IMAGES of WORK

• Elderly Nurse holding a child in painted terracotta. Greek. London, British Museum.
• Gladiators: marble relief of two women in battle; at the top is an inscription in Greek commemorating their honorable release from the arena; at the bottom, their names: Amazon and Achillia. Roman from Halicarnassus, 1st-2nd century CE. London, British Museum.
• Entertainer fresco on the wall of the inn of Salvius in Pompeii, perhaps advertising the availability of female hire (see Ulpian above). The woman approaches to kiss the man; above their heads is scrawled nolo / cum Myrtale (“I don't want it with Myrtale”). Roman, 1st century CE. Naples, National Archaeological Museum.
• Attendant pouring wine from an amphora into a pot or bucket set on a bronze stand in the shape of a satyr (full mosaic). From a Roman villa at Centocelle near Rome, 2nd century CE. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum.
• Dancer wearing transparent clothing (view 2) with musicians; details of a mosaic panel found on Rome's Aventine hill. Roman, 3rd century CE. Rome, Vatican Museum.
• Doctor, heavily draped, she is pictured with a small box in her right hand on a limestone funeral stele (damaged). The upper part of the inscription is missing; the letters remaining are: [probably her father's name]INI FIL[ia] MEDICA. Gallo-Roman, from Ste. Segolene, 2nd/3rd century CE. CIL 13.4334. Metz, Musee de la Cour d'Or.
• Doctor/Pharmacist is pictured in a niche on a limestone stele, sitting with a book under her hand on her left knee, her foot raised on a footstool, at the center of a workshop (pharmacy? factory for glass/soap?). Behind her is a shelf of round objects; a female worker stands, adding material to a vat. Beside her stands a smaller woman stirring a mixture in a vat with a figured implement (caduceus?) over a low heater; on the other side liquid is distilling into vats. Probably part of a larger tomb, since there is no inscription. Roman Gaul. 2nd century CE. Epinal (France), Musee d'art ancien et contemporain.
• Meretrix entertaining a customer on a roundel in a floor mosaic from a private Roman villa, 4th century CE . Piazza Armerina, Villa del Casale.
• Gymnasts: playing ball, lifting weights. A female judge presiding over the competition awards trophies to the victors (one victor holds a palm branch and crowns herself). Floor mosaic from a private Roman villa, 4th century CE . Piazza Armerina, Villa del Casale.
• Musician, a painted terracotta figurine of a young female dancing animatedly with her lyre. Greek, South Italy 200-100 BCE. Getty Villa.
• Old Woman, a bronze statuette of a servant spinning (smaller). Greek, 100-1 BCE. Getty Villa.
• Game Vendors: a relief of two well-dressed women in a space containing cleaned game hanging from the ceiling. One woman sits at a table, the other stands, pointing to an inscription on the wall (Aeneid I.607-9). (cast, possibly modern) EUR (Rome), Civilta Museum.
• Cushion and belt shop: shoppers or vendors on a relief of the Augustan age. (cast) EUR (Rome), Civilta Museum. (Florence, Uffizi).
• Cloth shop: shoppers or vendors on a relief of the Augustan age. (cast) EUR (Rome), Civilta Museum. (Florence, Uffizi).
• Serving woman: one of a series of frescoes from the taverna of Salvius. Pompeii, 1st century CE.
• Hairdressers in marble relief on a large family tomb from Neumagen. Trier, Landesmuseum.
• Fuller shop: replica of a wall painting from the workshop of Verecundus showing bleaching and carding of clothing. EUR (Rome), Civilta Museum, first century CE.
• Workshop of Verecundus: fresco showing women working beside men in the fuller's shop, bleaching and carding, cleaning. Replica, 1st century CE EUR (Rome), Museum of Roman Civilization.
• Thermopolion Diana: occupying the lower floor of a brick insula on the Via Diana near the Forum, this large, well-appointed fast-food shop must have been popular. It offered three entrances with side benches and external mosaic sidewalk, frescoed shop signs, a hot food and drink counter with intact stone basins, internal mosaic flooring, interior marble wall shelves with a fresco above the bank of shelves, brick arched ceilings, an embedded storage jar, a rear courtyard for tables and outside seating near a fountain, service stairs to cellar. The building is Hadrianic (117-138), the shop a 3rd century CE addition. Ostia Antica.
• Thermopolion of Asellina on the Via dell' Abbondanza in Pompeii; painted notices can be seen (now covered with glass). Roman, 1st century CE. Pompeii.

INSCRIPTIONS

• Coelia Mascellina was an importer of wine and oil whose name appears on this bronze stamp (signaculum). Translation (the words are separated by tiny amphorae): [belonging to] Coelia Mascellina, daughter of Gnaeus. Another inscription which bears her name, her occupation and her status was found on a monument in Rome: Coelia Mascellina, a woman of incomparable chastity, a businesswoman importing oil and wine from Baetica [Spain], made this for her father Gnaeus Coelius Masculus and for her most devoted parents (AE 1973, 71). Rome, 2nd half 2nd century CE.
• Naevoleia Tyche, a wealthy businesswoman who was probably a freedwoman, set up a tomb for herself, for her husband, C. Munatius Faustus, and for her freedmen and freedwomen. Pompeii, Street of Tombs. 1st century CE.
• Gaavia Philumina, a freedwoman who had a business on the Aventine hill, built a tomb (only one damaged block of which survives) for herself and two men, one of whom was a goldsmith (CVCVMA). Her business, which must have been profitable judging from her monument, was probably identified in the lost part of the inscription. Mid-1st century BCE. Rome, Terme Diocletiano.
• Aurelia Nais, fishmonger, had an elegantly carved marble cippus dedicated to her by two fellow freedmen: her patron, Gaius Aurelius Phileros, a former slave of her former master, and Lucius Valerius Secundus, a freedman of Lucius Valerius. Side 1 contains the libation jug, side 2 contains the libation dish. Early 2nd century CE. Rome, Terme Diocletiano.
• Heria Thisbe was a solo singer, the wife of Tiberius Claudius Glaphyrus who played the reed pipe and was victorious at the games in honor of Actium and of Augustus. Her marble funerary altar contains a libation pitcher on left side and a libation dish on right side. Last half 1st century CE. Rome, Capitoline Museum.
• Sellia Epyre was a maker and seller of gold-decorated luxury clothing (aurivestrix) on the Sacred Way. Her name appears on the cover of the marble cinerary urn while the name Q. FVTI OLYMPICI (genitive case, perhaps her husband) appears on its belly in a different script. Both were freedpersons and probably both were interred here. 1st half of 1st century CE. CIL VI.9214. Rome, Terme Diocletiano.
• Gnome Pierinis, a hairdresser whose niche in a columbarium was covered by a simple marble marker whose inscription was carefully decorated in red and contained, unusually, the precise date of her death (28 January 2 BCE). Rome, Terme Diocletiano.
• Hymnis Cellia, a musician who played the cithara (PSALTRIA); her columbarium niche was covered by this simple marble marker. Rome, Terme Diocletiano.
• Logas, a companion for the grandmother of Messalina, was only 16 at her death. Her mother (AP[h]RODISIA) placed this simple marble marker over the niche containing her ashes in the 1st century CE columbarium of the Statilii family (CIL 6.6335). Rome, Terme Diocletiano.
• Italia was a quasillaria, a spinner. She died at 20. Her husband (SCAEVA), a book keeper, set this simple marble marker over the niche containing her ashes in the 1st century CE columbarium of the Statilii family (CIL 6.6342). Rome, Terme Diocletiano.
• Optata Pasaes was an ostiaria, a doorkeeper or janitor. Her friends set this simple marble marker over the niche containing her ashes in the 1st century CE columbarium of the Statilii family (CIL 6.6326). Rome, Terme Diocletiano.
• Clodii, a family of freedpersons who practiced medicine, were proudly portrayed in civic dress on this marble funerary relief: CLODIA HILARA (right); CLODIVS METRODORVS MEDICVS (center); CLODIVS TERTIVS MEDICVS (left). Roman, last third of 1st century BCE. Paris, Louvre Museum.