Sulla dote di Pudentilla nell’Apologia di Apuleio

Abstract

This article tries to make a point about the question of Pudentilla’s dowry and the role that it played in Apuleius’s self-defense in his Apology. After having examined the type of evidence showed by Apuleius in the law court, the order in which it is presented and the function it has in the oration, we proceed to examine the question of the dowry. This is linked to the circumstance of a wedding celebrated in the isolation of the country and not in town, an unusual, though not illicit custom. From Apuleius’s evidence, we can deduce that the rhetorician will base his defense on the concepts of Pudentilla’s self-mastery and freedom of choice; moreover we can assume that the dowry had been fixed according to the dotis promissio and not the dotis dictio regulation.