By their social and material context as markers of graves, dedications and public signs of honour, inscriptions offer a distinct perspective on the social lives, occupations, family belonging, mobility, ethnicity, religious affiliations, public honour and legal status of Roman women ranging from slaves and freedwomen to women of the elite and the imperial family, both in Rome and in Italian and provincial towns. They thus shed light on women who are largely overlooked by the literary sources. The wide range of inscriptions and graffiti included in this book show women participating not only in their families and households but also in the social and professional life of their cities. Moreover, they offer us a glimpse of women's own voices. Marital ideals and problems, love and hate, friendship, birth and bereavement, joy and hardship all figure in inscriptions, revealing some of the richness and variety of life in the ancient world.

‘Hemelrijk (Univ. of Amsterdam, the Netherlands) has produced a remarkably informative and useful work … what makes the book particularly valuable to scholars as well as students is the separate downloadable PDF (available on the publisher's website) of the original Greek and Latin texts of all the inscriptions, edited in accordance with modern epigraphical conventions. Anyone interested in the ancient world will learn much from this excellent work … Highly recommended.’

M. J. Johnson Source: Choice Magazine

‘There is a great deal of pleasure and a wealth of information to be derived from Women and Society in the Roman World … Hemelrijk’s carefully curated and annotated collection of inscriptions fill a longstanding lacuna. Her sourcebook places front and centre the integral role of epigraphy as a rich reservoir of socio-historical and cultural detail about women extending beyond the strictly delimited stratum of elite and imperial households into all sectors of the ancient – and, in this case, Roman – world.’

Peter Keegan Source: Bryn Mawr Classical Review

‘… immensely useful for the study of Christian origins, for by illuminating ancient Roman women’s lives it sheds greater light on the world in which participants in early Christ cults lived. Many thanks to Emily Hemelrijk for producing such an informative and much-needed collection.’

Alicia J. Batten Source: Review of Biblical Literature