Welcome to my blog on topics about keeping the home - or attempting to - as a Gen X Mom of four and wife to one. :) This blog is written by me, Lori Seaborg, from the Florida-Alabama Gulf Coast. I'm not the person who is ahead of you in mothering and homemaking knowledge. I'm just the gal right beside you, motivating the 11yo daydreamer, keeping up with the 9yo future homemaker extraordinaire (every mama needs a helper like this one!), teaching the rascally 6-year-old while occupying the 3yo. Let's learn together!
Otacilia Pola was a woman of the ancient city of Pergamum, before the 3rd Century BC. All that we know of her is what her husband inscribed upon her tombstone:
Iouliov Bassov Otakilia Pwllh th glukutath gunaiki, filandrw kai filoteknw sumbiwsash ajmemptwv eth l
Well, that's Greek to me, so here is the translation:
"Julius Bassus to Otacilia Polla my sweetest wife, who loved her husband and children and lived with me blamelessly for thirty years."
In her husband's eyes, and worthy of inscription, Otacilia Polla was sweet, she was loving, and she was blameless.
Would you like to be remembered for anything other than that?
How about this one?:
"Julius Bassus to Otacilia Polla my groomed wife, who cleaned after her husband and children and lived with me in wealth for thirty years."
Being groomed, keeping the house clean, and having wealth may be worthwhile ambitions…..here on Earth. But we Christians are to seek after heavenly ambitions, those things that will give God reason to say, "Well done, my good and faithful servant."
If Otacilia Polla was only focused on the external things, do you think we would even know her name today? Yes, her name may have been on a tombstone, but her husband would not have written that she was sweet, loving, and blameless. Through centuries, Otacilia Polla's virtues have lived on to bring motivation to others.
I don't think her husband and children were the only ones who were pleased with Otacilia Polla, do you?
Where did you get this story from? It is amazing. Shades of Prov 31 all over it. But I really am fascinated as to where such a thing is recorded. Can you let me know?
I ran into it in a commentary...of all the things! When I was studying Titus 2 one day! Then I googled Otacilia Polla on the 'Net and found more written on the subject of what's on her tombstone. Here is a great commentary on the verses: http://www.gracenotes.info/titus/titus07.html . Scroll down to Titus 2:4 and then to "Mental Attitude" and you'll see our friend Otacilia Polla mentioned, in a slightly different translation than the one I originally found. The commentary in the link above, by the way, is well worth reading. There are a hundred sermons in those few verses, once you dig into the old language.
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