In order to avoid an incredibly lengthy response, I'm going to have to simplify greatly. The Greeks were far worse sexists than the Romans, and as Dr. Emily McDermott used to remark, Greek men simply didn't "get" (or seemed to regard as almost wholly alien) women. Greek wives, daughters, mothers, etc., were no less bound to family than Roman women. However, they lacked the kind of familial (albeit pervasively and heavily sexist) bonds that the Romans had. Greek husbands/fathers had separate quarters for the women and thought their wives were for having children, while female companionship was something one sought from professional courtesans. Classical Greek culture was heavily influenced by the masculine ethos as sung in the Homeric epics an depicted in the parades-turned-dramas, and lacked the more practical, agrarian perspective we find in Roman thought and depicted in various archaeological remains.

Also, Greek household management (οἰκονομικός) was culturally, intellectually, philosophically, and in most other ways different from the structure and the basis for the structure of the Roman household. Most concisely, Greek οἰκονομικός WAS concerned with management and had a kind of "economics" flavor to its systematic arranging of its constituents, treating those which were human not too differently from structural/architectural constituent parts.

The Roman family, particularly after Augustus, was a micro-empire/clan: the gens. Augustus deliberately modeled himself after the paterfamilias of the Roman family and therefore Rome itself became the macro-version of the Roman family. Recall that the paterfamilias had control over the life and death of the whole FAMILY (at least in theory), not just women. Also, although ideas such as whether Greek women were allowed attend the theater are highly speculative, the general segregation of women from any and all spheres of life outside of particular aspects of household management (with rare exceptions, such as priestesses and courtesans) isn't really a matter of debate. Not that Roman women faired much better, but we do find an increase in women who were educated, women with political power (think of Cicero's untimely demise), and some of the earliest common "story" stereotypes/motifs (the wicked-stepmother, the matriarch, etc.; in Greek literature we find less of this and one of the most common is women as witches or nagging wives, present in Roman literature as well but alongside other, more varied roles that probably reflected increased interactions with various spheres of public and private life).

Thanks Andrew. How about pre Ceasar Roman patters? Also suggestions for secondary literature addressing what you note in your helpful note. Thanks again.

Sources are somewhat easy as I still have my folder "Roman Women", which was originally just sources I used or was provided for an undergraduate course but which I continued to add to.

I must start with the obligatory "plugging" or recommendations of works by friends, although I actually DO recommend them (except the first).

The first is mine. I recommend it only because it's easy to find and the bibliography is decent: Protofeminist or Misogynist? Medea as a case study of gendered discourse in Euripidean drama (I think I still have it hosted here, but it's been put up other places).

On to the real recommendations:

1) Mary Lefkowitz' Women's Life in Greece and Rome (actually, she co-edited it with Fant, but I don't know her and Leftkowitz' other main contribution to the study of women in antiquity is about women in Greek myth).

2) Emily McDermott's Euripides' Medea. It's surprisingly broad for a book on a single play in how thoroughly it covers the dynamics of women's lives in Greece (especially marriage, although she devotes an entire chapter to the conceptions of family and another on two Greek conceptions of the civic especially as they relate to women's spheres of activity).

3) Nathan Barnes' Reading 1 Corinthians with Philosophically Educated Women. I actually haven't read this book, but it's based on his 2012 dissertation that I have read and have attached.

Now for the non-biased recommendations:

General books on women in the classical world:

1) For a general, broad and diverse approach designed to give you the most important information about the key topics together with the best sources for more information, there's Rawson's (Ed.) A Companion to Families in the Greek and Roman Worlds.

2) Women in the Classical World by Fanthan et al. is a must have.

3) Roman Women edited by Fraschetti contains a number of good essays on particular women, several of whom (e.g., Fulvia or Cornelia, the "mother of the Gracchi) are used to exemplify certain aspects of women's lives during Julius Caesar's day or around then.

4) Matrona Docta. Educated Women in the Roman Elite from Cornelia to Julia Domna (Routledge Classical Monographs) by Hemelrijk

5) Reading Roman Women by Dixon

6) Pomeroy's Goddesses, whores, wives, and slaves. Women in classical antiquity is a classic.

7) Marilyn B. Skinner's Sexuality in Greek and Roman Culture.

Books with primary source material:

1) I have to mention Leftkowitz here again. I've attached the scan I received years ago from the book she and Fant edited. 

2) Sexuality in Greek and Roman Society and Literature: A Sourcebook (Routledge Sourcebooks for the Ancient World)

Specific studies:

I've tried to provide a sample focused on women in relation to family, but have included more general sources because among those I had on hand they are important. See attached (hopefully they upload).

Totally forgot to include one of the books I got off of my shelves for recommendation:

Grubbs' Women and the Law in the Roman Empire: A Sourcebook on Marriage, Divorce and Widowhood

Thanks. This will help me out here as I think these differences here lead also to differences in political things.

Hi Clifford,

Just stumbled across the following article reference and thought it might be of interest to you.

Greco-Roman Sex Ratios and Femicide in Comparative Perspective, by Walter Scheidel.

Abstract:     

Is it possible to demonstrate that ancient Greeks or Romans disposed of newborn daughters in ways that skewed sex ratios in favor of males? Epigraphic, papyrological, and archaeological evidence fails to provide reliable empirical support for this notion. At the same time, we cannot rule out the possibility that femicide did in fact occur. Drawing on comparative anthropological and historical evidence, this paper briefly develops two models of femicidal practice.

A different perspective, particularly if there is a demonstrated skewing of sex ratios.

You should be able to download it here:

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1505793

Thanks

Hi Clifford.  Just stumbled across the following on academia.edu, and thought it might be of use.  (Title listing only, so not downloadable there.)

David M. Pritchard 2004, ‘A Woman’s Place in Classical Athens: An Overview’, Ancient History 34, 170-91.

There is an overall concern with Athens here. Greece was not a nation as it now is, but a cultural entity embracing a number of societies. The fear and confusion regarding women was mainly, but not entirely, an Athenian trait.