Not just a housekeeper: a new look at the work of the Roman vilica

Abstract The presence of the vilica or female supervisor at a Roman villa is attested across five centuries in varied texts, and her duties are detailed in an entire book of Columella’s On Agriculture . This paper challenges assumptions by modern scholars that her managerial functions were confined to those of a housekeeper, focused on food supplies for the household and the supervision of domestic labor inside the house. Through closer examination of textual, iconographic, and archaeological evidence, we can see that the vilica ’s principal role was to oversee not the domestic sphere, but rather a range of vital productive activities on the farm. In particular, she seems to have been responsible for wine and oil making and for important rituals linked to production. This has implications for our understanding of the roles of women within Roman farming and the Roman economy.