Ancient Athenian Women Essay

Hipponax famously asserted, “There are only two happy days in man’s life with a woman: the day he marries her and the day he buries her.” Many ancient texts, such as Hesiod’s Works and Days, lament the necessity to procreate with and live alongside women – an inherently evil sex created by Zeus as “a plague to men.” Ancient Athens effectively propagated its patriarchal social structure through the institution of marriage; by formally restraining the “dangerous” reproductive powers of women, men ensured the production of legitimate male heirs and perpetuated the patrilineal endowment of wealth. Through the influential authority of male kyrios, display of dowries, and focus on fertility rites, weddings – likened by scholars to the practices

For this reason, it is impossible to analyze the roles of women as a unanimous whole throughout Greek antiquity. This paper focuses on wedding rituals involving elite women of Ancient Athens, especially during the Classical era, due to their important functions of forming political alliances between families and consolidating wealth. These marriages – one of the few festivities women were allowed to actively participate in – were symbolic coming-of-age transitions that legitimized social attitudes and hierarchies within the ancient Athenian community. Female philosophers, particularly Pythagoreans, emphasized the concept of harmonia (“balance”) as the underlying key to order. This sense of harmony was said to appear as a result of women properly fulfilling their appointed roles in society. The most important role for a woman was transitioning from her status as a parthenos (maiden) to a nymphe (married woman without children), then ultimately to a gyne (adult woman with a child). An elite woman was essentially obligated to wed as a matter of public interest, raising legitimate noble children – particularly boys – for the continued prosperity of Athenian society. In fact, a man was legally permitted to murder anyone who partook in sexual intercourse with a woman whom he “kept for the purpose of begetting legitimate children.” Thus this system was inherently created by and for men, demoting women to

In Hesiod’s Works and Days, he advises men on the proper time to wed: “Bring home a wife to your house when you are of the right age, while you are not far short of thirty years nor much above; this is the right age for marriage.” Plato asserts that men had an obligation to the State to marry and procreate; those who were unmarried by the age of thirty-five should be fined and denied his honor. This age difference created an inherently asymmetrical relationship since young girls were placed under the authority of men who were about twice as old as they. As some scholars rightfully pointed out, “because Athenian girls married very young (in many cases, at 12-14 years), their introduction to sexual intercourse must often have been, or seemed to be, tantamount to rape.” In addition to the superiority bestowed by this age difference, it was not uncommon for grooms to enter marriages with some sexual experience. Ancient Athens promoted sexual, political apprenticeships (paiderastia) between men and young boys. This homosexual behavior was considered more pure than sexual relations with a female, which reinforced the patriarchal disregard for women. With no equality in age, sexual experience, or legal status, the polarity of power between bride and groom was