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VI. Gender

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 March 2021

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Extract

In the West, recent years have witnessed a big increase in accepting sexual fluidity, as manifested in the growing visibility of the LGBT community. It was different in antiquity, where a binary culture of masculinity and femininity prevailed, although reality will have been more diverse. Ancient historians and literary scholars have worked on concepts of masculinity in antiquity, but more recent studies of Greek religion have mainly analysed positions and representations of women, in so far as they have focused on gender differences at all. I will therefore first look at some elements of the female life cycle and daily life (§1), then consider representations of women in art and myth, and goddesses as possible role models (§2), and conclude with a discussion of the most important women's festivals (§3). At all times, we should keep in mind, however, that the real life of women probably differed significantly from male ideologies of their worth and proper place. This means that, although I focus on female gendered roles, male gendered roles will play a role too, even if more indirectly than directly in this chapter.

Type
Research Article
Information
New Surveys in the Classics , Volume 46: Greek Religion (Second Edition) , 2016 , pp. 79 - 96
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 2021

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References

1 Rosen and Sluiter 2003; Van Nortwick 2008; Rubarth 2014.

2 For surveys, see Scheer 2011; Foxhall 2013. Bjork-James 2019 provides a useful online bibliography.

3 As with the chapter on myth, no modern study of Greek religion has a chapter on gender. This absence is also noted by Georgoudi 2005: 70 n. 6, but see Goff and Taylor 2004; Bodiou and Mehl 2009; Dillon, Eidinow, and Maurizio 2017.

4 For a good introduction to many aspects of gender and history, see Downs and Rubin 2019.

5 For birth, see Bremmer 2020a.

6 Ephippus fr. 3; Nonnus, Dion. 25.220; Hesychius σ 1981. It is unknown whether this custom was widespread.

7 Calame 1997 (≈ Calame 2019) is still seminal. See also Sourvinou-Inwood 1988; Dowden 1989; Dillon 2003; Neils and Oakley 2003.

8 For vases, see Sourvinou-Inwood 1991: 58–98; Stansbury-O'Donnell 2009; Klinger 2009: 104; Bernhardt 2014; Tsiafakis 2019: no. 5 (with further bibliography). On ‘taming’, see Calame 1997: 238–44; Topper 2010 (with latest bibliography).

9 For Io, see Yalouris 1990. For Proitos, see, most recently, Cairns 2005; Fowler 2000–13: ii.169–78, 239–40; Bremmer 2019e: 40f.

10 For the Leukippides, see Prange 1992; Calame 1997: 185–91; Baldassi 2018. On ‘kidnapping’, see Bremmer and Horsfall 1987: 110 (Bremmer). For Thessaly, see Aelian as translated by Scholfield 1959.

11 For Athens/Attica, see Burkert 2004b: 119–21; Parker 2005: 228–49. For Corinth, see Calame 1997: 120–1. For Ilion, see Graf 2000a. For Keos, see Plut. Mor. 249. For Magna Graecia, see Kleibrink 2017.

12 For Sparta, see Ducat 2006: 241–5, 261–77; Nobili 2014; Calame 1997. For ‘lesbian’ love in myth and Sparta, see Calame 1997: 252–5.

13 See Lardinois 1989, 2010; duBois 1995; Caciagli 2011: 97–133.

14 For Chios, see Ath. 13.566E. For, Elis, see Paus. 5.16; also Calame 1990; Serwint 1993; Mirón 2004–5 [2007].

15 For Helen, see SEG 26.457f, 35.320 (?); Kahil 1988; Calame 1997: 191–202. On kanêphoros, see Roccos 1995. For Kallisto, see Henrichs 1988: 254–67; Dowden 1989: 182–91; McPhee 1992; Fowler 2000–13: ii.107–8. On beauty contests, see Graf 1985: 275; Gherchanoc 2016.

16 For her name, which is sometimes spelled as Agraulos, see Fowler 2000–13: ii.454.

17 Pace Parker 2005: 222 n. 17; cf. Eur. Ion 23; Hesychius α 611: Ἀγλαυρίδες⋅ νύμφαι παρὰ Ἀθηναίοις.

18 For this much discussed ritual and myth, see, most recently, Parker 2005: 219–23; Sourvinou-Inwood 2011: 36–50; Räuchle 2015; Meyer 2017: 267–88 (with detailed discussion of the literary, iconographical, and topographical evidence); Mackin Roberts 2019. There are also interesting observations in Sonnino 2010.

19 Holloway 1992; Meyer 2007. Rühfel 1992, notes that girls’ marble statues were often smaller than those of boys; see also Osborne 1994.

20 Many studies, but see, especially, Oakley and Sinos 1993; Vérilhac and Vial 1998.

21 On women and dirt, see Parker 1983: 84–5; Cole 1992; von Staden 1992b; Carson 1999.

22 See Kron 1996: 140–55; Lindner 2003; Pirenne-Delforge 2005; J. Connelly 2007; Bruit Zaidman 2013; Leventis 2019.

23 For Hera's priestesses, see Fowler 2000–13: ii.683–5 (quotation). For Lysimache, see Thonemann 2020. For the Pythia, see, most recently, Graf 2011; Chalupa 2014. For female seers, see Bremmer 2019e: 153–5.

24 Richardson 1974: 179–80; Manfrini 1992; Pfisterer-Haas 2002; Kosso and Lawton 2009.

25 Ferrandini Troisi 1986; Sofroniew 2012.

26 On private shrines, see Purvis 2003; Blok 2018. For late antiquity, see Bremmer 2017: 33–41. For old women, see Bremmer 2019e: 234.

27 On Orphism and women, see Bremmer, 2019c: 80.

28 On supervision of women, see Cole 1992: 113–14. For Phryne, see Gherchanoc 2012; Eidinow 2016: 23–30; Bremmer 2020c.

29 For Athens, see the nicely produced Kaltsas and Shapiro 2008.

30 Meyer 2014.

31 Bérard 1984; Shapiro 1991; Lissarrague 1992 (funeral, libation, marriage, and more); Merthen 2014; E. Giudice 2015: 127–54 (richly illustrated); Gaifman 2018: 74–9 (departure of warriors).

32 Klöckner 2002.

33 For the role of mythology, see Gould 2001: 112–57. For Pandora, see Bremmer 2008: 19–34; Steiner 2013.

34 Bernhard and Daszewski 1986 (Ariadne); Neils 1990 (Medea). For betrayal, see Bremmer 2019e: 245.

35 For opposing views, compare Sourvinou-Inwood 1990 with Foley 1996.

36 For this example, with ethnographical parallels, see Bremmer 2008: 329–33.

37 See Fowler 2000–13: ii.217 (Lemnian women); Villagra 2018.

38 On Eriphyle, see Buxton 1982: 37. For the Phineids and Themisto, see Watson 1995: 236–7 and 224–5, respectively. For Medea and Procne, see Klöckner 2005; E. Giudice 2008; Räuchle 2008.

39 For old women, see Bremmer 2019e: 244.

40 See Pilz 2011a; M. West 2013: 129–62.

41 Blok 1995 (with bibliography); Dowden 1997; Wünsche 2008; Martini 2013.

42 See also Meyer 2010.

43 Loraux 1992 is still fundamental.

44 Masson 1990: 543–7.

45 Argive initiates received a shield during the Heraia: see Burkert 1983: 163–4; Moretti 1991.

46 Burkert 2001–11: vi.104–21.

47 See, most recently, Parker 2005: 270–83; Chlup 2007 (a sophisticated article to which I refer for the various levels of meaning of the Thesmophoria); Bremmer 2014: 170–7 (thick description). Also Ruscillo 2013; Osek 2018; Patera 2020. I refer to these studies for the sources.

48 Demetrios of Kallatis FGrH 86 F 6 (death of twenty-five girls during the festival); Cic. Verr. 4.99 (women and maidens perform sacrifices for Demeter in Sicilian Catane); Lucian, Dial. meret. 2.1 (courtesan and virgin attendance); Schol. Theocr. 4.25c (participation by maidens and women), if in garbled and clearly late text, which still suggests the possibility of local varieties and/or later developments.

49 On huts and beds, see Kron 1988 and 1992: 620–3; von Staden 1992a.

50 Serv. Aen. 1.430 (Corinth); Apollodorus FGrH 244 F 89 (Paros); Hdt. 2.171 (Danaids).

51 On play and festival, see Bowie 1993: 205–27; Zeitlin 1996: 375–416. On meeting in their own demes, see Clinton 1996.

52 Versnel 1993: 242–4.

53 For Baubo, see Bremmer 2019e: 65 (recent bibliography). On walls and secrecy, see Bremmer 2019c.

54 Robert 1969: 1005–7 and 1989: 289–90; McLardy 2015; Henrichs 2019: 3–9.

55 Clinton 1988. For the connection with fertility of the land, note the dedications of ploughs and hoes in the Thesmophoreion of Gela: Kron 1992: 636–9.

56 Detienne 1979. Contra: Kron 1992: 640–3, 650; Osborne 2000. Note also Flemming 2007 (priestesses of Ceres/Demeter).

57 See Pautasso, 2020.

58 For Dionysiac ecstasy, see Henrichs 1994; Gödde 2016.

59 For the Bacchae, see March 1989; Versnel 1990: 31–205, passim.

60 As noted by Heinemann 2016: 502.

61 Kossatz-Deissmann 1991: 175–92.

62 Pace Heinemann 2016: 593 n. 2.

63 Bremmer 2019e: 251–77; McGlashan 2021 (forthcoming).

64 I owe these examples to Osborne 2010a: 368–404 (interesting methodological reflections) at 377. For additional bibliography on the Lenaean vases and the cakes, see Tsiafakis 2019: 10, no. 10; also Heinemann 2016: 429–33. On dance, see Delavaud-Roux 1995, 2006; Toillon 2017.

65 Kannicht 1992; Schlesier 1993; Seaford 1993.

66 Moraw 1998; Fahlbusch 2004; Villanueva Puig 2009; Heinemann 2016; G. Giudice 2018.

67 As observed by Osborne 2010a: 387.

68 Bremmer 2019e: 266–9.

69 See the survey in Versnel 1990: 134–50.

70 Parker 2005: 283–9; Reitzammer 2016; Cook 2018: 87–110.

71 Hes. fr. 139; Sappho fr. 140a, 168; Panyassis fr. 22b Davies = 27 Bernabé; Antimachus of Kolophon fr. 92; Epimenides fr. 13.

72 For all texts, see Bühler 1998: 463–73. See also Hiltebeitel 1988; Holes 2004; Vajda 2008.

73 Du Boulay 1986.

74 Contra Winkler 1990: 188–209, who drew his modern parallels not from rural areas but from circles that had already come into contact with Western ideas.

75 E. Harris 2014.