Women in Antiquity: CLAS 330/HUM 330/WS 330 (3 units)
Presession, Summer 1995: Monday, May 15 - Saturday, June 3
9:00 -11:50 AM MTWTHF ML 312
Instructor: Marilyn B. Skinner (mskinner@ccit.arizona.edu)

Readings:
Pomeroy, chapter 4
Lefkowitz and Fant: 79, 82-83; 86-88

Solon: Archon of Athens in 594 BC. Responsible for legislation codifying changes in Athenian women's social and legal position that had developed throughout Archaic period.

Purpose: curbing aristocracy through sumptuary laws and strengthening democracy.

The Status Dispute: "seclusion" vs. "protection"

• attempts to explain women's absence from public life
• evidence on each side of the debate
• errors in framing the question
• integration of household resources (estate & dowry)
• parallel situation in contemporary Mediterranean societies: women's networks operate as a counter to men's public activities and discourse ("coffeehouse palaver")

Economic Protection for Women: Dowry (L&F 79)

1. Girl's share of paternal estate; after 451/50, establishes citizenship of children
2. Provided for poor girls by law; state dowered war orphans
3. Inalienable
4. Passes from husband's administration to son, who inherits
5. Economic competition to dower girls well

Citizenship and Demographics

1. Adult male citizen population of Attica: 30,000-40,000 in 5th century, 21,000 in later 4th century
2. Athenian concept of "citizenship" - were women citizens? Meaning of "citizen": inherited and formal participation in a community
3. Pericles' citizenship law of 451/50 BC
   • effect upon population
   • Peloponnesian war creates shortage of men
4. Life expectancy and age at marriage: effect on family patterns
   • 45.0 for men
   • 36.2 for women
   • 2.7 surviving children per female
5. "Infanticide dispute"

Customs and Laws Pertaining to Women

1. Property administration:
   • small trousseau (limited to three dresses)
   • could receive bequest from husband (added to dowry)
   • contractual capacity limited to bushel of barley (L&F 83)
2. Divorce
   • father could take daughter back
   • repudiation by husband (confiscation of dowry in case of adultery)
   • wife seeking divorce must work through male kin
   • children remained with father
3. Proof of legitimate marriage or citizenship (L&F 86, 90)
   • no written records
   • witnesses and circumstantial evidence
4. Respectable women not named in public (L&F 79)
   • Contrast situations of Aristotle's daughter and Herpyllis
   • Implications of naming a woman (e.g., Alce in L&F 87)
   • Female use of matronymics

Role of Women in Religion

1. Ritual activities--women contribute to welfare of city-state
   1. Girls: choral dancing, arrephoroi, "bears" at Brauron
   2. Married women:
      • Panathenaic procession, other civic cults
      • Thesmophoria
      • Dionysiac rituals
2. Priestesses: important class of citizen women named during their lifetimes in inscriptions, because of their public role
   1. often hereditary within family
   2. function: sacerdotal official
      • oversee cult of divinity
      • administrative duties connected with cult, e.g., assessing fines, organizing festivals
      • legal standing exactly parallel to that of male counterparts, could make contracts, sue and be sued
      • sacrosanct, given public funeral
   3. acted in public sphere when performing religious function
      • Priestess of Athena Polias forbade Spartan king Cleomenes to enter Acropolis (508 BC)
      • Theano, priestess of Demeter and Kore, defied public order to curse Alcibiades (415 BC)
3. Priestess of Athena Polias
   1. served for life, had residence on Acropolis
   2. managed cult and its personnel
   3. trained girls who served the goddess
   4. oversaw the weaving of sacred robe and its dedication
   5. prepared sacred banquests
   6. Lysimache: held office for 64 years during the period of the Peloponnesian War, named by Aristophanes in contexts that suggest she was publicly known as proponent of peace
4. Role of Basilinna, wife of the Archon Basileus, at Anthesteria
   • secret offerings to Dionysus
   • Gerari (fourteen women) perform rituals under her direction
   • symbolic wife of the god
5. Priestess of Demeter at Eleusis:
   1. eponymous
   2. paid an obel daily by all initiates
   3. priestesses may have enacted sacred tale of goddesses

www.stoa.org/diotima