"Attitudes towards them in early Roman society become clear through a set of Leges Regiae (‘Royal Laws’) put forward by Romulus, designed to make them behave with modesty and decorum. A woman joined to her husband by confarreatio (formal marriage) shared in all his possessions and sacred rites, and nothing could annul these marriages apart from adultery, or if she poisoned his children or cloned his key. Quite how much authority the husband had over his wife is debatable: Cato tells us that husbands had the right to kill their wives for adultery or drinking (because drinking leads to adultery), but Dionysius of Halicarnassus states that the husband had at least to confer with the woman’s relatives first."
