Pomponia Graecina

POMPONIA GRAECINA. - A Roman noblewoman, wife of Aulus Plautius. According to the testimony of Tacitus (Annal., XIII, 32), around 58 A.D., "superstitionis externae rea", she was referred to the judgment of her husband, who, according to ancient custom, judged her before her relatives concerning her life and reputation and declared her innocent.

From this passage of Tacitus, in connection with the subsequent statements in which it is said that for 40 years P. lived in continual sadness and wore nothing but mourning garments, it has commonly been concluded that P. was a Christian. If this opinion, which seemed to be supported by the discovery of certain Christian inscriptions of relatives or descendants of P. (De Rossi, La Roma sotter. crist., II, Rome 1867, pp. 281-362), cannot have a direct foundation in the words of Tacitus, it may nevertheless be accepted by deduction.

The foreign superstition of which P. was accused could only have been the Jewish or the Christian religion, because every other was not incompatible for a Roman. As for Judaism, besides the fact that it enjoyed favor at the imperial court, where even Poppaea, Nero's favorite, was a proselyte (Josephus, Antiq. Iud., XX, 8), one would not understand who could ever have accused P. and had her judged. Supposing her instead to be Christian, the accusers could have been the Jews themselves, who already from the beginning had hated the Christians and were interested in striking at Christian propaganda by having one of its noblest conquests suppressed.

Agostino Amore