THE MATERIAL SIDES OF MARRIAGE Women and Domestic Economies in Antiquity

In the 6th century in Liguria Maritima, which had returned under Byzantine control, archaeological and epigraphic sources rather than the rare written documents confirm that women in a class of local possessores played a leading role, along with the Byzantine civil and military hierarchies. The presence in Albenga (Savona) of at least two rural churches that were also used as cemeteries (S. Calocero and S. Vittore) indicates that there was a privileged social class that probably continued to wield significant political power or carried out important administrative functions. In the more outlying areas with respect to the antique Roman municipia, groups of burials emerged near early-Christian churches based on the presence of an aristocratic social class that not only chose privileged funerary sites but also commissioned expertly and artistically decorated stone sarcophaguses or carefully crafted masonry graves. This lends plausibility to the theory that even after death it was the intention of the deceased to ensure that their power and prestige would endure, a situation also confirmed by the type of container used to preserve the body. The social and cultural level of these wealthy classes is exemplified through elaborate female funerary epigraphs, like those of Honorata and Heliades (Albenga), Maria (Capo Don), Paula (Pieve in Finale) and, above all, Domina Lidoria (S. Paragorio in Noli). Based on these texts it can be postulated that during a period of transformation and change – like the one following the end of Roman political control – women played a central role in the political framework of western Liguria Maritima.