The Lex Oppia was a law established in ancient Rome in 215 BC, at the height of the Second Punic War during the days of national catastrophe after the Battle of Cannae,[1] and repealed in 195 BC.
Instituted by Marcus Oppius, a tribune of the plebs during the consulship of Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus and Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, the Lex Oppia was the first of a series of sumptuary laws, and it restricted not only a woman's wealth, but also her display of wealth.[1] Specifically, it forbade any woman to possess more than half an ounce of gold, to wear a multi-colored garment (particularly those trimmed in purple), or to ride in an animal-drawn vehicle in the city or any town or within a mile thereof, except in the case of public religious festivals.[2]
In his Ab urbe condita (From the founding of the city) book 34 Livy discusses the abolishment of the Lex Oppia from the perspective of Cato the Elder and Lucius Valerius.[3]