Join us 1:30pm on first Wednesdays for our monthly Senior Wednesday. This month's speaker is Dr. Cheryl Golden delivering a talk entitled "Women's Work: Poisons and Women in Roman Culture."

Women's Work: Poisons and Women in Roman Culture

The topic of poison in any society readily brings to mind both accidental and intentional hazards. Household cleaning products and pesticides serve to make our homes safe from some contaminants while creating dangers themselves. The medicine cabinet, containing prescription drugs and other remedies, holds cures, usually safe for the patient, but potentially fatal to others. Outside the household industrial pollution gives us ecological concerns. The city of Rome in the first centuries B.C. and A.D. dealt with many of the same problems. The Roman senate crafted legislation to regulate the sale of hemlock, aconite and opium in the market place and the women who knew how to use these substances. In western literature there is the perception that women who murder do so by stealth or cunning while men murder through force. In the Roman court room and in Roman literature we find examples of women taking advantage of their roles as cooks, healers, mothers, providing food, medicine, and other potions to their unsuspecting "loved ones" only to have their victims fall to feminine foul play. Why?

About the Speaker: Dr. Cheryl Golden,

Professor of History and Director of the Division of Humanities at Newman University

Cheryl Golden is a professor of ancient history at Newman University.  Completing advanced degrees at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and the University of Houston, her teaching and research interests include Greece, Rome, the ancient Near East in areas related to legal, military and political history.  She is currently editing an article on Thucydides' geographic analysis of Thrace and a book on Poisons in the Roman World for Routledge. Working at Newman has allowed Golden to explore a variety of subjects as a generalist, teach abroad in the Netherlands and escort students abroad to England, Italy and Greece.

CHOOSE FROM TWO WAYS TO JOIN THE PRESENTATION:   

In-person: Join us at the Museum of World Treasures for the live, in-person presentation! No need to register — simply walk in! Tickets are $4 plus tax or free for Museum members. Light refreshments provided.

Virtually via YouTube Livestream (link will be sent to members via email).