Stigmatized persons are hard to recover, esp. voices of late antique sex workers. Late Roman historian Ulriika Vihervalli has a study in their newish (2024), open access book _Desire & Disunity - Christian Communities and Sexual Norms in the Late Antique West_ on methods archive.org/details/oape... - ThreadSky

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sarahebond.bsky.social • 30 days ago

Stigmatized persons are hard to recover, esp. voices of late antique sex workers. Late Roman historian Ulriika Vihervalli has a study in their newish (2024), open access book _Desire & Disunity - Christian Communities and Sexual Norms in the Late Antique West_ on methods https://archive.org/details/oapen-20.500.12657-89837/page/115/mode/1up

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sarahebond.bsky.social•30 days ago

Sadly, most of the evidence is in proscriptive texts like the Theodosian Code, but Vihervalli looks to Salvian and to Maximus of Turin to see how clerics tried to convert sex workers. You can also read this book via @jstor.bsky.social open access + @archive.org: https://www.jstor.org/stable/jj.6947062.

sarahebond.bsky.social•30 days ago

What does it means when Augustine says:

Augustinus Ordine 2.12 CCSL 29.114:

Aufer meretrices de rebus humanis, turbaveris omnia libidinibus.

Remove prostitutes from human societies and you will throw everything into confusion through lusts.

See McGinn 2004: 95: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3998/mpub.17679

sarahebond.bsky.social•30 days ago

Recovering the lives, stigmata, and economies of marginalized sex workers is worth it, but it does require a different approach in the archives. I laud Vihervalli and medievalists like Susan McDonough for exploring strategies of recovery for these workers. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781032655826-16/archival-scraps-collective-biography-susan-mcdonough

sarahebond.bsky.social•30 days ago

Addendum: Podcast between @goingmedieval.bsky.social and Jamie Page on medieval sex workers: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/medieval-sex-workers/id1564113746?i=1000685217587 and then Sarah Levin-Richardson' book on the Brothel of Pompeii for earlier evidence: https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/brothel-of-pompeii/30A33063D0317A93E86D821FCDF86A79

lostgoth.bsky.social•29 days ago

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