Not only are Juvenal’s images of men literary constructions but, in addition, they are also constructed as satire. In a genre which extends into different areas of everyday life without intending to depict social reality, the satiric perspective focuses in an often biased and distorting manner on unmanly men, whose behaviour deviates from traditional ideals of Roman masculinity and ‚virtus‘ (virtue, manliness). These ideals are evoked by the satirist as a foil for contemporary Roman elite men. As a multi-relational category, masculinity draws attention to the wide range of male characters in Juvenal’s satires, in particular in relation to femininity, to (passive) sexuality, to social and economic status. Yet masculinity is but ‚one‘ category of difference among others in a complex fabric of elements of the literary mise-en-scène of characters.