Roman Marriage System

Ancient Greco-Roman marriage was strictly monogamous. Wives often enjoyed greater financial independence, and society encouraged widows and divorced wives to remarry. Widows could inherit their husbands’ estates, meaning some poor widows remained poor, while rich widows became very wealthy. Some women who married multiple times even accumulated vast fortunes and were sought after by many men. Therefore, while most ordinary widows were “true widows” (1 Timothy 5:3), some were “wanton widows” who lived for pleasure (1 Timothy 5:6).

Cato the Younger was a Roman Republican politician and orator, depicted in Dante’s Divine Comedy as the guardian of Mount Purgatory. He divorced his wife Marcia, who then remarried his 60-year-old friend Quintus Hortensius. Six years later, Marcia, now a widow, inherited Hortensius’s property and returned to Cato the Younger. The two became extremely wealthy. The “wanton widows” (1 Timothy 5:6) might refer to such widows who inherited significant wealth.