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Bustuariae
Apr. 13th, 2004 11:37 amWas reading "Best American Crime Writing: 2003 Edition" - it's a collection of crime/criminology articles, & I read this one called "My Undertaker, My Pimp" by Jay Kirk, out of Harper's Magazine. Anyway, it's about Mack Moore, who owns (or maybe now it's owned - he put the place up for sale)a brothel in Beatty, NV called "Angel's Ladies" (Angel's Moore's wife). Moore used to be a disreputable undertaker in Oregon & then became a slightly less disreputable brothel owner. At any rate, the writer mentions a type of ancient Roman prostitute that I'd never even heard of, which is odd because one would think that I, of all people, would know of this particular type of Roman prostitute. They were called bustuariae, dedicated to the Roman deities of death, & they not only plyed their trade in personalized mausoleums in the cemeteries, but also hired themselves out as professional mourners.
So I found a website that was generally biased against prostitution, that listed various classes of Roman prostitutes:
Ranks of Prostitutes in Rome
The highest rank of Prostitutes were the "Delicatae"…Kept women, or the mistresses of wealthy patrons, who corresponded to the "hetarae" of the Greeks.
Next came the ‘Famosae’, daughters of respectable families, who filled this calling because the "needed the money" or because they enjoyed the pleasure; the ‘Doris’ were very beautiful women who went naked habitually; the ‘Lupae’ or She-wolves, were poor women who lived in squalid shelters in the woods, under the arches, or in abandoned or ruined buildings, etc. who entertained their customers in the alleys.
The ‘Elicariae’ were baker’s girls, who were sent out to sell little cakes of the shapes of the genital organs of men and women for sacrificial offerings in the temple of Priapus, or Venus, and who carried on prostitution as a side-line.
‘Bustuariae’ had their business in the cemeteries where they hired out as professional mourners, also with prostitution as a sideline.
‘Copaie’ were the slave servant girls.
‘Noctilae’, or night-walkers, a class resembling our modern street-walkers.
"Blitidae’- a degraded set of women who were usually drunk on cheap wine.
‘Diabolares’ whose fee was a diabolon (two cents)
‘Forariae’ -country girls who lurked at the roadside to pick up a little money
‘Gallinae’ who combined the trade of prostitute with that of thief.
‘Quadrantariae’-whose fee was the smallest copper coin made (1/2 cent)
Then every baker, tavern-keeper, bath-house keeper, barber, and perfumer kept attendant prostitutes to accommodate their customers-no one was obliged to do without sex-if he could raise ½ cent."
Scholaris Island
So I found a website that was generally biased against prostitution, that listed various classes of Roman prostitutes:
Ranks of Prostitutes in Rome
The highest rank of Prostitutes were the "Delicatae"…Kept women, or the mistresses of wealthy patrons, who corresponded to the "hetarae" of the Greeks.
Next came the ‘Famosae’, daughters of respectable families, who filled this calling because the "needed the money" or because they enjoyed the pleasure; the ‘Doris’ were very beautiful women who went naked habitually; the ‘Lupae’ or She-wolves, were poor women who lived in squalid shelters in the woods, under the arches, or in abandoned or ruined buildings, etc. who entertained their customers in the alleys.
The ‘Elicariae’ were baker’s girls, who were sent out to sell little cakes of the shapes of the genital organs of men and women for sacrificial offerings in the temple of Priapus, or Venus, and who carried on prostitution as a side-line.
‘Bustuariae’ had their business in the cemeteries where they hired out as professional mourners, also with prostitution as a sideline.
‘Copaie’ were the slave servant girls.
‘Noctilae’, or night-walkers, a class resembling our modern street-walkers.
"Blitidae’- a degraded set of women who were usually drunk on cheap wine.
‘Diabolares’ whose fee was a diabolon (two cents)
‘Forariae’ -country girls who lurked at the roadside to pick up a little money
‘Gallinae’ who combined the trade of prostitute with that of thief.
‘Quadrantariae’-whose fee was the smallest copper coin made (1/2 cent)
Then every baker, tavern-keeper, bath-house keeper, barber, and perfumer kept attendant prostitutes to accommodate their customers-no one was obliged to do without sex-if he could raise ½ cent."
Scholaris Island
