The question of what kind of clothing is appropriate for women as well as for men, and what the consequences of violating these social expectations can be, plays an important role in many of the poems in Propertius' 4^th book (c. 16 B C) . The polyphonic thematic stress on dress and gender roles can be understood against the background of the cultural developments of the Late Republic on the one hand and the restoration efforts of the first princeps on the other. Various facets of this phenomenon can be illustrated in particular by the example of silk robes from Kos in 4.2 and 4.5, by Arethusa's transformation into an Amazon in 4.3 and the appearances of other fighting women, as well as by the figure of Hercules in 4.9, who wants to gain access to the rites of the Bona dea, among others, by referring to the women's clothes he once wore hiding at the court of Queen Omphale in the disguise of a young girl.