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World History
SPARTAN WOMEN
It is against the backdrop of this essentially misogynous world, where women were deemed "a curse to
mankind" and "a plague worse than fire or any viper" (Euripides), that the status of Spartan women must
be judged. Spartan women were not as free as modern women. Their primary role in society was that of
wives and mothers. Their fathers chose their husbands for them, and they were honored most for
producing sons. They did not have the right to vote (but then they weren't expected to spend forty years
in the army, either), and they could not be elected to public office. Nevertheless, they enjoyed status and
rights that were exceptional in ancient Greece and the scandal of the ancient world.
The greater freedom and status of Spartan women began at birth. Sparta's laws required female infants
and children to be given the same care and food as their brothers – in contrast to other Greek cities, where
girls were more likely to be exposed (rejected and killed) at birth, were fed on a less nutritious diet than
their brothers, and were prevented from getting exercise or even fresh air.
Furthermore, like their brothers, Spartan girls attended the public school, although for a shorter period of
time than the boys. At school they were allowed and encouraged to engage in sports. But, as Plato points
out in his Protagoras (342d), this education was not purely physical. On the contrary, in Sparta "not
only men but also women pride themselves on their intellectual culture." This was more than mere
literacy: it was systematic education in rhetoric and philosophical thought.
Marriage for a Spartan woman was an almost non-ceremonial event. The woman was abducted in the
night by her suitor, her head was shaved, and she was made to wear men's clothing and lye on a straw
pallet in the dark. From there on she would meet with her husband for almost entirely procreative reasons.
If she was formerly a girl, she became a woman through marriage. Any Spartan man could abduct a wife,
which led to a system of polyandry (many husbands, one wife or vice versa) in Sparta. When a child was
born, the woman had little to do with the his/her upbringing, rather nurses handled the child's care (in
addition, a female Spartan child was subject to the same tests of strength as a male child.).
Because Sparta's male citizens were required to devote their lives to the military and other forms of public
service, Sparta's matrons ran the estates of their husbands. This meant that Spartan wives controlled the
family wealth – and, in effect, the entire Spartan agricultural economy. A Spartan citizen was dependent
on his wife's efficiency to pay his dues to his dining club and his son's agoge fees. This economic power
is in particularly sharp contrast to cities such as Athens, where it was illegal for a woman to control more
money than she needed to buy a bushel of grain. (An excellent article on how Spartan women's economic
power gave them status is provided by Maria Dettenhofer in "Die Frauen von Sparta", in Reine
Maennersache? (Deutsche Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich, 1996).)
What was more: Spartan women could inherit and so transfer wealth. Athenian women, by contrast, were
never heiresses; all property passed to the next male kinsman, who might at most be required to marry the
heiress in order to claim the inheritance – an arrangement that often led men to discard their previous
wife, although she was blameless, just to get their hands on the inheritance of a kinsman. Economic
power has always had the concomitant effect of increasing status. This is clearly evidenced by
contemporary descriptions of Spartan women. They were "notorious" for having opinions ("even on
political matters"!) and – what was clearly worse from the perspective of other Greek men – "their
husbands listened to them"! Aristotle claimed that Spartan men were "ruled by their wives" – and cited
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the freedom of Spartan women as one of two reasons why the Spartan constitution was reprehensible.
In a frequently quoted incident, the wife of King Leonidas was asked why Spartan women were the only
women in Greece who "ruled" their husbands. Gorgo replied, "Because we are the only women who give
birth to men." In other words, only men with the self-confidence to accept women as equals were men at
all.
Athenian Women
Compared to the women of Sparta, the status of an Athenian woman in Greek society was minimal. By
comparison to present day standards, Athenian women were only a small step above slaves by the 5th
century BC. From birth a girl was not expected to learn how to read or write, nor was she expected to earn
an education. On reading and writing, Menander wrote, "Teaching a woman to read and write? What a
terrible thing to do! Like feeding a vile snake on more poison." Other authors and philosophers had
similar quips about women.
Most of what has been written about Athenian women comes from the 7th century BC onward, when
education in Athens began to emerge. Prior to that date, it has been alluded to by some authors, that the
status of women was not so glum. In particular, the rights of women in Athens and their decline may have
been the direct result of political pressures brought about by Pericle's ruling on the legitimacy of
marriage. Similarly there is evidence to suggest that Athenian women prior to the 7th century BC had
been subject to similar rites of passage as boys. The scholar Jean-Pierre Vernant, wrote that the
Arrephoroi, and many other religious celebrations of Athens, could have been reduced from perhaps an
entire age grade's participation, to only a handful of girls who were chosen to participate. Even then, it
was only the noble and upper class families which were considered for participation.
Athenian women can be classified into three general classes. The lowest class was the slave women, who
carried out more of the menial domestic chores, and helped to raise the children of the wife. Male slaves
held the task of working in the trade arts (pottery making, glass working, wood working, etc) or to
educate the sons of a house. The second class was that of the Athenian citizen woman. The third class was
known as the Hetaerae. The hetaerae unlike the slaves and the citizens, were much akin to the Geisha's of
China. Hetaerae women were given an education in reading, writing, and music, and were allowed into
the Agora and other structures which were off limits to citizen and slave women. Most sources about the
Hetaerae indicate however, that their standing was at best at the level of prostitutes, and the level of
power they attained was only slightly significant.
Marriage
Athenian citizen girls, since birth were raised differently than their male counterparts. Jean Vernant,
likened the difference to the phrases of Xenophon, that "boys were meant to be made men in their early
years, while girls were raised to be kept and protected (i.e. virgin)". In domestic life, a boy was taught
reading and writing, while a girl was taught spinning and other domestic duties by the slaves her family
had. In the ritual sphere, children of either sex were not excluded from the numerous rites of Athens until
their later years, and women played an important role in the 120 festivals which took place in Athens
every year. Children in Athens were constantly subject to numerous religious rites and festivals. Young
girls and women often played a part in these festivals (as for some it was the only contact the women had
with other women outside of their general locality), however, the most ritualistic and most important
aspect of their life was marriage.
Marriages were arranged by the father and were accompanied by a great deal of fanfare. When the
marriage was to take place the girl gave away all of her toys to the temple of Artemis, and her hair was
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cut (in some places her girdle was offered to Athena Apatouria). For the next several months the bride
was taught the domestic duties she would perform for the rest of her life by her mother and by slaves. A
series of rites then followed. On the night before the wedding day, the bride and groom took rituals baths,
and sang hymns to Hymen. The father made sacrifices to Hera, Zeus, Artemis, Aphrodite, and Peitho.
When the ceremony began there was a feast at the bride's father's home, and at the feast bread would be
passed out by a child who would say, "They have escaped evil; they have found the good." During and
after the feast, numerous wedding hymns, libations, and blessings occurred culminating in the grand
procession, from the father's house to the groom's house. Once she arrived at the house, the bride held a
sieve of barley (Vernant states that the sieve of barley represented her new role as "preparer of food". An
alternate interpretation is that the sieve of barley, a sacred symbol to Demeter, was a fertility symbol
among other things). Then she entered and was taken to the hearth where she was given offerings. The
final act, after being received at the hearth, was the consummation of the marriage inside of the wedding
chamber, which was closely guarded by a friend.
Wedding's were arranged through the father of the bride. The relationship between both families which
ensued was between the father, groom, and the father's brother. The marital contract was between the
groom and the father, while the bride's dowry was given to the father's brother. If a wife was widowed it
was the duty of the father's brother to find her another husband. A woman could not own property, and
was practically an object herself. If the husband died, she vacated the house and went to her father's
brother. If the father's brother was killed then the woman became a virtual slave, with minimal rights; in
comparison to modern women's lives and in particular to Spartan women, Athenian women were subject
to a life of subservience. They were not supposed to leave the house save for the general locality
(although some country women were allowed a bit more freedom), their domestic work was minimal
depending on the number of slaves she had. In general, her main purpose as a wife was to produce
healthy children.
Ironically the power of women, and the jokes often made about them or their intelligence have proven,
that though house life was restricting, they did wield some power. Namely, in Aristophanes' "Lysistrata"
the obvious power of women is through using or withholding their biological capabilities. Beyond the
mundane scope however the question must be asked, if women were of so low status in Athens and across
Greece, then why were the goddesses worshiped (strong female figures themselves) and so embedded into
Greek lives? One theory holds that Greek women held much more power than once thought, in that if the
husband did something the women didn't like "domestic retribution" could occur. Similarly women held
extremely high posts in the ritual events of Athens, it is not beyond speculation that women were not
totally subjugated based on their reproductive capabilities, but held an important ritual or sacred purpose,
without which the religious life and perhaps the culture of Athens would suffer.
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