Ethnicity and Gender 491In order to form a sustainable community, such all-male groups would have had to
intermarry with the pre-existing local population. In fact, the evidence is somewhat
mixed. Archaeological evidence is inconclusive (Hodos 1999; Shepherd 1999), and
shows considerable variation between settlements. Greek sources refer both to colonists
accompanied by families (Herodotos 1.164–166, Pausanias 10.10.6–7) and to inter-
marriage between colonists and local women (Justin 43.3.4). One of our few definitive
statements about Roman colonization (Tacitus,Histories3.34.1) says that the colonists
settled by Rome at Cremona in 218BCintermarried with the local population. We do
not know whether this was the exception or the rule, but intermarriage on such a scale
suggests that women were crucial to the establishment of connections between disparate
ethnic groups.
One of the areas in which we have a significant body of evidence for female influence
on civic identity is in the development of religious cults in Italy. Cults were an important
element in the cultural identity of a community, and especially so in the case of a newly
founded colony. Glinister’s study of women in Roman colonies suggests that they played
an important role in the ritual life of their communities (Glinister 2009: 119–21). The
prevalence of healing cults in mid-Republican Italy, characterized by large quantities of
terracotta anatomical votives connected with fertility and childbirth, suggests a significant
female presence as worshippers. The only public role open to women in ancient Italy was
that of priestess, but even women who did not hold formal positions in a cult played an
important role in the religious life of a community, particularly a newly established one.
Votive inscriptions from Pisaurum, mostly dedicated to female deities, include one made
by thematronae Pisaurensesto Juno, which seems to indicate that the women of the
colony had an important role in the conduct of the ritual life of the community (Coarelli
2000: 201). In this instance, women can be seen as playing an important and distinctive
role in the establishment of a new Romanized identity for Pisaurum, whereas in other
contexts, such as intermarriage between people of different ethnic groups, gender could
potentially be a factor in cultural integration.
Gender may also have been a factor in the process of cultural change that took place
in Italy after the Roman conquest, and also in the ways it has been studied by modern
scholars. Many of the important symbols of Roman culture that have been central to stud-
ies of “Romanization”—aspects such as adoption of Roman forms of urbanism, Roman
forms of government, Roman cults, and Roman inscriptions—are intimately connected
with the public sphere and therefore with areas of life that are both elite-dominated
and largely male spheres of activity. Even more personal aspects of culture, such as the
use of Latin and adoption of Roman dress, the Romantria nomina, or Roman cul-
tures of bathing, or dining, can be gendered. This raises important questions about the
ways in which the adoption of Roman culture may have impacted differently on men
and women.
Women were not entirely excluded from the public sphere, as demonstrated by euer-
getic inscriptions set up by women, by activities of female civic patrons and benefactors
(Forbis 1990; 1996), and by the role of women in civic cults. Where women do have
a public profile, however, they are often honored for benefactions or other public
services performed in association with male relatives, and their role is therefore to
support and enhance the prestige of the wider family (Forbis 1990: 503–5). Although,