The Roman Women Who Drank Their Own Poison

In 331 BCE, mysterious deaths swept through Rome. Then an accusation against some of the city's most prominent women turned an apparent health crisis into one of ancient history's strangest poisoning scandals.

A City Gripped by Mysterious Deaths

Rome was frightened.

In 331 BCE, prominent citizens were dying from an illness no one seemed able to explain. As the deaths mounted, suspicion spread through the city.

Was Rome suffering from a deadly epidemic? Or was someone deliberately killing its citizens?

According to the Roman historian Livy, the answer appeared to arrive from an unexpected source: an enslaved woman with a terrifying accusation.

She claimed that respected Roman matrons were secretly preparing poisons.

What followed was extraordinary.

The Women and Their Mysterious Preparations

The informant approached a Roman official and offered to expose the alleged plot, provided she received protection.

Investigators subsequently discovered preparations in the homes of several women.

But the accused women insisted that the substances were not poisons at all.

They were medicines.

Among the women named in Livy's account were Cornelia and Sergia, who reportedly maintained that their preparations were harmless.

The authorities challenged the women to demonstrate that claim.

If the mixtures were truly medicinal, why not drink them?

Twenty Women Drink

The women agreed.

According to Livy, twenty Roman matrons drank the preparations in an attempt to prove their innocence.

All twenty died.

It was a shocking outcome, and one that appeared to confirm the accusations.

But the scandal did not end there.

Livy reports that the investigation expanded and that 170 women were subsequently convicted.

His account does not establish that all 170 were executed, and the surviving evidence does not allow us to independently verify the scale of the alleged conspiracy.

Nevertheless, the story presents a remarkable picture of a city convinced that deadly substances were being prepared within its own households.

Rome Turns to the Gods

The Romans did not respond only through investigation and punishment.

Livy also describes an unusual religious measure: the revival of a ritual involving the driving of a nail.

In Roman tradition, this solemn act could be performed during moments of public crisis.

It reflected the belief that extraordinary threats sometimes required extraordinary appeals to divine protection.

But the ritual leaves us with another question.

What, exactly, had Rome been trying to stop?

A conspiracy of poisoners?

Or an epidemic that frightened citizens could not understand?

Poison, Epidemic, or Panic?

Livy wrote about these events centuries after they supposedly occurred.

He himself acknowledged uncertainty surrounding the episode, including whether the deaths were caused by disease or deliberate wrongdoing.

That distinction matters.

Ancient communities did not possess modern medical knowledge. When unexplained deaths struck, fear and suspicion could provide answers where evidence could not.

It is possible that the accusations reflected genuine acts of poisoning.

It is also possible that illness, rumor, and public panic helped transform a medical crisis into a criminal scandal.

The surviving account cannot settle the question.

And that is what makes the events of 331 BCE so unsettling.

Twenty women reportedly drank substances they claimed were medicines.

They died.

Another 170 were reportedly convicted.

Yet more than two thousand years later, we still cannot say with confidence whether Rome had uncovered a murderous conspiracy—or created one out of fear.

Poison… or panic?

Historical source: Livy, History of Rome (Ab Urbe Condita), Book 8, Chapter 18.

Historical note: The events are known primarily through Livy's later account. His reported numbers, accusations, and descriptions should not be treated as independently established facts.