as proponents of “family values” might be interested to know, familia itself ultimately derives from the word famulus, meaning “slave.” A family was originally all those people under the domestic authority of a paterfamilias, and that authority was, in early Roman law at least, conceived as absolute.101 A man did not have total power over his wife, since she was still to some degree under the protection of her own father, but his children, slaves, and other dependents were his to do with as he wanted—at least in early Roman law, he was perfectly free to whip, torture, or sell them. A father
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