the demos in Anaphe, and she is literally “hero-ized” (ἀφηρώϊξε).

The people (demos) [honour]
Euanassa, daughter of excellent Krinoteles
on account of her virtue,
due to her noble life, due to her
love for her homeland and love for her husband (philandron) [Tit. 2:4]
and love for her excellent children (philoteknon) [Tit. 2:4], and due to her
benefactions for the people, she is a hero. (My translation. Another translation is here.)

ὁ δᾶμος
Εὐάνασσαν Κρινοτέλους ἀ-
ρετᾶς ἕνεκα καὶ καλο<κἀ>γαθίας δι-
ά τε τὸν εὐσχήμονα βίον καὶ διὰ
5 τὰν φιλόπατριν καὶ φίλανδρον καὶ
φιλότεκνον ἀρετὰν καὶ διὰ τὰς εἰ-
ς αὐτὸν εὐεργεσίας ἀφηρώϊξε.
IG XII.3 288; PH75802 Inscriptions.Packhum.org

AMYMONE

This epitaph is for a woman named Amymone. It is written in Latin and dates to the first century BC.

Hie sita est Amymone Marci optima et pulcherrima:
Lanifica pia pudica frugi casta [Tit. 2:5 Vulgate] domiseda.
(CIL VI.11602 = ILS 8402 = CLE 237)

The opening statement reads, “Here lies Amymone, the best and most beautiful [wife of] Marcus.” This is followed by a list of virtues: lanifica (wool-worker),[5] pia (pious), pudica (modest), frugi (frugal), casta (chaste/ faithful), domiseda.

This last word, domiseda, is extremely rare. However, because it is made up of the words domus (“house”) and sedeō (“sit”), and because it is listed along with other feminine virtues, it is not difficult to understand its meaning. Susan Hylen translates it as “stayer at home.”[6] 

MURDIA

This well-known and lengthy inscription for a woman named Murdia was sponsored by one of her sons. It is written in Latin and towards the end of the inscription are these lines:

… since the funeral tribute of all good women should be simple and similar, because their natural excellences, guarded by their own custody, do not require variations in language and since it is enough that all have done the same things worthy of a good reputation, and because it is difficult for a woman to acquire original themes for praise, because their life is tossed by lesser vicissitudes, it (follows) necessarily that conventional virtues should be pursued lest what is lost from the best principles should debase the remainder.

Hereby my mother, dearest to me, won the greatest praise of all, in that in modesty (modestia) decency (probitate), chastity (pudicitia), obedience (opsequio), woolmaking (lanificio), zeal (diligentia) and loyalty (fide) she was like and similar to other good women nor yielded to any, (having attained) the chief or at least an equal glory from her labour, wisdom, dangers.
CIL 6.10230 = ILS 8394 = FIRA III 70. Translation: Horsfall (1982: 30-31).[7]

“That the word of God may not be maligned”

In the first century, churches were usually small and vulnerable, and being a Christian could be difficult and dangerous. Romans were suspicious of new religious movements that might threaten the Roman way of life. So, in some of his letters, Paul advises that Christians conform to social norms as much as possible.[7]

Paul’s aim in Titus 2:4-5 is plainly stated: “so that the word of God may not be maligned.” This principle is still relevant. Christians should not behave in ways that their society finds offensive or in ways that society believes are disruptive to social harmony. Otherwise, Christians may find themselves bringing disrepute to God and Christian doctrine (Tit. 2:5, 8, 9-10).

In societies where young women have more freedoms than in past centuries, pressuring women to stay at home, or be “keepers at home” (KJV), can cause the word of God to be ridiculed and dismissed, the very thing Paul wanted to avoid.

Unlike what some believe, Titus 2:4-5 does not attempt to define or prescribe “biblical womanhood.”  These two verses are not the sum total of what the Bible, or even Paul, says about women. Nor are the virtues listed in these two verses especially Christian. They are Roman virtues.

Footnotes

[1] There was a social expectation that older women would train younger women. For example, an ancient letter attributed to a female philosopher, pseudonymously named Theano, instructed younger women to listen to the teaching of older women. Theano wrote,

Indeed, to you younger women authority has been given by custom to rule over the household slaves once you have been married [cf. 1 Tim. 5:14], but the teaching (didaskalia) ought to come from the older women (presbyterōn) because they are forever giving advice about household management. For it is good first to learn the things you do not know and to consider the counsel of the older women the most suitable; for a young soul must be brought up in these teachings from girlhood.
Quoted by Annette Bourland Huizenga in her book Moral Education for Women in the Pastoral and Pythagorean Letters: Philosophers of the Household (Koninklijke Brill, 2013), 50.

There are a few other letters like this one, pseudonymously attributed to women (pseudo-Melissa, pseudo-Myia), which say similar things. See chapter 5 of Sarah B. Pomeroy’s Pythagorean Women: Their History and Writings (Johns Hopkins University Press: 2013) (Google Books)

[2] The Greek verb behind the word “train” is sōphronizō. This word occurs in the New Testament only in Titus 2:4. The implication of this verb may be that Paul wanted the older women to train the younger women to be respectable and moderate (sōphrosunē) in their behaviour. On page 229 of his commentary on First and Second Timothy and Titus (Paideia; Baker Academic, 2019),  Christopher R. Hutson gives “train in temperance” as a gloss of sōphronizō.

Sōphrosunē is used in ancient texts to describe the epitome of social respectability, restraint, and decorum for men and for women. Cicero, writing in Latin, explains that what the Greeks call sōphrosunē, “I at one time call temperance, at another time moderation, and sometimes even modesty; but I do not know whether that virtue may not be properly called frugality, which has a more confined meaning with the Greeks …” Cicero, Tusculan Disputations, 3.8.16 (English; Latin).

Women could be sōphrosunē and also be active and influential in the community as the inscription of Claudia Ammion, a powerful woman in Thyatira around AD 50, shows.

The dyers honoured and set up this monument from their own resources for Claudia Ammion—daughter of Metrodorus Lepidas, wife of Tiberius Claudius Antyllus, three times gymnasiarch, priestess of the Augusti, and high priestess of the city for life. Having been contest-director in a brilliant and extravagant manner with purity (agneia) [cf. Tit. 2:5] and modesty (sōphrosunē), excelling others.
TAM V 2 972 (See p. 56 here.)

It is interesting that Claudia Ammion is described as being brilliant and extravagant “with modesty” (sōphrosunē). Sōphrosunē occurs in the New Testament in the context of women’s behaviour in 1 Timothy 2:9 and 15. I’ve written about 1 Timothy 2, which includes “I am not allowing a woman to teach …”, here.
Wikipedia has a short article on this virtue, here.

[3] This article with these inscriptions started as a footnote in my main article on Titus 2:4-5, here, but my footnote kept growing as I came across more inscriptions listing the virtues of ancient Roman women.

[4] Some of these words also appear on inscriptions celebrating virtuous men. A few of these words, however, occur only rarely on inscriptions for men. The gymnasiarch Sarapion, for example, is described as loving his children (philotekne) and loving his wife (philogynaie). (IGA 2.371; SB 1 (1915) 411)

[5] I have a footnote on the virtuous feminine occupation of wool-working, here.

[6] Hylen writes,

The attributes in Amymone’s funeral epitaph represented an idealized version of feminine virtue. … Women in antiquity were often described in antiquity as ideally occupied within the home. In another example from a literary source, the first-century Jewish author Philo wrote, “Women are best suited to the indoor life, which never strays from the house” (Leg. 3.169). Amymone is portrayed as attaining such virtue. But there is little evidence that women were confined or chose to stay within their homes. …

The term domeseda seems more likely to have communicated Amymone’s devotion to the needs of her household rather than her actual location. During her lifetime, her work likely took her outside their living quarters.
Hylen, Women in the New Testament World (Oxford University Press, 2019), 20.

A bit more information on Amymone’s inscription is here.

[7] There is more on this inscription, known as Laudatio Murdiae, here.
Laudatio Turiae (CIL. 6.1527), another long Latin inscription commemorating a woman, contains these rhetorical questions:

Why should I mention your domestic virtues: your loyalty, obedience, affability, reasonableness, industry in working wool, religion without superstition, sobriety of attire, modesty of appearance? Why dwell on your love for your relatives, your devotion to your family?

More information on Laudatio Turiae is here.

Laudatio Murdiae and Laudatio Turiae both contain a Latin word that means “obedience.” This word is arguably stronger than the Greek verb hypotassomai (used in Titus 2:5) which may be more about loyalty and allegiance rather than submission in the way this word is often understood. I could not find hypotassomai or its cognates in any ancient Greek inscription about wives, but I’ll keep looking for it.

[7] I list some of these verses in a footnote here.

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More on the New Testament “household codes” here.

“Busy at Home on Crete (Titus 2:5): A Private Domestic Space or Working in the Public Glaze?” by Dr Lyn Kidson (Read it here.)

Image Credit

One of the tablets containing the Lauditio Turiae (CIL. 6.1527) inscription. (Source Wikimedia)