a.d. V Kal. Iun.
May 28 in Ancient Rome
A law bans marriage between Romans and barbarians
No barbarian brides
politicsAD 370 or 373
Julian date · ≈ May 29 on our calendar
Valentinian I and Valens forbade provincials of any rank to marry barbarian wives, or provincial women to marry foreigners, under pain of death.
nulli provincialium, cuiuscumque ordinis aut loci fuerit, cum barbara sit uxore coniugium, nec ulli gentilium provincialis femina copuletur.
No provincial, of whatever rank or place, may have a marriage with a barbarian wife, nor may a provincial woman be joined to any foreigner.
Valentinian I
Background
By the later fourth century, the Roman frontiers were crowded with peoples from beyond the Rhine and Danube. Many barbarians served in the Roman army, and some rose high in it, while others were settled inside the empire. Contacts, trade and marriages across the frontier were common, and the emperors worried about loyalty and security.
This law, addressed to Theodosius, master of cavalry (the father of the future emperor Theodosius I), is short and harsh. No provincial, "of whatever rank or place", may marry a barbarian wife, and no provincial woman may be joined to any of the gentiles, foreigners from outside the empire. If such marriages had produced family ties, anything "suspicious or harmful" found in them was to be punished by death. A later summary in the Code puts it plainly: no Roman may take a barbarian wife of any nation, and Roman women may not marry barbarians, on pain of capital punishment.
Historians debate how widely it applied: it may have targeted frontier contacts with specific peoples rather than every marriage disputed. Either way, it shows how the Roman state tried to draw legal lines around family life, even as Roman and barbarian were mixing in the army and the provinces.
⚠ Uncertain date: Year uncertain (370 or 373 usually).
Ancient source: Codex Theodosianus 3.14.1 · Reference
Sources
☁ Rome today (1991–2020 avg): 24°/14°C (75°/57°F) · rain 21% of days
Rome in MayLate spring was a time of hard field labour and fresh food: beans, greens and…
Fields & crops
Hay was cut, barley harvested in warm places, beans threshed, and vines and young crops weeded and hoed per Columella 11.2. Sheep were washed and sheared.
Courts & law
A busy legal season. Romans avoided marrying in May, which was considered unlucky, especially before the Ides per Ovid, Fasti 5.490.
Senate & politics
Senate and assemblies met normally. The temple of Mercury, dedicated on the Ides of May, was the seat of an early guild of merchants per Livy 2.27; on that day traders sprinkled their goods with water from his spring to wash away the month's lies per Ovid, Fasti 5.663–92.
Military
Full campaigning season: armies marched and supply convoys used good roads and calm seas.
Festivals & religion
Floralia ended on 3 May; the Lemuria (9, 11, 13 May) drove ghosts from the house at midnight with black beans; the Argei, rush puppets, were thrown into the Tiber on 14 or 15 May per Ovid, Fasti 5.
Daily life
Late spring was a time of hard field labour and fresh food: beans, greens and the first barley. Enslaved farm workers, often chained in the ergastulum on large estates, did the heaviest work per Columella 1.6–8, who advises on their supervision. In the city, the Floralia's games included mimes and, by tradition, performers who undressed at the crowd's demand per Valerius Maximus and Lactantius; hostile or late sources. Childbirth was a major risk for women at any season; inscriptions record many deaths of young mothers per surviving epitaphs.
Sources: Ovid, Fasti 5 · Columella 1 and 11.2
All days in May →
LATIN LINE OF THE DAY
Hominem pagina nostra sapit.
“My page tastes of humanity.”
Martial, Epigrams 10.4 · translation ours (literal)
