Re-Textualizing Lucretia: Cultural Subversion in the City of God
Augustine devoted a section of the first book of the City of God to a critical reconsideration of the ancient story of the rape and suicide of the Roman matron Lucretia. Four centuries earlier, Livy had canonized Lucretia as an exemplum virtutis: in the Augustan age Lucretia embodied ideas about fem...
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Johns Hopkins Univ. Press
1994
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| In: |
Journal of early Christian studies
Year: 1994, Volume: 2, Issue: 1, Pages: 53-70 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Parallel Edition: | Non-electronic
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| Summary: | Augustine devoted a section of the first book of the City of God to a critical reconsideration of the ancient story of the rape and suicide of the Roman matron Lucretia. Four centuries earlier, Livy had canonized Lucretia as an exemplum virtutis: in the Augustan age Lucretia embodied ideas about feminine chastity and civic order that Livy deemed vital for the regeneration of Roman moral and political life. Following the sack of Rome in 410, however, Augustine found Lucretia's tale a powerful idiom for responding to pagan recriminations, for critiquing current conceptions of honor, and for refuting contemporary Christian claims about sexual purity and the nobility of volitional death. Augustine's reappraisal of Lucretia was subversive and a direct challenge to widely held cultural assumptions. |
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| ISSN: | 1086-3184 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Journal of early Christian studies
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1353/earl.0.0209 |