STOLA
STOLA The
stola was a garment
peculiar to the Roman matron, and was worn as a badge of lawful marriage
(cf.
V. Max. 6.1; Hor.
Sat. 1.2, 94). It was a
tunica put
on over the shift or
tunica interior, and
reached down to the ankles. There is reason to believe that it was identical
with the
tunica recta or regilla, which the bride
wore at the marriage ceremony (cf. Becker-Göll,
Gallus, 2.27). It was bordered below with a flounce or hem
called
instita (Hor.
Sat. 1.2, 29), and seems from certain monuments to have also had
a purple stripe as a border round the neck. This has been identified with
the
patagium, perhaps correctly, though the
passages in which it is mentioned speak of the
patagium as being of gold (Nonius, p. 540, 4; Tert.
de Pallio, 3;
TOGA), not purple. It had sleeves, reaching down to the elbows,
fastened with a row of clasps, and not sewn. If, however, the
tunica interior had sleeves, the stola was without
them, as in the wellknown statue. of Livia, shown in the accompanying cut.
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Statue of Livia.
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Like the corresponding Greek garment, the stola was girded (cf. Ennius, ap.
Non. p. 198, “et quis illaec est lugubri succincta stola;”
though this is not conclusive, as is shown below) generally high above the
waist, forming a cluster of folds (cf. Martial,
3.93,
4). This, too, is shown by the
monuments on which it appears. The word
stola,
as derived from the Greek
στολή, had
originally a quite general meaning (Nonius, p. 537, 24: “Stolam
veteres non honestam vestem solum sed etiam omnem quae corpus
tegeret” ), and in Ennius it is used of men's as well as women's
clothes (
Frag. ed. Ribbeck, vv. 285, 287, 345). There is no
record of the date at which it was adopted by the Roman women, but one
cannot be wrong in connecting the change with the transformation which the
PALLA had undergone. That is
to say, when the palla, which was originally worn like the Doric shift, was
used as a shawl or mantle, another undergarment besides the tunica interior
became necessary, and that adopted by the matrons was the stola. The disuse
of the
TOGA which was in the
earliest times worn by women as well as men, is probably not unconnected
with this change. However this may be, the
longa
vestis is mentioned as early as the Second Punic War as the
privilege of married women (Macrob.
Saturn.
1.6, 13; cf.
C. I. L. 1.1194, “ita leibertate illei me,
hie me decora[r]at stola” ). It remained in use as the garb of
the
matronae (
Cic.
Phil. 2.18,
44;--Varro,
L. L. 8, 28; 9, 48; 10, 27) until the time of Tiberius,
when it ceased to be fashionable. References to it in literature are,
however, none the less frequent in post-Augustan writers (
Mart. 1.35,
8,
&c.), and in Ulpian it is one of the
muliebria
vestimenta:
“quae matris familiae
[p. 2.717]causa sunt
comparata” (
Dig. 34,
2,
23,
2). Under
the Empire, as its use in actual life became less common, it was apparently
given a symbolic meaning, and bestowed on matrons who had the
jus liberorum. Such at least is the most probable
explanation of the title
stolata femina, which
occurs as a name of honour on inscriptions, chiefly of the 2nd and 3rd
centuries A.D. (Orelli-Henzen, 3030, 7190, note 2;
C. I. L.
3.5225, 5283, 6155, p. 998: cf. Hübner,
Hermes, 1878, xiii. p. 425
seq., and
Comm. phil. in hon. Thes. Mommsenii, p. 104
seq.). Such a stola was doubtless distinguished in
some way from that in ordinary use. (Marquardt,
Privatleben,
pp. 60, 573-575, 581; Iwan Miller,
Handbuch, pp. 803, 876-77;
Becker-Göll,
Gallus, 2.27, 3.253;
Baumeister,
Denkmäler, art.
Toga, p. 1841.)
[
W.C.F.A]
