Roman writers acknowledged the peculiar biological and psychological characteristics of children. This thesis examines the hypothesis that they regarded them as members of distinct epidemiological and therapeutic groups. Its chief sources of information are medical texts from the Early Empire, supplemented by archaeological evidence. It attempts to determine the extent to which the above traits informed theories concerning the prevalence, pathogenesis and prognosis of childhood ailments.

Celsus stated that children should not be treated in the same way as adults. This thesis investigates whether other medical authorities shared this view, and whether Roman practitioners abided by this principle. It explores the ways in which they treated sick children and whether they employed different approaches according to the age or gender of individuals.

This research breaks new ground in that it makes direct comparisons between treatments for children and adults, and children of varying age, and between children of either gender. It acknowledges the diversity of medicine in the Roman world and places equal emphasis on ‘scientific’ and supernatural practices. Another innovation is the use of case studies; these provide an opportunity to compare and discuss choices of therapeutic modalities for nine groups of diseases and in patients in different age categories.

Roman children in the early empire: a distinct epidemiological and therapeutic category?

Kinship and Family in Ancient Egypt

Understanding the Sources

Setting the Terms

Dynamising Kin Groups

In Greece and Rome, a female stood at the center of attention of her family and the outside world only on two occasions, at her marriage and at her funeral. Therefore a party thrown in the honor of a minor girl, recorded in three papyri, all from third-century Oxyrhynchus (P.Oxy. Hels. 50.17; P.Oxy. LXVI 4542 and 4543) seems rather odd at first sight. From these papyri we learn that this event, the so-called therapeuteria, was a family get-together to which relatives, neighbors and friends were invited. As the editors of P.Oxy. LXVI remark, the girls for whom the event was organized were apparently still minors and unmarried since they lived at home. However, no convincing explanation has been advanced so far that would sufficiently explain this custom. This paper presents evidence from ancient ethnographic reports, medical texts, early Islamic sources and comparative evidence from modern Egypt, which offer highly interesting parallels and a new interpretation of this family party, and which would explain it as an indigenous tradition cultivated already for several millennia in this region.

Sabine R. Huebner

Papers

Female Circumcision as a Rite de Passage in Egypt—Continuity through the Millennia?