Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 July 2017
Quand on parle de « famille », et plus précisément de « famille aristocratique », il faut d'abord s'entendre sur le sens du terme (J.-L. Flandrin, 1984). Dans la perspective d'une étude comparative, on est amené, pour la famille romaine, à jouer constamment sur deux registres : d'un côté le vocabulaire latin et les concepts sous-jacents (É. Benveniste, 1969 ; G. Franciosi, 1975-1976 ; Ph. Moreau, 1978b ; R. P. Saller, 1984a) — gens, familia, domus, mais aussi nomen, genus, stirps, etc. —, de l'autre la langue et les concepts que manient les historiens de la famille médiévale et moderne, en assimilant ou en adaptant les définitions et les analyses des anthropologues.
Au prix d'une certaine simplification, on parlera donc ici, comme Georges Duby (1981) ou Gérard Delille (1985), sinon Marc Auge (1975) et Françoise Héritier (1981), surtout :
This article first recalls the problems posed by terminological ambiguity and the fact that familles of the Roman aristocracy studied by historians have been artifactually reconstructed by prosopologists according to literary sources for the Republic and epigraphic sources for the Empire. We then consider the specific answers provided by Roman society to problems crucial for any study of aristocratie strategies: demographic behavior (celibacy, marriage, fertility, birth rate, etc.), the choice of spouses (in marriage and kinship), and practices related to succession and inheritance. We compare their behavior with that of aristocracies from other eras and social contexts who had similar goals: the biological continuation of their familles, the transmission and increase of patrimonies, and the diversification and extension of symbolic capital. Despite the Roman aristocracy's flexibility regarding adoption and divorce, it seems to hâve suffered from similar difficulties and failings as later ones. These difficulties indicate the coexistence of thoroughly contradictory ideals and practices which proscribe our viewing their behavior as uniform ; rather it continually changed over time and space, as a function above ail of transformations in political leadership.