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Greek Women

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Title: Greek Women

Author: Mitchell Carroll


        
Release date: May 10, 2010 [eBook #32318]

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREEK WOMEN ***




Produced by Thierry Alberto, Renald Levesque and the Online
Distributed Proofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net.







WOMAN

In all ages and in all countries

GREEK WOMEN

by

MITCHELL CARROLL, Ph.D.
Professor of Classical Philology in the George
Washington University

_Copyrighted 1907-1908_




GENERAL INTRODUCTION

The history of woman is the history of the world. Strait orthodoxy may
remind us that man preceded woman in the scheme of creation and that
therefore history does not begin with woman; but this is a specious
plea. The first historical information that we gain regarding Adam is
concerned with the creation of woman, and there is nothing to show us
that prior to that time Adam was more active in mind or even in body
than a mollusc. It was not until the coming of woman that history began
to exist; and if the first recorded act of the woman was disastrous in
its consequences, at least it possesses the distinction of making
history. So that it may well be said that all that we are we owe to
woman. Whether or not the story of the Garden of Eden is to be
implicitly accepted, there can be no doubt that from the moment of the
first appearance of mankind on the scene woman has been the ruling cause
of all effect.

The record of woman is one of extremes. There is an average woman, but
she has not been found except in theory. The typical woman, as she is
seen in the pages of history, is either very good or very bad. We find
women saints and we find women demons; but we rarely find a mean. Herein
is a cardinal distinction between the sexes. The man of history is
rarely altogether good or evil; he has a distinct middle ground, in
which we are most apt to find him in his truest aspect. There are
exceptions, and many; but this may be taken as a rule. Even in the
instances of the best and noblest men of whom we have record this rule
will hold. Saint Peter was bold and cautious, brave and cowardly, loving
and a traitor; Saint Paul was boastful and meek, tender and severe;
Saint John cognized beyond all others the power of love, and wished to
call down fire from heaven upon a village which refused to hear the
Gospel; and it is most probable that the true Peter and Paul and John
lived between these extremes. Not so with the women of the same story.
They were throughout consistent with themselves; they were utterly pure
and holy, as Mary Magdalene,--to whose character great wrong has been
done in the past by careless commentary,--or utterly vile, as Herodias.
Extremism is a chief feminine characteristic. Extremist though she be,
woman is always consistent in her extremes; hence her power for good and
for evil.

It is a mistaken idea which places the "emancipation" of woman at a late
date in the world's history. From time immemorial, woman has been
actively engaged in guiding the destinies of mankind. It is true that
the advent of Christianity undoubtedly broadened the sphere of woman and
that she was then given her true place as the companion and helper
rather than the toy of man; but long before this period woman had
asserted her right to be heard in the councils of the wise, and the
right seems to have been conceded in the cases where the demand was
made. Those who look upon the present as the emancipation period in the
history of woman have surely forgotten Deborah, whose chant of triumph
was sung in the congregation of the people and was considered worthy of
preservation for all future ages to read; Semiramis, who led her armies
to battle when the Great King, Ninus, had let fall the sceptre from his
weary hand, and who ruled her people with wisdom and justice; and others
whose fame, even if legendary in its details, has come down to us.
Through all the ages there was opportunity for woman, when she chose to
seize it; and in many cases it was thus seized. Rarely indeed do we find
the history of any age unconcerned with its women. Though their part may
at times seem but minor, yet do they stand out to the observant eye as
the prime causes of many of the great events which make or mark epochs.
When we think of the Trojan War, it is Agamemnon and Priam, Achilles and
Hector, who rise up before our mental vision as the protagonists in that
great struggle; but if there had been no Helen, there would have been no
war, and therefore no Iliad or Odyssey. We read Macaulay's stirring
ballad of_ Horatius at the Bridge, _and we thrill at the recital of
strength and daring; but if it had not been for the virtue of Lucretia,
there would have been no combat for the bridge, and the Tarquins might
have ended their days in peace in the Eternal City. And, in later times,
though Mirabeau and Robespierre and Danton and Marat fill the eye of the
student of the cataclysmic events of the French Revolution, it was the
folly of Marie Antoinette that gave these men their opportunity and even
paved the way for the rise and meteoric career of a greater than them
all.

These are instances of mediate influence upon great events; but there
have been many women who ham exerted immediate influence upon the story
of mankind. That which is usually mistermed weakness is generally held
to be a feminine attribute; and if we replace the term by the truer
word,--gentleness,--the statement may be conceded. But there have been
many women who have been strong in the general sense; and these have
usually been terribly strong. Look at Catherine of Russia, vicious to
the core, but powerful in intellect and will above the standard of
masculine rulers. Look at Elizabeth of England, crafty and false, full
of a ridiculous vanity, yet strong with a strength before which even
such men as Burleigh and Essex and Leicester were compelled to bow.
Look at Margaret of Lancaster, fighting in her husband's stead for the
crown of England and by her undaunted spirit plucking victory again and
again from the jaws of defeat, and yielding at last only when deserted
by every adherent. Look at Clytemmstra and Lady Macbeth, creatures of
the poet's fancy if you will, yet true types of a class of femininity.
They have had prototypes and antitypes, and many.

Women have achieved their most decisive and remarkable effects upon the
history of mankind by reaching and clinging to extremes. Extremism is
always a mark of enthusiasm, and enthusiasm accomplishes effects which
must have been left forever unattained by mere regulated and
conscientious effort. The stories of the Christian martyrs show in
golden letters the devotion of women to a cause; and I have no doubt
whatever that it was in the deaths of young maidens, in their hideous
sufferings borne with resignation and even joy, that there came the
conviction of truth which is known as the seed which was sown in the
blood of the martyrs. The high enthusiasm which supported a Catherine
and a Cecilia in their hours of trial was strong to persuade where the
death of a man for his convictions would have been looked upon as a
matter of course. It is from this enthusiasm and extremism that there
sounds one of the key-notes of woman's nature--her loyalty. Loyalty is
one of the blending traits of the sexes; yet, if I were compelled to
attribute it distinctively to one sex, I should class it as feminine in
its nature.

Loyalty to one idea, to one ideal, has been a predominant characteristic
of woman from time immemorial. Sometimes this loyalty takes the form of
patriotism, sometimes of altruism, sometimes of piety in true sense; but
always it has its origin and life in love. The love may be diffused or
concentrated, general or particular, but it is always the soul of the
true woman, and without it she cannot live. Love for her God, love for
her race, love for her country, love for the man whom she delights to
honor--these may exist separately or as one, but exist for her they
must, or her life is barren and her soul but a dead thing. Love, in the
true sense of the word, is the essence of the woman-soul; it is the soul
itself. She must love, or she is dead, however she may seem to live.
That she does not always ask whether the object of her love, be it
abstract or concrete, be worthy of her devotion is not to be attributed
to her as a fault, but rather as a virtue, since the love itself expands
and vivifies her soul if itself be worthy. It is at once the expression
and the expenditure of the unsounded depths of her soul; it is through
its power over her that she recognises her own nature, that she knows
herself for what she is. The woman who has not loved, even in the
ordinary human and limited meaning of the word, has no conception of her
own soul.

Thus far I have spoken of love in its broad sense, as the highest
impulse of the human soul. But there is another and a lower aspect of
love, and this is the one most usually meant when we use the word,--the
attraction of sex. Even thus, though in this aspect love becomes a far
lesser thing, it possesses no less power. The passion of man for woman
has been the underlying cause of all history in its phenomenal aspects.
The favorite example of this power has always been that of Cleopatra and
Mark Antony; but history is full of equally convincing instances.

To love and to be loved; such is the ultimate lot of woman. It matters
not what accessories of existence fate may have to offer; this is the
supreme meaning of life to woman, and it is here that she finds her true
value in the world. She may read that meaning in divers manners; she may
make of her place in life a curse or a blessing to mankind. It matters
not; all returns to the same cause, the same source of power_. _The
strongest woman is weak if she be not loved, for she lacks her chief
weapon with which to conquer; the weakest is strong if she truly have
won love, for through this she can work miracles. Her strength is more
than doubled; heart and brain and hand are in equal measure, for that
with which the heart inspires the brain will be transmitted by the heart
to the hand, and the message will be too imperative to fear failure.

It is a strange thing--though not inexplicable--that your ambitious
woman is far more ruthless, far more unscrupulous, far more determined
to win at any cost, than is the most ambitious of men. Again comes the
law of extreme to show cause that this should be; but the fact is so
sure that cause is of less interest. Not Machiavelli was so false, not
Caligula was so cruel, not Caesar was so careless of right, as the woman
whose political ambition has taken form and strength. That which bars
her path must be swept aside, be it man or notion or principle. She sees
but the one object, her goal, looming large before her; and she moves on
with her eyes fixed, crushing beneath her feet all that would turn her
steps.

I have spoken of the cruelty of an ambitious woman; and it is worth
while to pause a moment to consider this trait as displayed in
women--not as a means, but as an end. There have been men who loved
cruelty for its own sake; but they are few, and their methods crude,
compared with the woman who have felt this strange passion. In the days
of human sacrifices, it was the women who most thronged to the
spectacles, who most eagerly fastened their eyes upon the expiring
victims. In the gladiatorial combats, it was the women who greeted each
mortal thrust with applause, and whose reversed thumbs won the majority
for the signal of death to the vanquished. In the days of terror in
France, it was the woman who led the mob that threatened the king and
queen, and hanged Foulard to a lamp post after almost tearing him to
pieces; it was the women who sat in rows around the guillotine, day
after day, and placidly knit their terrible records of death; it was the
women who cried for more victims, even after the legal murderers of the
tribunals grew weary of their hideous task of condemnation.

Not only thus--not only under the influence of excitement and
passion--but in cold blood, there are instances among women of such
ghastly cruelty that men recoil from the contemplation of such deeds.
There is record of a Slavonic countess whose favorite amusement was to
sit in the garden of her country palace, in the rigors of a Russian
winter, while young girls were stripped by her attendants and water
poured slowly over their bodies, thus giving them a death of enduring
agony and providing the countess with new, though unsubstantial, statues
for her grounds. This not more than two centuries ago, and in the
atmosphere of so-termed Christianity. The annals of the Spanish
Inquisition would be ransacked in vain for such ingenuity of torture;
and though the Inquisitors may have grown to love cruelty for its own
sake, they at least alleged reason for their deeds; the Russian countess
frankly sought amusement alone.

Yet in these things there is to be found no general accusation of women.
That cruelty should be carried by them to its extreme, that they should
love it for its own sake, is but the development of extremism, and is
isolated in examples, at least by periods. The Russian countess was not
cruel because she was a woman, but, being cruel of nature, she was the
more so because of her sex. The ladies of imperial Rome did not love the
sight of flowing blood because they were women, but, being women, they
carried their acquired taste to bounds unknown to the less impulsive and
less ardent nature of men.

Yet there comes a question. Is this lust for blood, this love of
cruelty; latent in every woman and but restrained, by the gentler
teachings and promptings of her more developed nature in its highest
presentation? So some psychists would have us believe; but they have
only slight ground for their sweeping assertion. That civilisation is
but restrained savagery may perhaps be conceded; but if the restraint
has grown to be the ever-dominant impulse, then has the savage been
slain. It is not, as some teach, that such isolated idiosyncrasies as we
have considered are glimpses of the tiger that sleeps in every human
heart and sometimes breaks its chain and runs riot. As a rule, these
things are matters of atmosphere. Setting aside such pure isolations as
that of the Russian countess, it will almost invariably be found that
the display of feminine cruelty, or of any vice, is of a time and place.
There has never been a universal rule of feminine depravity in any age.
Babylon, Carthage, Greece, Rome, and all the olden civilisations have
had their periods when female virtue was a matter of laughter, when
women outvied men in their moral degradation, when evil seemed
triumphant everywhere; but there always remained a few to "redeem the
time," and salvation always came from those few. Moreover, the sphere of
immorality and crime was always limited. The Roman world, when it was
the world indeed, might be given up to vice and sin, displayed in their
most atrocious forms by the women of the Empire; but there still stood
the North, calm, virtuous, patient, awaiting its opportunity to "root
out the evil thing" and to give the world once more a standard of purity
and righteousness. The leaven of Christianity was effective in its work
upon the moral degradation of the Roman Empire; but it was not until the
scourge of the Northmen was sent to the aid of the principle that
success was fully won. So the North was not of the same day with Rome in
civilised vice, and the reign of evil in the Latin Empire was but the
effect of conditions, not the instincts of humanity. Rome was taught
evil by long and steadfast evolution; it did not spring up in a day
with its deadly blight, but was the result of progressive causation.

It may be doubted if the feminine intellect has increased since the dawn
of civilisation. To-day woman stands on a different plane of
recognition, but by reason of assertiveness, not because of increased
mental ability. As with that of man, the possibilities of woman's
intellect were long latent; but they existed, and the result is
development, not creation of fibre. I repeat that I do not believe that
the feminine intellect has grown in power. I doubt if the present age
can show a mind superior in natural strength to that of Sappho; I do not
believe that the present Empress of China, strong woman as she is, is
greater than Semiramis, or that even Elizabeth of England was the equal
of the warrior-queen of Babylon. But there can be no doubt that there
exists a broader culture to-day than ever before and that thus the
intellectual sum of women is always growing, though there comes no
increase in the mental powers of the individual. It has been so with
man. We boast of the mighty achievements of our age; but we have not yet
built such a structure as that of the Temple of the Sun at Baalbec, or
the Pyramid of Cheops at Ghizeh. We pride ourselves upon our letters;
but the grandest poem ever written by man was also the first of which we
have record--the Book of Job, and we do not even know the name of the
poet who thus set a standard which has never since been reached. We may
claim Shakespeare as the equal of Homer in expression; but it requires
true hero worship among his admirers to place the Elizabethan singer
upon an equality with the old Greek in any other respect. There has been
no growth of individual intellect in either sex since the days of which
we first find record; but there has been an increase of average and a
definition of tendency which are productive of higher general result.
And the natural consequence of this state of things is found in the fact
that even a Sappho in the world of letters would not stand out so
prominently, would not be considered such a prodigy, were she to come in
these days. We should admire her genius and her powers without feeling
the sensation of wonder that these should be possessed by a woman. It is
in the recognition of this fact that we are better enabled to understand
the changing aspect in the relations of women to men during these latter
years. There has been no alteration in the possibilities within the
grasp of the individual, but great change within those which can be
claimed by the sex at large. Women can do no more now than in the olden
days when they were considered as almost inferior to animals; but woman
has profited by the opportunities of her time, and is every day
developing powers until now unsuspected.

[Illustration 12 _ASPASIA After the painting by Henry Holiday. Aspasia
was born in Miletus. At an early age, accompanied by another young girl,
Thargelia, she went to Athens. Their beauty and talents soon won them
distinction--Thargelia married a king of Thessaly, and Aspasia married
Pericles, "more than a king," says Plutarch. The home of Aspasia in
Athens was frequent by the_ elite _of the city and state, attracted by
her beauty, her art of speaking, and her influence. Socrates valued her
great mind, and even called himself one of her disciples. Plato speaks
of her great reputation. She was born in the fifth century before
Christ. The date of her death is not known._]

The whole value of history is in teaching us to understand our own time
and to prognosticate the future with some degree of correctness. More
especially is this true of all class history, and the story of sex
development may be so rated. It is to find the reason of what is and the
nature of what is to come that we turn to the records of the past and
ask them concerning their message to us of these things. In our
retrospective view of woman, we shall, if we are alive to suggestion,
find steadfast tendencies of development. It is true that these
tendencies do not always remain in the light; like rivers, they
sometimes plunge underground and for a time find their paths in
subterranean channels where they are lost to sight; but they always
reemerge, and at last they find their way to the central sea of the
present. Future ages will doubtless mark the course of those tendencies
not only up to but through our own age; for though I have spoken of a
central sea, the simile is hardly correct, inasmuch as the true ocean
which is the goal of these rivers is not yet in the sight of humanity.
But we at least find promise of that ocean in the steadfast and
determined course of the streams which flow toward it; progress has
always a goal, though it may be one long undiscerned by the abettors of
that progress. So it is with the story of woman. We know what she has
been; we see what she is; and it is possible dimly to forecast what she
will be. Yet I dare to assert that there will be no radical change;
there may be new direction for effort, new lines of development, but the
essential nature will remain unaltered. It is not, however, with this
informing spirit that we have to do in such a work as this. There have
been many misconceptions regarding woman; I would not venture to claim
that none now exist. Yet there is a general consensus of agreement
concerning her dominating and effective characteristics, and the
probability is that in these general laws so laid down the common
opinion is of truth.

Of course, I would not dare to make such an absurd claim that there
exists, or has ever existed, a man who could truthfully say that he knew
woman in the abstract; but that does not necessarily mean that knowledge
of the tendencies and characteristics of the sex is impossible. The
reason of the dense ignorance which prevails among men concerning women
is that the men attempt to apply general laws to particular cases; and
that is fatal. It is absolutely necessary, if we are to gather wisdom
and not merely knowledge from our researches in history, that we should
take into account the result of combination of traits. Otherwise we
should not only find nothing but inconsistency as a consequence of our
study, but we should utterly fail to understand the tendencies of that
which we learn. We must be broad in our judgments if we are to judge
truly. When we read of the Spartan women sending forth their sons to die
for their country, we must not believe that they were lacking in the
depth of maternal affection which is one of the most beautiful
characteristics of the feminine nature. Doubtless they suffered as
keenly as does the modern mother at the death of her son; but they were
trained to subordinate their feelings in this wise, and their training
stood them in stead of stoicism. Nay, even when we read of the
profligacy of the women of imperial Rome, we must not look upon these
women as by nature imbruted and degraded, but we must understand that
they but yielded to the spirit of their environment and their schooling.
They were not different at heart, those reckless Maenads and votaries of
Venus, from the chaste Lucretias or holy Catherines of another day; they
simply lacked direction of impulse in right method, and so missed the
culmination of their highest possibilities.

There is an old saying which tells us that women are what men make them.
Thus generally stated, the saying may be summed up as a slander; but it
has an application in history. There can be no doubt that for
millenniums of the world's adolescence women were controlled and their
bearing and place in society modified by the thought of their times,
which thought was of masculine origin and formation. This state of
affairs has long since passed away, and it may be said that for at least
a thousand years, in adaptation of the saying which I have quoted, the
times have been what women have made them. It was the influence of women
which brought about the outgrowths of civilisation in the dawn of
Christianity that have survived until now. It was the influence, if not
the actual activity, of women that was responsible for the birth of
chivalry and the rise of the spirit of purity. It was the influence of
women that made possible such characters as those of Bayard and Sir
Philip Sydney. It was the influence of women that softened the roughness
and licentiousness of a past day into the refinement and virtue which
are the possessions of the present age.

There has always, in the worst days, been an undercurrent of good, and
its source and strength are to be found in the eternal feminine spirit,
which in its true aspects always makes for righteousness.

The world's statues have, with few exceptions, been raised to men, the
world's elegies have been sung of men, the world's acclamations have
been given to men. This is world justice, blind as well as with bandaged
eyes. Were true justice done--were the best results, the results which
live, commemorated in stone, the world itself, to adapt the hyperbole of
the Evangelist, could hardly contain the statues which would be reared
to women. But it is precisely in the cause for this neglect that there
lies the value of the work which has been done by woman for the welfare
of mankind. It is one of the truths of history that the greatest and
most enduring effects have always been accomplished in the least
conspicuous manner.

The man who searches effect for cause must find his goal most often in
the influence of a woman. Not always for good; that could not be. But it
would seem that all that has endured has been for good, and that the
evil which has been wrought by woman--and it has not been slight--has
been ephemeral in all respects. I know of no enduring evil that can be
traced to a woman as its source; but I know of no constant good which
did not find either its beginning or its fostering in a woman's thought
or work. Poppaea leaves but a name; Agrippina leaves an example. It may
be true of men that the evil that they do lives after them, while the
good is oft interred with their bones; but it is not true of women. Of
course, there is a sense in which it is true--in the descent from mother
to son of the spirit of the unrighteous mother; but even this would not
seem to hold as a rule, and the effects are often modified by the
influence of a love for a higher nature. The sum of woman's influence
upon the destinies of the world is good, the balance inclines steadily
toward the best. Woman is the hope of the world.

It is to find the persistence of this influence that we search her
history. Sometimes we shall find strange factors in the equation that
gives the sum, strange methods of attaining the result; but the result
itself is always plain. Nor is there ever entire lack of contemporary
influence of good, even when the evil seems predominant. If we read of
an Argive Helen bringing war and desolation upon a nation, we shall find
in those same pages record of a Penelope teaching the world the beauty
of faith and constancy. If we trace the story of a Cleopatra ruining men
with a smile, we shall find in the same day an Octavia and a Portia. If
we hear of the Capitol betrayed by a Tarpeia, we have not far to seek
for a Cornelia, known to all time as the Mother of the Gracchi. And it
is those who made for good whose names have come down to us as
incentives and examples. The more closely we read our history, the more
surely are we convinced that the tendency has always been upward; the
progress has been steadfast from the beginning, and it has carried the
world with it.

As I began with the statement that the history of woman is the history
of the world, so I end. This truth at least is sure. The earth is very
old; it has seen the coming and the going of many races, it has
witnessed the rise and fall of uncounted dynasties, it has survived
physical and social cataclysms innumerable; and it still holds on its
way, serenely awaiting its end in the purpose of its Creator. What that
end shall be no man may know; but it is the end to which woman shall
lead it.

G.C.L.
Johns Hopkins University.




PREFACE

It is the purpose of this volume to give a simple sketch of the history
of Greek womanhood from the Heroic Age down to Roman times, so far as it
can be gathered from ancient Greek literature and from other available
sources for a knowledge of antique life. Greek civilization was
essentially a masculine one; and it is really remarkable how scant are
the references to feminine life in Greek writers, and how few books have
been written by modern scholars on this subject. In the preparation of
this work, the author has consulted all the authorities bearing on old
Greek life, acknowledgment of which can only be made in general terms.
He feels, however, particularly indebted to the following works: Mlle.
Clarisse Bader, _La Femme Grecque_, Paris, 1872; Jos. Cal. Poestion,
_Griechische Philosophinnen_, Norden, 1885; ibid., _Griechische
Dichterinnen_, Leipzig, 1876; E. Notor, _La Femme dans l'Antiquite
Grecque_, Paris, 1901; R. Lallier, _De la Condition de la Femme
Athenienne au Veme et au IVeme Siecle_, Paris, 1875; Ivo Bruns,
_Frauenemancipation in Athen_, Kiel, 1900; Walter Copeland Perry, _The
Women of Homer_, New York, 1898; Albert Galloway Keller, _Homeric
Society_, London, 1902; and Mahaffy's various works, especially _Social
Life in Greece from Homer to Menander_, and _Greek Life and Thought_. In
making quotations from Greek authors, standard translations have been
used, of which especial acknowledgment cannot always be given, but Lang,
Leaf and Myers' _Iliad_, Butcher's and Lang's _Odyssey_, Wharton's
_Sappho_, and Way's _Euripides_, call for particular mention.

In the spelling of Greek proper names the author has endeavored to adapt
himself to the convenience of his readers by being consistently Roman,
and has used in most cases the Latin forms. He has retained, however,
the Greek forms where usage has made them current, as Poseidon, Lesbos,
Samos, etc., and has invariably adopted forms, neither Greek nor Latin,
which have become universal, as Athens, Constantinople, Rhodes, and the
like. The Greek names of Greek divinities have been preferred to their
Roman equivalents.

To conclude, my thanks are due to the publishers for their uniform
courtesy and help, and to Mr. J.A. Burgan for the careful reading of the
proof; nor could I have undertaken and carried through the work without
the sympathetic aid and encouragement of my wife.

MITCHELL CARROLL.
_The George Washington University_.




I

GREEK WOMEN


Whenever culture or art or beauty is theme for thought, the fancy at
once wanders back to the Ancient Greeks, whom we regard as the ultimate
source of all the aesthetic influences which surround us. To them we look
for instruction in philosophy, in poetry, in oratory, in many of the
problems of science. But it is in their arts that the Greeks have left
us their richest and most beneficent legacy; and when we consider how
much they have contributed to the world's civilization, we wonder what
manner of men and women they must have been to attain such achievements.

Though woman's influence is exercised silently and unobtrusively, it is
none the less potent in determining the character and destiny of a
people. Historians do not take note of it, men overlook and undervalue
it, and yet it is ever present; and in a civilization like that of the
Greeks, where the feminine element manifests itself in all its higher
activities,--in its literature, its art, its religion,--it becomes an
interesting problem to inquire into the character and status of woman
among the Greek peoples. We do not desire to know merely the purely
external features of feminine life among the Greeks, such as their
dress, their ornaments, their home surroundings; we would, above all,
investigate the subjective side of their life--how they regarded
themselves, and were regarded by men; how they reasoned, and felt, and
loved; how they experienced the joys and sorrows of life; what part they
took in the social life of the times; how their conduct influenced the
actions of men and determined the course of history; what were their
moral and spiritual endowments;--in short, we should like to know the
Greek woman in all those phases of life which make the modern woman
interesting and influential and the conserving force in human society.
Yet, when we estimate our sources of information, we find that there is
no problem in the whole range of Greek life so difficult of solution as
that concerning the status and character of Greek women.

The first condition of a successful study of Greek women is to
familiarize one's self with the _milieu_ in which they lived and moved.
To do this we must adapt ourselves to a manner of life and to
conceptions and feelings widely different from our own. The Greek spirit
of the fifth century before the Christian era has but little in common
with the spirit of the twentieth century; and unless we gain some
insight into the spirit of the Greeks, we cannot understand the
fundamental differences between the life of the Greek woman and that of
the modern woman. Let us note a few respects in which this difference
shows itself.

The Greek attitude toward nature was that of reverent children who saw
everywhere therein manifestations of the divine. To them everything was
what we call supernatural. If wine gladdened the heart of man, it was
the influence of a god. If love stirred the breast, a god was inspiring
man with a sweet influence, and the divine power must not be resisted.
The gods themselves yielded to the impulses of love; why should not men?
Furthermore, Greek thought conceived of the human being as the noblest
creation of nature. Christian theology conceives of the body as the
prison house of the soul, from which the soul must escape to attain its
highest development; the Greeks, on the other hand, regarded body and
soul as forming a complete, inseparable, and harmonious unit. There was
no impulse toward distinguishing between the two, no restless reaching
out toward something regarded as higher and nobler; seeing infinite
possibilities in man as man, the Greek sought only the idealization of
the human being as such, the completion and realization of the highest
type of humanity, physical and spiritual. Because of this peculiar
conception of man, the gods of the Greeks rose out of nature and did not
transcend it. Some of them were personifications of the forces of
nature; others were merely, according to Greek ideas, the highest
conceptions of what was admirable in man and woman. When we consider the
goddesses of the Olympian Pantheon, we see that this conception of the
ideal in woman must have been very high, manifesting itself in the
characters of Hera, the goddess of marriage and of the birth of
children; Athena, "intellect unmoved by fleshly lust, the perfection of
serene, unclouded wisdom;" Demeter, goddess of agriculture and of the
domestic life; Aphrodite, goddess of love and beauty and the
idealization of feminine graces and charm; Artemis, the maiden divinity
never conquered by love, and the protectress of maidens; and Hestia,
goddess of the hearth and preserver of the sanctity of the home.

It is difficult for us to appreciate the passionate love of beauty which
animated the Greeks.

      "What is good and fair
      Shall ever be our care.
      That shall never be our care
      Which is neither good nor fair."

This immortal burden from the stanzas of Theognis, sung by the Muses and
Graces at the wedding of Cadmus and Harmonia, "strikes," says Symonds,
"the keynote to the music of the Greek genius." This innate love of
beauty, fostered by natural surroundings and held in restraint by a
sense of measure, was the most salient characteristic of the Greek
people. It is impossible for us to realize the intensity of the Greek
feeling for beauty; and to them the human body was the noblest form of
earthly loveliness. To illustrate, we may recall the incident of
Phryne's trial before the judges. Hyperides, her advocate, failing in
his other arguments, drew aside her tunic and revealed to them a bosom
perfectly marvellous in its beauty. Phryne was at once acquitted, not
from any prurient motives, but because "the judges beheld in such an
exquisite form not an ordinary mortal, but a priestess and prophetess of
the divine Aphrodite. They were inspired with awe, and would have deemed
it sacrilege to mar or destroy such a perfect masterpiece of creative
power." Nor was the Greek conception of beauty purely sensual. Through
the perfection of human loveliness they had glimpses of divine beauty,
and "the fleshly vehicle was but the means to lead on the soul to what
is eternally and imperishably beautiful." Thus the lesson of the
_Phaedrus_ and _Symposium_ of Plato is that "the passion which grovels in
the filth of sensual grossness may be transformed into a glorious
enthusiasm, a winged splendor, capable of rising to the contemplation of
eternal verities and reuniting the soul of man to God."

This last reflection leads us to the most important difference between
ancient and modern conceptions, that in regard to the relations between
the sexes. We of the Christian era have a clear doctrine of right and
wrong to guide us, a law given from without ourselves, the result of
revelation. The Greeks, on the other hand, "had to interrogate nature
and their own hearts for the mode of action to be pursued. They did not
feel or think that one definite course of action was right and the
others wrong; but they had to judge in each case whether the action was
becoming, whether it was in harmony with the nobler side of human
nature, whether it was beautiful or useful. Utility, appropriateness,
and the sense of the beautiful were the only guides which the Greeks
could find to direct them in the relations of the sexes to each other."
Hence we find that the Greeks deemed permissible much which offends the
modern sense of propriety; for example, when maidens captured in war
became for a time the concubines of the victors, as Chryseis in the
Iliad, and were afterward restored to their homes, they were not thought
in the least disgraced by their misfortune; "for if such a stain happen
to a woman by force of circumstances," says Xenophon, "men honor her
none the less if her affection seems to them to remain untainted."

How, then, are we to bridge over the gulf which separates us from the
Greeks? What are our sources of knowledge of Greek woman and her manner
of life?

We must first of all know the country of the Greeks. The influence of
country and climate on the Greek nationality has been frequently
emphasized, and the physical phenomena which moulded the characters of
the men must also have affected the women. A climate so mild that, as
Euripides says, "the cold of winter is without rigor, and the shafts of
Phoebus do not wound;" a soil midway between harsh sterility and
luxurious vegetation; a system of fertile plains and rugged plateaus and
varied mountain chains; a coast indented with innumerable inlets and
gulfs and bays--these were the physical characteristics which moulded
the destinies of Greek women. Furthermore, the modern Greek people trace
the threads of their history unbroken back to ancient times, in spite
of the incursions of alien peoples and years of subjugation to the Turk.
Many ancient customs survive, such as the giving of a dowry and the
bathing of the bride before the wedding ceremony. On the islands of the
AEgean, where there has been but little intercourse with foreigners, the
type of features so familiar to us from Greek sculpture still prevails,
and the visitor can see beautiful maidens who might have served as
models for Phidias and Praxiteles. The configuration of the land led to
the Greek conception of the city-state--the feature of internal polity
which had most to do with the seclusion of women.

Greek literature, however, is our chief source of knowledge in this
regard, yet even the information afforded by that literature is
inadequate and unsatisfactory in the glimpses it gives of the life of
woman. All that we know about Greek women, with the exception of the
fragments of Sappho's poems, is derived from chronicles written by men.
Now, men never write dispassionately about women. They either love or
hate them; they either idealize or caricature them. Furthermore, Greek
literature was not only written by men, but also by men for men. The
Greek reading public, the audience at the theatre, the gathering in the
Assembly and in the law courts, were almost exclusively masculine.
Remarks indicating the inferiority of the frailer but more fascinating
sex are even in our day not altogether displeasing to the average man,
and constitute one of the stock _motifs_ of humor; hence it is not to be
taken too seriously that on the Greek stage there was much abuse of
woman--though this is offset by passages in which the sex is
extravagantly praised. Euripides was once called a woman hater in the
presence of Sophocles. "Yes," was the clever response, "in his
tragedies."

Then, aside from the point of view of the writer, only meagre facts can
be gleaned here and there from Greek literature regarding the life of
Greek women. Only by gathering and comparing disparate passages
collected from writers of different views, of different States, and of
different periods, can we get anything like a systematic presentation of
the outward aspect of feminine life. We are more fortunate, however,
when we consider the subjective side; for the Greek epos and drama
present feminine portraitures which necessarily reflect, more or less
clearly, the thought and feelings of woman in the age in which the poet
flourished. Homer gives an accurate portrayal of the Heroic Age, on the
borderland of which his own life was passed, while memories of it were
still fresh in the minds of men. The Athenian tragedians also locate
their plots in the Heroic Age, but they endow their characters with a
depth of thought, with a power of reflection, with an insight into the
problems of life, which were altogether foreign to men and women in the
childhood of the world, and were characteristic of Athens in its
brilliant intellectual epoch. Hence a history of Greek womanhood must
draw largely from the works of the poets, and must endeavor to give a
picture of the women who figure in the Iliad and the Odyssey and in the
dramas of AEschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. The lyric poets of Greece
are also of unique importance in the study of ancient humanity, for they
reveal the hearts of men and women and make known the conflicts of the
soul. The historical women of Hellas are few in number, and are known to
us only through meagre passages in the historians, orators, and
philosophers.

A third source of information is Greek art. When woman figures so
largely in the few relics of antiquity which have come down to us
intact, what a commentary on ancient womanhood must the art of the
Greeks have been, before the ruthless hands of Romans and barbarians and
the tooth of time effaced her most precious treasures! The vase
paintings of the Greeks illustrate every phase of private life, and
abound in representations of the maiden and the matron, in the home, at
the loom, in the bridal procession, at the wedding. And Greek sculpture
presents ideal types of woman, perfect physically and highly endowed
with every intellectual and sensuous charm. From these works of plastic
art, abounding in the museums of Europe, we know that the Greek woman
was beautiful, the peer of man in physical excellence. In form, the
Greek woman was so perfect as to be still taken as the type of her sex.
"Her beauty, from whatever cause, bordered closely upon the ideal, or
rather was that which, because now only found in works of art, we call
the ideal. But our conceptions of form never transcend what is found in
nature. She bounds our ideas by a circle over which we cannot step. The
sculptors of Greece represented nothing but what they saw; and even when
the cunning of their hand was most felicitous, even when love and grace
and all the poetry of womanhood appeared to breathe from their marbles,
the inferiority of their imitation to the creations of God, in
properties belonging to form, in mere contour, in the grouping and
development of features, must have sufficed to impress even upon
Phidias, that high priest of art, how childish it was to rise above
nature." But it is not merely physical perfection which appeals to us in
these masterpieces of plastic art. Love and tenderness and every womanly
charm find expression in every feature of the countenance; and there is,
above all, a moral dignity, an elevation of soul, a spiritual fervor,
which lift us from things of earth and impart aspirations toward the
eternal. The women who gave insight and inspiration to the sculptor in
his portrayal of Hera and of Athena and of Aphrodite must have possessed
in some measure the qualities imparted by the artist to his works. The
status of woman among the Greeks differs according to the period, tribe,
and form of government, and all the various phases of life and
civilization arising from these must be taken into consideration in
reaching our conclusions. Greek history falls into certain well-defined
periods which are distinct in culture and civilization. There is first
the Heroic Age, portrayed in Greek mythology and in the Homeric poems,
the age of demigods and valiant warriors and noble women. This is the
monarchical period in Greek history. Kings presided over the destinies
of men, and about them were gathered the nobles. Society was
aristocratic; the life portrayed was the life of courts. A court made a
queen necessary; and where there is a queen, woman is always a source of
influence and power for good or evil, and wins either the deference and
regard, or the fear and resentment of men. Succeeding the Heroic Age,
there followed the "storm and stress" period in Greek life, when
monarchies were overturned and gave place to oligarchies, and they, in
turn, to tyrannies; when commerce was developing, colonies were being
sent out to distant parts of the Mediterranean, and the aristocratic
classes were enjoying the results of wealth and travel and the
interchange of social courtesies. In this period, epic poetry declined,
and lyric poetry took its place in the three forms of elegiac, iambic,
and melic; the arts, too, were beginning to be cultivated. This is the
Transition Age of Greece. In aristocratic circles, among the families of
the oligarchs and in the courts of tyrants, woman continued to hold a
prominent place; but among the poorer classes, who were ground down by
the aristocrats, life was hard and bitter, and woman was censured as
the source of many of the ills of mankind.

The Transition Age constitutes the portal admitting to Historical Greece
proper. In most communities, the levelling process has gone on, and
democracies have taken the place of oligarchies and tyrannies. The
people have asserted themselves and are regnant. It is a noteworthy fact
in Greek history that where democracy prevailed woman was least highly
regarded and had fewest privileges. In Athens, where democracy was
all-controlling, feminine activities were confined largely to the
women's apartments of the house. In other cities, oligarchies continued
to have power, and an aristocracy was still recognized, as at Sparta;
and here the privileges and freedom of woman were very great.

The early tribal divisions among the Greeks must also be taken into
consideration. The Achaeans are closely identified with the Heroic Age;
they built up the powerful States in the Peloponnesus, and undertook the
first great national expedition of Hellas. Thus the Achaeans are the
representative Homeric people, with its monarchical life and the
prominent social status of its women. The Achaean civilization gave way
before the Dorian migration, and ceased to be a factor in Greek history.
Of the three remaining divisions, the AEolians inhabited parts of
Thessaly, Boeotia, and especially the island of Lesbos, and the Greek
colonies of Asia Minor along the shores of the North AEgean. Their most
brilliant period was during the Transition Age, when Lesbos was ruled by
a wealthy and powerful aristocracy and later by a tyranny, and when
lyric poetry reached its perfect bloom in the verses of Sappho. AEolian
culture was marked by its devotion to music and poetry and by its
richness and voluptuousness. At no other time and place in the whole
history of Hellas did woman possess so much freedom and enjoy all the
benefits of wealth and culture in so marked a degree as among the AEolian
people of Lesbos.

The Dorian and the Ionian peoples occupied the arena during the
historical period; and, representing as they did opposing tendencies,
they were continually in conflict. The Dorians mainly occupied the
Southern and Western Peloponnesus, Argos, Corinth, Megara, AEgina, Magna
Graecia, and the southern coast of Asia Minor; the Ionians inhabited
Attica, Euboea, most of the islands of the AEgean, and the famous twelve
Ionian cities along the coast of Asia Minor. The chief city of the
Dorians was Sparta; but Sparta had a form of government peculiar to
itself, which must not be taken as representing all the Dorian States.
Yet among the Dorian States in general there was much the same degree of
freedom enjoyed by women as in Sparta, though they were not subjected to
the same harsh discipline.

The Ionian cities of Asia Minor were greatly influenced by Asiatic love
of ease and luxury, and they introduced into Greece many aspects of the
civilization and art of Asia. There is a tradition that when the Ionians
migrated from Hellas to Asia Minor they did not take their wives with
them, as did the Dorians and AEolians, and, consequently, they were
compelled to wed the native women of the conquered districts. As they
looked upon the wives thus acquired as inferior, they were glad to shut
them up in the women's apartments, following the Oriental custom, and to
treat them as domestics rather than as companions. Thus is supposed to
have arisen the custom of secluding the women of the household, which
rapidly spread among Ionian peoples, even in Continental Greece.

Athens was the chief city among the Ionian peoples, but it developed a
civilization peculiarly its own, known as the Attic-Ionian, combining
much of the rugged strength and vigor of the Dorians with the
refinement, delicacy, and versatility of the Ionians. Yet the status of
woman in the city of the violet crown was a reproach to its otherwise
unapproachable preeminence. Nowhere else in entire Hellas were Greek
women in like measure repressed and excluded from the higher life of the
men as among the Athenians. Consequently, the name of no great Athenian
woman is known to us. But the Ionian repression of women of honorable
station led to the rise of a class of "emancipated" women, who threw off
the shackles that had bound their sex and united their fortunes with men
in unlawful relations as hetaerae, or "companions." Owing to their pursuit
of the higher learning of the times and their cultivation of all the
feminine arts and graces, the hetaerae constituted a most interesting
phenomenon in the social life of Greece, and played an important role in
Greek culture, especially in Athens. As the centre of culture for
Hellas, and as the exponent of literature and art for the civilized
world, Athens demands especial attention in its treatment of women.

The classical period of Greek history was succeeded by the Hellenistic
Age, an epoch introduced by the spread of the Greek language and culture
over the vast empire of Alexander the Great. The theory of the
city-state had been one of the chief causes of the seclusion of women;
and as Alexander broke down the barriers between the Greek cities and
introduced uniformity of life and manners throughout his empire, from
this time on the status of woman is gradually elevated, her attention to
the higher education becomes more general, and she takes a more
prominent part in culture and politics and all the living interests of
the day. Alexandria usurps the place of Athens as the chief centre of
Greek life and thought, and here the Greek woman plays a conspicuous
and prominent role. Then, as Rome spread her conquests over the Orient,
the Graeco-Roman period succeeds the Hellenistic, and through the
intermingling of alien civilizations a womanhood of purely Greek culture
is merged into the cosmopolitan womanhood of the Roman world.
Christianity rapidly becomes the leaven that permeates the lump of the
Roman Empire, and, appealing as it did to all that was highest and best
in feminine character, finds ready acceptance among the women of
Hellenic lands. The woman of Greek culture, with rare exceptions, ceases
to exist, and our subject reaches its natural termination.




II

WOMANHOOD IN THE HEROIC AGE


The life of the earliest Greeks is mirrored in their legends. Though not
exact history, the heroic epics of Greece are of great value as pictures
of life and manners. Hence we may turn to them as valuable memorials of
that state of society which must be for us the starting point of the
history of the Greek woman.

The evidence of Homer regarding the Heroic Age is comprehensive and
accurate. The discoveries of recent years are making Troy and Mycenae and
other cities of Homeric life very real to us. We find that Homer
accurately described the material surroundings of his heroes and
heroines--their houses and clothing and weapons and jewels. The royal
palaces at Troy and Tiryns and Mycenae have been unearthed, and we know
that their human occupants must have been persons of the character
described by Homer, for only such could have made proper use of the
objects of utility and adornment found in these palaces and now to be
studied in the museums of Europe. Hence we are driven to the conclusion
that though Agamemnon be a myth and Helen a poet's fancy, yet men and
women like Agamemnon and Helen must once have lived and loved and
suffered on Greek soil.

Furthermore, great movements in the world's history are brought about
only by great men and great women. The great epics of the world tell the
stories of national heroes, not as they actually were, but idealized and
deified by generations of admiring descendants. Hence, behind all the
marvellous stories in myth and legend were doubtless actual figures of
men and women who influenced the course of events and left behind them
reputations of sufficient magnitude to give at least a basis for the
heroic figures of epic poetry.

To appreciate the elements from which the immortal types of Greek Epic
were composed, a comparison with the Book of Judges is apposite. In
Judges we have represented, though in disconnected narrative, the heroic
age of Ancient Israel, and from material such as this the national epic
of the Hebrew people might have been written. In such an epic, women
like Deborah and Jephthah's Daughter and Delilah would be the idealized
heroines, as are Penelope and Andromache and Helen in Homeric poems. It
is not unreasonable, therefore, to suppose that in the Achaean Age there
lived actual women, of heroic qualities, who were the prototypes of the
idealized figures presented by Homer and the dramatic poets.

Woman must have played a prominent role in the childhood of the Greek
world, for much of the romantic interest which Greek legend inspires is
derived from the mention of the women. Helen and Penelope, Clytemnestra
and Andromache, and the other celebrated dames of heroic times, stand in
the foreground of the picture, and are noted for their beauty, their
virtues, their crimes, or their sufferings. Thus, a study of the history
of woman in Ancient Greece properly begins with a contemplation of
feminine life as it is presented in the poems of Homer.

Homer's portrayal of the Achaean Age is complete and satisfactory,
largely because he devotes so much attention to woman and the conditions
of her life. His chivalrous spirit manifests itself in his attitude
toward the weaker sex. Homer's men are frequently childish and
impulsive; Homer's women present the characteristics universally
regarded as essential to true womanhood. They even seem strangely
modern; the general tone of culture, the relation of the sexes, the
motives that govern men and women, present striking parallels to what we
find in modern times.

Homer has presented to us eternal types of womanhood, which are in
consequence worthy of the immortality they have acquired. At present, we
shall merely seek to learn from these works as much as possible about
the life of woman as seen in the customs of society, and in
archaeological and ethnographic details.

That which strikes us as most noticeable in the organization of society
in heroic times is its patriarchal simplicity. Monarchy is the
prevailing form of government. "Basileus," "leader of the people," is
the title of the sovereign, and every Basileus rules by right hereditary
and divine: the sceptre of his house is derived from Zeus. The king is
leader in war, head of the Council and of the Assembly of the people,
and supreme judge in all matters involving equity. The "elders"
constitute the Council, and the people are gathered together in Assembly
to endorse the actions of their chiefs. The Iliad describes the life of
a Greek camp; but Agamemnon, the suzerain, has under him men who are
kings at home. The Odyssey describes civil life in the centres where the
chieftains at Ilium are royal rulers. The two epics are chiefly
concerned with the lives of these kings and their families. It is the
life of courts and kings, of the aristocracy, with which Homer makes us
familiar; and in the monarchies of Homer the status of woman is always
elevated and her influence great. The wife shares the position of her
husband, and his family are treated with all the deference due the head.
As the king derives his authority by divine right, the people live
peaceably under the government of their chief as under the authority and
protection of the gods. Such are the salient features of the Homeric
polity.

With what inimitable grace does the poet initiate us even into the life
of the little girl at her mother's side. Achilles is chiding Patroclus
for his tears: "Wherefore weepest thou, Patroclus, like a fond little
maid that runs by her mother's side and bids her mother take her up, and
tearfully looks at her till the mother takes her up?" Now, let us note
the maiden at the dawn of womanhood. The mother had prayed that her
daughter might grow up like Aphrodite in beauty and charm, and like
Athena in wisdom and skill in handiwork. Father and mother observe with
happiness her radiant youth; and her brothers care tenderly for her. Her
pastimes consist in singing and dancing and playing ball and the various
forms of outdoor recreation. Young men and maidens join together in
these sports. Homer represented such scenes on the Shield of Achilles:
"Also did the lame god devise a dancing place like unto that which once
in wide Cnossos Daedalus wrought for Ariadne of the lovely tresses. There
were youths dancing and maidens of costly wooing, their hands upon one
another's wrists. Fine linen the maidens had on, and the youths
well-woven doublets, faintly glistening with oil. Fair wreaths had the
maidens, and the youths daggers of gold hanging from silver baldrics.
And now they would run round with deft feet exceeding lightly, as when a
potter sitting by his wheel that fitteth between his hands maketh trial
of it whether it will run: and now anon they would run in line to meet
each other." Such were their pastimes, and equally joyous were their
occupations. To the maidens seem to have been chiefly assigned the
outdoor tasks of the household, which would contribute to their physical
development. Thus the Princess Nausicaa and her girl friends wash in the
river the garments of fathers and brothers; and the Shield of Achilles
represented a vintage scene where "maidens and striplings in childish
glee bear the sweet fruit in plaited baskets, and in the midst of them a
boy made pleasant music on a clear-toned viol, and sang thereto a sweet
Linus-song, while the rest with feet falling together kept time with the
music and the song."

The education of the girls was of the simplest character. They grew up
in the apartment of the mother, and learned from her simple piety toward
the gods a modest bearing, skill in needlework, and efficiency in the
management of a household.

While enjoying a freedom far greater than that allowed to maidens in the
classical period, the Homeric girls did not take part in the feasts and
pastimes of court life. Thus the poet tells us that Nausicaa, who is a
perfect picture of the Greek girl in the springtime of her youth and
beauty, "retired to her chamber upon her return to the palace, and
supper was served to her by a nurse in her apartments," while Odysseus
was being graciously entertained by her father and mother in the court
below. Strict attention to the _convenances_ of their sex and station
was required of these primitive women; and the high-minded maiden
Nausicaa feared evil report should the stranger, Odysseus, be seen with
her in the streets of the city, as such intimacy would be a "shame" to
her, a maiden; while it was also a "shame" for a married woman to go
alone into the presence of men, even when in her own house, though she
could enter their presence when attended by her handmaidens. Thus
Penelope is followed by her maidens when she goes to the hall of the men
to hear the minstrel Phemius. "Bid Antinoe and Hippodamia," says she,
"come to stand by my side in the halls, for alone I will not go among
men, for I am ashamed." Nor did Helen and Andromache ever appear in
public without their handmaidens. In seeming opposition to this
excessive modesty was that office of hospitality which ofttimes required
young women to bathe and anoint the distinguished strangers who were
guests in the house. Thus Polycaste, the beautiful daughter of Nestor,
bathed and anointed Telemachus, and put on him a cloak and vest. Helen
performed like offices for Odysseus when he came in disguise into Troy,
and Circe later for the same hero. Though the poet's statements may at
times, in matters of outward appearance, do violence to modern social
rules, yet, because life in heroic times was simpler and less
conventional, there could innocently be greater freedom of expression
between the sexes regarding many matters which are tabooed in good
society in this very conventional age. Hence such passages as those
cited are to be taken rather as an evidence of the innocence and
ingenuousness of Homer's maidens than as an imputation of lack of
modesty.

There are many indications pointing to the universal beauty of Homeric
women. Thus a favorite epithet of the country is "Hellas, famed for fair
women." There are also numerous epithets applied to Homeric characters
significant of beauty, as "fair in form," "with beautiful cheeks," "with
beautiful locks," "with beautiful breasts," and the like, demonstrating
the universal love of physical beauty as well as the prevalence of
beautiful types.

Marriage was a highly honorable estate, and both young men and maidens
looked forward to it as a natural and desirable step in the sequence of
life. The preliminaries were of a distinctly patriarchal type. The
marriage was usually a matter of arrangement between the suitor and his
intended father-in-law. Sometimes a man might win his bride by heroic
deed or personal merit; but usually the successful suitor was he who
brought the most costly wedding gifts. Thus the characteristic feature
was wife purchase. Usually these gifts were offered to the bride's
father or family; but in the case of the (supposed) widow Penelope, they
were presented to the woman herself. The gifts were added to the wealth
of the bride's household. The idea of dower as such is foreign to the
Homeric poems, though the poet occasionally represents the bride as
receiving from parents rich gifts, which apparently were to be her
personal property, in addition to the nuptial gifts from her family,
consisting of herds or jewels or precious raiment.

From the eagerness with which suitors sought to win the regard of the
maiden, it would seem that she had some choice in the selection of a
husband; but in general the father decided whom he would have for his
son-in-law, though at times the maiden was given her choice from a
number of young men approved by her father. Widows were expected to
remarry; and in their case considerable freedom of choice existed.

The marriage ceremonies were of a social rather than religious or civil
character. The wedding day was celebrated by a feast provided by the
groom in the house of the bride's father. All the guests were clad in
their most costly raiment, and they brought presents to the young
couple. In these patriarchal times, when the father was both chief and
pontiff, so that his approval gave a sacred character to the union, the
leading away of the bride from the house of her father seems to have
constituted the most important act of the marriage ceremony. In the
description of the Shield of Achilles, Homer gives us a glimpse of this
solemnity. Under the glow of torches, surrounded by a joyous company,
dancing and singing hymeneal songs, the bride was led to the house of
her future husband. She was veiled, a custom that was a survival of the
old attempt to avoid angering the ancestral spirits by withdrawing
unceremoniously from their surveillance. The gods presided over
marriage, but no priest or sacrifice was needed; no ceremonies have been
recorded which confirm the theory of bride capture, so often said to be
at the basis of Homeric marriages, nor is there mention of any
ceremonial rites on the wedding night.

Marriage among the Homeric Greeks had primarily two distinct objects in
view: the preservation of a pure line of descent, and the protection of
the property rights of the family. Hence the wife and mother had in her
hands all the sacred traditions of the family; if these were preserved
by her, she added to their glory; if violated, the prestige of the
family suffered untold loss. In consequence, there was no polygamy and
no divorce. Monogamy could be the only sanctioned form of marriage where
such conceptions of wedded life prevailed. Concubinage existed,
especially when the husband was long absent from home; but it was looked
upon with disfavor and frequently led to unfortunate consequences, as in
the cases of Phoenix and Agamemnon. Hetairism and prostitution did not
receive in the Homeric days the recognized place that was later accorded
them in the social structure of the Greeks. The many instances of
conjugal devotion in the Iliad and the Odyssey, as seen, for example, in
Hector and Andromache, Odysseus and Penelope, Alcinous and Arete, show
the high average of marital fidelity in heroic times. There are also
many minor indications that the ties of the family were very sacred
among the Achaeans, and that conjugal affection was very strong. One of
the lamented hardships of the long siege was separation from one's wife:
"For he that stayeth away but one single month far from his wife in his
benched ship fretteth himself when winter storms and the furious sea
imprison him; but for us the ninth year of our stay here is upon us in
its course." And the prayer of Odysseus for Nausicaa shows the Greek
love of home and happy married life: "And may the gods grant thee all
thy heart's desire: a husband and a home, and a mind at one with his may
they give--a good gift; for there is nothing mightier and nobler than
when man and wife are of one heart and mind in a house, a grief to their
foes, and to their friends great joy, but their own hearts know it
best."

The view taken of adultery is a good test of the position of woman in
society. In Homeric times, adultery was regarded as the violation of a
property right. There are few harsh words in the Iliad against Helen;
all the anger of the Greeks was concentrated against Paris, who had
violated the bond of guest friendship, and had alienated his host's
property. Menelaus readily pardoned Helen, when material reparation had
been exacted; there is no moral reprehension of the adultery itself.
Clytemnestra was violently condemned, less because she yielded to the
seductions of AEgisthus than because her crime led to the murder of her
husband. There seems to have been also a natural perpetuity of the
marriage contract. To the Greeks, Helen was always the wife of Menelaus.
The ideal for the wife was single-hearted loyalty toward her husband;
faithfulness and submission were the principal virtues of women. Moral
lapses by men were frequent, and the same standard of marital rectitude
was not required from them as from the women of the heroic days.

The social manners of the time, and especially the elevated position of
the matron, may be gathered from Homer's account of Telemachus's
reception at the palace of King Menelaus in Sparta. He and his friend
Pisistratus are conducted into the great hall, where, after having
bathed and anointed themselves and put on fresh raiment, they are
received by their host, Menelaus. They are placed on chairs beside him,
and a repast is brought, of which they are invited to partake. Menelaus
does not yet know who his guests are, but he has observed that
Telemachus weeps when Odysseus is mentioned in conversation.

While he is pondering on this, Helen comes forth into the hall from her
"fragrant vaulted chamber" in the inner or woman's part of the house.
With her are three handmaids, one of whom sets for her the well-wrought
chair, a second brings a rug of soft wool, while the third places at her
side a silver basket on wheels, across which is laid a golden distaff
charged with wool of violet blue. Helen immediately takes a leading part
in the entertainment of the guests, one of whom, with woman's intuition,
she is the first to recognize, and they converse far into the night.
Then good cheer is spread before them, and Helen casts into the wine
whereof they drink "a drug to lull all pain and anger and bring
forgetfulness to every sorrow." Presently Helen bids her handmaids show
with torches the guests to their beds beneath the corridors, where
bedsteads have been set with purple blankets and coverlets and thin
mantles upon them.

Here, in her royal palace, Helen is in every sense a queen. Endowed with
charms of intellect, as well as of person, she regulates the life and
determines the tone of the society about her; and she is but an example
of the high social position of the Homeric women.

The Homeric matron had as her regular duties the management of the
household, and was trained in every domestic occupation. Spinning and
weaving were her chief accomplishments, and all the Homeric heroines
were highly skilled in the textile arts. The garments worn by the men
were fashioned at home by handmaidens under the superintendence of their
mistress, who herself engaged in the work. Penelope had fifty slave
maidens to direct in the various duties of the household. The daughters
of Celeus, like Rebecca of old, went to the well to draw water for
household use; and the clothes washing of the Princess Nausicaa and her
maidens has been already mentioned. So, by the side of the refinement
and elegance of the Homeric Age we have a simplicity of manners that but
adds to the charm.

In spite of these beautiful instances of domestic harmony and affection,
the women of Homer had really no rights, in the modern sense of the
term. Throughout the whole of life their position was subject to the
will or the whims of men. At marriage, woman merely passed from the
tutelage of her father to that of her husband, who had absolute power
over her. But though the power of the husband was absolute, yet he was
generally deferential toward the wife he loved, and was frequently
guided by her opinions. Thus, the Phaeacians say of Queen Arete:
"Friends, this speech of our wise queen is not wide of the mark, nor far
from our deeming, so hearken thereto. But on Alcinous here both word and
work depend." With Arete lay the real seat of authority, though she
could claim no rights, and doubtless the tactful and clever Homeric
woman was, as a rule, the dominating influence in the palace.

When the husband died, the grown-up son succeeded to his rights, and it
was in his power, if he saw fit, to give his widowed mother again in
marriage. Penelope's obedience to her son Telemachus is one of the
striking features of the Odyssey. He had it in his power to give her in
marriage to any of the suitors, but he refrained, from filial affection
and mercenary motives. "It can in no wise be that I thrust forth from
the house, against her will, the woman that bare me and reared me," says
Telemachus; and he continues: "Moreover, it is hard for me to make heavy
restitution to Icarius, as needs I must if, of my own will, I send my
mother away."

Far worse, however, was the lot of the widow whose husband had been
slain in battle. She became at once the slave of the conqueror, to be
dealt with as he wished. Hector draws a gloomy picture of the fate of
Andromache in case he should be slain: "Yea, of a surety I know this in
heart and soul; the day shall come for holy Ilium to be laid low, and
Priam and the folk of Priam of the good ashen spear. Yet doth the
anguish of the Trojans hereafter not so much trouble me, neither
Hecuba's own, neither King Priam's, neither my brethren's, the many and
brave that shall fall in the dust before their foemen, as doth thine
anguish in the day when some mail-clad Achaean shall lead thee weeping
and rob thee of the light of freedom. So shalt thou abide in Argos and
ply the loom at another woman's bidding, and bear water from Fount
Messeis or Hyperia, being grievously entreated, and sore constraint
shall be laid upon thee. And then shall one say that beholdeth thee
weep: 'This is the wife of Hector, that was foremost in battle of the
horse-training Trojans, when men fought about Ilium.' Thus shall one say
hereafter, and fresh grief will be thine for lack of such an husband as
thou hadst to ward off the day of thraldom. But me in death may the
heaped-up earth be covering, ere I hear thy crying and thy carrying into
captivity." Similar lamentations over the harsh treatment of the widows
and the sad lot of the orphans, when the natural protector had been
slain, occur again and again. When taken captive, the noblest ladies
became the concubines of the victor, and were disposed of at his
pleasure. Briseis is a striking instance of this. She was a maiden of
princely descent, whose husband and brother had been slain by Achilles.
Yet she looked upon her position as a captive as quite in the natural
order of things. She manifestly became much attached to her captor, and
left "all unwillingly" when she was carried off to Agamemnon's tent.
When she was restored to Achilles, she laments the fallen Patroclus, who
had promised to make her godlike Achilles's wedded wife.

Many female slaves of noble descent are mentioned by Homer, and their
positions in the households of their mistresses are frequently of
importance. Thus Euryclea, who had nurtured Odysseus and reared
Telemachus, was practically at the head of the domestic affairs of the
palace, and her relations with Penelope were most affectionate. The
other slaves were divided into several classes, according to their
different qualities and abilities. To some were assigned the menial
offices, such as turning the handmills, drawing the water, and preparing
the food for their master; while others were engaged in spinning and
weaving, under the direct oversight of their lady mistress.

It is but natural that the great ladies of heroic times, reared in the
luxury of courts, attended by numerous slaves, and exercising an
elevating influence over their husbands through their personal charms,
should devote great attention to the elegancies of the costume and the
toilet. The Greek love of beauty led to love of dress. Numerous
epithets point to this characteristic of Homeric ladies; as "with
beautiful peplus," "well-girdled," "with beautiful zone," "with
beautiful veil," "with beautiful sandal," and the like; and care in
dressing the hair is seen in such phrases as "with goodly locks," "with
glossy locks."

The Homeric poems describe for us the dress of the AEolico-Ionians down
to the ninth or eighth centuries before Christ, and it differs in many
important particulars from that of the classical period as seen in the
Parthenon marbles.

The women wore only one outer garment, the peplus, brought to Hellas
from Asia by the Aryans, which garment the Dorian women continued to
wear until a late period. The peplus in its simplest form consisted of
an oblong piece of the primitive homemade woollen cloth, unshapen and
unsewn, open at the sides, and fastened on the shoulders by _fibulae_,
and bound by a girdle; but, undoubtedly, as worn by Homeric princesses
it assumed a much more regular pattern and was richly embroidered. The
pharos was probably a linen garment of Egyptian origin, which was
sometimes worn instead of the peplus. Thus the nymph Calypso "donned a
great shining pharos, light of woof and gracious, and about her waist
she cast a fair golden girdle, and a veil withal on her head." Both
these garments left the arms bare, and, while frequently of some length
behind, as seen in the epithet "the robe-trailing Trojan dames," were
short enough in front to allow the feet to appear.

As the peplus was open at the sides, the girdle was the second most
important article of feminine attire. This was frequently of gold, as in
Calypso's case, and adorned with tassels, as was Hera's girdle with its
hundred tassels "of pure gold, all deftly woven, and each one worth an
hundred oxen." But the girdle of girdles was the magic cestus of golden
Aphrodite, which Hera borrowed in order to captivate Zeus. The tightened
girdle made the dress full over the bosom, so that the epithet
"deep-bosomed"--that is, with full, swelling bosom--became frequent.
Another characteristic article of dress was the _kredemnon_, a kind of
veil, of linen or of silk, in color generally white, though at times
dark blue. It was worn over the head, and allowed to fall down the back
and the sides of the head, leaving the face uncovered. There was no
garment, like a cloak, to be worn over the peplus. For freer movement
women would cast off the mantle-like _kredemnon_, which answered all the
purposes of a shawl. Thus Nausicaa and her companions, when preparing
for the game of ball, "cast off their tires and began the song," and
Hecuba, in her violent grief, "tore her hair and cast from her the
shining veil." There were also metal ornaments for the head, the
_stephane_, or coronal, and the _ampyx_, a headband or frontlet. The
_kekryphalos_ was probably a caplike net, bound by a woven band;
Andromache "shook off from her head the bright attire thereof, the net,
and woven band." Other feminine ornaments were: the _isthmion_, a
necklace, fitting close to the neck; the _hormos_, a long chain,
sometimes of gold and amber, hanging from the nape of the neck over the
breast; and _peronae_, or brooches, and ear-rings of various shapes,
either globular, spiral, or in the form of a cup, Helen, for example,
"set ear-rings in her pierced ear, ear-rings of three drops and
glistening; therefrom shone grace abundant."

To embrace in one general description these various articles of feminine
attire, "we may think of Helen as arrayed in a colored peplus, richly
embroidered and perfumed, the corners of which were drawn tightly over
the shoulders and fastened together by the _perone_. The waist was
closely encircled by the zone, which was, no doubt, of rich material
and design. Over her bosom hung the _hormos_ of dark red amber set in
gold. Her hair hung down in artificial plaits, and on her head was the
high, stiff _kekryphalos_, of which we have spoken above, bound in the
middle by the _plekte anadesme_. Over the forehead was the shining
_ampyx_, or tiara, of gold; and from the top of the head fell the
_kredemnon_, or veil, over the shoulders and back, affording a quiet
foil to the glitter of gold and jewels."

Such is the picture of the Heroic Age as drawn for us by Homer. It is a
bright picture in the main, though the treatment of the widows and the
captive maidens throws on it dark shadows. But when we become acquainted
with the heroines of this age, and study their characters in the
environment in which Homer places them, we shall be all the more
impressed with the high status maintained by the gentler sex at the dawn
of Greek civilization.

Before treating of the heroines of Homer, however, let us briefly notice
the maidens and matrons of Greek mythology who do not figure so
conspicuously in the Chronicles of the Trojan War, but who have won a
permanent place in art and in literature.

We should not fail to mention the mortal loves who became through Zeus
the mothers of heroes,--Europa, whom he wooed in the form of a white
bull, and carried away to Crete, where she became the mother of Minos,
Rhadamanthus, and Sarpedon; Semele, who was overcome with terror when
Zeus appeared in all his godlike array, and who gave birth to Dionysus,
god of the vine; Leda, wooed by Zeus in the guise of a snow-white swan,
the mother of Helen, and of Castor and Pollux; Alcmene, mother of
Heracles; Callisto, changed, with her little son Arcas, because of the
jealousy of Hera, into the constellations known as the Great and the
Little Bear; and, finally, Danae, daughter of Acrisius, King of Argos,
locked up by her tyrannical father in a brazen tower, but visited by
Zeus as a golden shower. The offspring of this union was the hero
Perseus. King Acrisius, in dread of a prophecy that he was destined to
be slain by his grandson, had the mother and helpless infant enclosed in
an empty cask, which was consigned to the fury of the sea. Terrified at
the sound of the great waves beating over their heads, Danae prayed to
the gods to watch over them and bring them to some friendly shore. Her
piteous prayers were answered, and mother and child were rescued and
found a hospitable haven on the island of Seriphos,

      "When rude around the high-wrought ark
       The tempests raged, the waters dark
       Around the mother tossed and swelled;
       With not unmoistened cheek she held
       Her Perseus in her arms and said:
       'What sorrows bow this hapless head!
       Thou sleepst the while, thy gentle breast
       Is heaving in unbroken rest,
       In this our dark, unjoyous home,
       Clamped with the rugged brass, the gloom
       Scarce broken by the doubtful light
       That gleams from yon dim fires of night.
       But thou, unwet thy clustering hair,
         Heedst not the billows raging wild,
       The moanings of the bitter air,
         Wrapt in thy purple robe, my beauteous child!
       Oh! seemed this peril perilous to thee,
         How sadly to my words of fear
         Wouldst thou bend down thy listening ear!
       But now sleep on, my child! sleep thou, wide sea!
       Sleep, my unutterable agony!
         Oh! change thy counsels, Jove, our sorrows end!
         And if my rash, intemperate zeal offend,
       For my child's sake, his father, pardon me!'"

The god Apollo, too, had his mortal loves: the fair maiden Coronis, whom
in a fit of jealousy he shot through the heart,--the mother of
AEsculapius, the god of healing; Daphne, the beautiful nymph, who would
not listen to his entreaties, and was finally changed into a laurel
tree; and the muse Calliope, by whom he became the father of Orpheus,
who inherited his parent's musical and poetical gifts. The story of the
loves of Orpheus and his beautiful wife, Eurydice, is one of the most
touching in all literature: how she died from the bite of a venomous
serpent, and her spirit was conducted down to the gloomy realms of
Hades, leaving Orpheus broken-hearted; how Zeus gave him permission to
go down into the infernal regions to seek his wife; how he appeased even
Cerberus's rage by his music, and Hades and Proserpina consented to
restore Eurydice to life and to her husband's care, but on the one
condition that he should leave the infernal regions without once turning
to look into the face of his beloved wife; and how he observed the
mandate until just before he reached the earth, when he turned, only to
behold the vanishing form of the wife he had so nearly snatched from the
grave. The rest of his days were passed in sadness, and finally some
Bacchantes, enraged at his sad notes, tore him limb from limb, and cast
his mangled remains into the river Hebrus. "As the poet-musician's head
floated down the stream, the pallid lips still murmured 'Eurydice!' for
even in death he could not forget his wife; and as his spirit floated on
to join her, he incessantly called upon her name, until the brooks,
trees, and fountains he had loved so well caught up the longing cry and
repeated it again and again."

The story of Niobe is one of the best-known Greek legends, because of
its exquisite portrayal in art. Niobe, daughter of Tantalus, the mother
of fourteen children,--seven manly sons and seven beautiful
daughters,--in her pride taunted the goddess Latona, mother of Apollo
and Artemis, because her offspring numbered only two. She even went so
far as to forbid her people to worship the two deities, and ordered that
all the statues of them in her kingdom should be torn down and
destroyed. Enraged at the insult, Latona called her children to her, and
bade them slay all the children of Niobe. Apollo, therefore, coming upon
the seven lads as they were hunting, slew them with his unfailing
arrows; and while the mother was grieving for the loss of her sons,
Artemis began to slay her daughters. In vain did the mother strive to
protect them, and one by one they fell, never to rise again. Then the
gods, touched by her woe, changed her into stone just as she stood, with
upturned face, streaming eyes, and quivering lips.

Three other heroines of mythology deserve to be enrolled within this
brief chronicle: Andromeda, Ariadne, and Atalanta. The Princess
Andromeda, a lovely maiden, was being offered as a sacrifice to a
terrible sea monster who was devastating the coast. She was chained fast
to an overhanging rock, above the foaming billows that continually
dashed their spray over her fair limbs. As the monster was about to
carry her off as his prey, the hero Perseus, returning from his conquest
of Medusa, suddenly appeared as a deliverer, slew the monster, freed
Andromeda from her chains, restored her to the arms of her overjoyed
parent, and thus won the princess as his bride.

Far more pathetic is the story of the Princess Ariadne, daughter of King
Minos of Crete, who fell in love with the Athenian hero Theseus when he
came to rescue the Athenian youths and maidens from the terrible
Minotaur. She provided him with a sword and with a ball of twine,
enabling him to slay the monster and to thread his way out of the
inextricable mazes of the labyrinth. Theseus in gratitude carried her
off as his bride; but on the island of Naxos he basely deserted her,
and Ariadne was left disconsolate. Violent was her grief; but in the
place of a fickle mortal lover, she became the fair bride of an
immortal, the genial god Dionysus, who discovered her on the island and
wooed and won her.

Atalanta, the third of this illustrious group, the daughter of Iasius,
King of Arcadia, was a famous runner and sportswoman. She took part with
Meleager in the grand hunt for the Calydonian boar, and it was she who
at last brought the boar to bay and gave him a mortal wound. When
Atalanta returned to her father's court, she had numberless suitors for
her hand; but, anxious to preserve her freedom, she imposed the
condition that every suitor should engage with her in a footrace: if he
were beaten, his life was forfeited; if successful, she would become his
bride. Many had thus lost their lives. Finally, Hippomenes, a youth
under the protection of Aphrodite, who had bestowed on him three golden
apples, desired to race with the princess. Atalanta soon passed her
antagonist, but, as she did so, a golden apple fell at her feet. She
stooped to pick it up, and Hippomenes regained the lead. Again she
passed him, and again a golden apple caused her to pause, and Hippomenes
shot ahead. Finally, just as she was about to reach the goal, the third
golden apple tempted her to stop once more, and Hippomenes won the race
and a peerless bride.




III

WOMEN OF THE ILIAD


The reader of the Iliad and the Odyssey finds himself in an atmosphere
altogether human. As he peruses these pages, so rich in pictures of the
life and manners of heroic times, it matters little to him whether the
men and women of epic song had merely a mythical existence, or were, in
fact, historical figures. The contemporaries of Homer and later Greeks
had an unshaken belief in the reality of those men and women; and the
poet has breathed into them the breath of genius, which gives life and
immortality.

We have in these poems the most ancient expression of the national
sentiment of the Greeks, and from them we can form a correct idea of the
relations of men and women in prehistoric times, and of the character
and status of woman in the childhood of the Greek world.

It is a noteworthy fact that the plots of both the Iliad and the
Odyssey--as well as the most interesting episodes they contain--turn
upon love for women; and a clear idea of the importance of woman in the
Heroic Age could not be given better than by briefly reviewing the
brilliant panorama of warlike and domestic scenes in which woman
figures.

We are first introduced to a Greek camp in Troy land. During ten long
years the hosts of the Achaeans have been gathered before the walls of
Ilium. What is the cause of this long struggle? A woman! Paris, son of
King Priam, had carried off to his native city Queen Helen, wife of
Menelaus, King of Sparta. Aided by the wiles of Aphrodite, to whom he
had awarded the golden apple as the fairest in the contest of the three
goddesses, Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite, Paris succeeded in winning the
heart of this fairest of Greek women and in persuading her to desert
husband and daughter to follow the fortunes of a handsome stranger. On
the isle of Cranae their nuptial rites were celebrated, and after much
voyaging they reached their new home in Troy, where King Priam,
fascinated with the beauty and grace of this new daughter, in spite of
his dread of the consequences, graciously received the errant pair. The
Greek chieftains bound themselves by an inviolable oath to assist the
forsaken husband to recover his spouse, and, marshalling their forces,
they entered upon the long and tedious war. Thus, a woman was the cause
of the first great struggle between Orient and Occident, of the
assembling of the mighty hosts of the Achaeans under King Agamemnon, of
ten years of siege and struggle and innumerable wars, of the hurling of
many valiant souls to Hades, of the fall of Troy, and of the varied
wanderings and dire fortunes of the surviving heroes and heroines of the
epic story.

The Iliad does not tell the whole story of the Trojan War; Homer invites
the muse to sing of but one episode thereof--the dire wrath of Achilles.
The cause of that violent outburst is also a woman. The Greek chieftains
are gathered in the place of assembly, along the banks of the Scamander.
In their midst is an aged priest of the town of Chryse, bearing in his
hand the fillets of Apollo, the Far-darter, upon a golden staff. He
beseeches the Greeks to restore to him his dear child, the maiden
Chryseis, their captive, and to accept in return the proffered ransom,
reverencing the god. There is a sympathetic murmur among the chieftains,
who urge the granting of the petition; but the thing pleases not the
heart of Agamemnon, king of men, who had received the beautiful captive
as his own share of the booty, and for love of her will not give her up.
So he roughly sends the old man away, and lays stern charge upon him not
to be seen again near the ships of the Achaeans. Outraged in his dignity
as a priest and in his tenderness as a father, the aged sire prays to
Apollo, who at once sends dire pestilence upon the Greeks; and the pyres
of the dead burn continually in multitude. Nine days speed the god's
shafts throughout the host, and on the tenth the valiant warrior
Achilles summons the folk to assembly, and bids Calchas, "most excellent
of augurs," declare the cause of the pestilence. Calchas, after much
hesitation, responds that the Far-darter has brought war upon the Greeks
because Agamemnon has done despite to the priest, and has not set his
daughter free and accepted the ransom.

Agamemnon is violently enraged at the seer; his dark heart within him is
greatly filled with anger, and his eyes are like flashing fire. He
charges the seer with never saying anything that is pleasant for him to
hear. And as for Chryseis, he would fain keep her himself in his
household; for he prefers her even before Clytemnestra, his wedded wife,
to whom she is nowise inferior, neither in favor nor stature nor wit nor
skill. Yet if she be taken away from him for the good of the people, he
demands another prize forthwith, that alone of the Greeks he may not be
without reward. Then is the valiant Achilles enraged at the covetousness
of his chief, and a violent quarrel ensues. At last, Agamemnon asserts
that he will send back Chryseis, but he will come and take in return
Achilles's meed of honor, Briseis of the fair cheeks, that Achilles may
know how far the mightier is he and that no other may hereafter dare to
rival him to his face.

Then is the son of Peleus the more enraged, and, had not the goddess
Athena appeared and restrained his wrath, he would have assailed
Agamemnon on the spot. However, he speaks again with bitter words and
declares that hereafter longing for Achilles will come upon the Achaeans
one and all; for no more will he fight with the Greeks against the
Trojans. So the assembly breaks up, after this battle of violent words
between the twain. Achilles returns to his huts and trim ships, with
Patroclus and his company; and Agamemnon sends forth Odysseus and others
on a fleet ship to bear back to her father the lovely Chryseis, and to
offer a hecatomb to Apollo. Thus Chryseis is restored to her father's
arms, and appears no more in the story.

But Atrides ceases not from the strife with which he has threatened
Achilles. He summons straightway two heralds, and bids them go to the
tent of Achilles and take Briseis of the fair cheeks by the hand and
lead her to him. Unwillingly they go on their mission, and find the
young warrior sitting sorrowfully beside his hut and black ship. He
knows wherefore they come, and bids his friend Patroclus bring forth the
damsel and give them her to lead away. And Patroclus hearkens to his
dear companion, and leads forth from the hut Briseis of the fair cheeks,
and gives her to the heralds. And the twain take their way back along
the ships of the Achaeans and with them goes the maiden, all unwilling.

In this moment of grief at the loss of the woman he loves, Achilles
bethinks him of his dear mother, the Nereid Thetis, and, stretching
forth his hand toward the sea, he prays to her to hearken to him. His
lady mother hears him as she sits in the sea depths beside her aged
sire, and with speed she arises from the gray sea, and sits down beside
him and strokes him with her hand and inquires the cause of his sorrow.
Into her sympathetic ear he tells all the story of his wrongs, and the
goddess shows herself the tenderest and most loving of mothers. He bids
her seek justice for him at the throne of mighty Zeus, with whom she is
potent on account of favors she has done him. She bewails with her son
that she has borne him to brief life and evil destiny; but she bids him
continue wroth with the Achaeans, and refrain utterly from battle, while
she will early fare to Zeus's palace upon Mount Olympus, and she thinks
to win him. True to her promise, she betakes herself to sunny Olympus
and finds the father of gods and men sitting apart from all the rest
upon the topmost peak. She clasps his knees with one hand as a suppliant
and with the other strokes his chin, and prays him to do honor to her
son and exalt him with recompense for the gross wrong he has suffered.
And Zeus, though he knows that it will lead to strife with Lady Hera,
his spouse, promises to heap just vengeance upon Agamemnon.

Thus, upon the very threshold of the Iliad, the chord of maternal
affection is struck; and when the wild passions of early manhood have
led to sorrow and humiliation, the mother appears, affording sympathy
and comfort, and is ready to traverse sea and earth and heaven to
intercede for her wronged and grief-stricken son.

Achilles remains away from battle, sulking beside the ships. The odds
are now in favor of the Trojans in the conflict that is being waged.
Both sides are weary of continual fighting, and a single combat is
arranged between Menelaus and Paris, the wronged husband and the
present lord of Helen. The meed of victory is to be Helen herself, with
all her treasures, she now appearing for the first time in the Epos.

Helen is summoned from her palace to witness the combat. So she hastens
from her chamber, attended by two handmaidens, and comes to the place of
the Scaean gates, where are gathered King Priam and the elders of the
city.

Homer nowhere attempts to describe Helen's beauty in detail, but
impresses it upon the reader merely by showing the bewitching effect of
her presence upon others. Even these sage old men fall under the spell
of her divine beauty, and, when they see her coming upon the towers,
softly speak winged words, one to the other:

"Small blame is it that Trojans and well-greaved Achaeans should for such
a woman long time suffer hardships; marvellously like is she to the
immortal goddesses to look upon. Yet even so, though she be so goodly,
let her go upon their ships and not stay to vex us and our children
after us."

Priam, however, addresses his beautiful daughter-in-law with gentle
words, laying the blame, not on her, but on the gods, for the dolorous
war of the Achaeans. Helen utters expressions of self-reproach, and then,
at Priam's request, points out the famous warriors of the invading host.

Paris is vanquished in the single combat, and Menelaus would have slain
his foe, and in that moment have regained Helen, had not the goddess
Aphrodite snatched up Paris in a cloud and transported him to his
chamber. Aphrodite then appears to Helen, in the form of an aged dame,
and bids her return to her lord. Helen recognizes the goddess, and her
scornful, bitter reply shows how the high-spirited lady rebelled at the
chains with which Aphrodite bound her. The wrath and menace of
Aphrodite, however, overcome her noble resolution, and she reluctantly
returns. When she sees her husband, she chides him scornfully for his
cowardice, and regrets that he had not perished at the hands of
Menelaus. But Paris is unaffected by her reproaches. His thoughts, as
ever, are not of war, but of love, and Helen, owing to the subtle power
of Aphrodite, cannot long resist his caresses. Meanwhile, the injured
husband rages through the host like a wild beast, if anywhere he might
set his eyes on and slay the wanton Paris.

We are now approaching a series of domestic scenes, in which figure the
three principal female characters of the Iliad. Owing to the abortive
issue of the single combat, the truce between Greeks and Trojans is
declared at an end, and the forces once more array themselves in
conflict. The Trojans are being hard pressed. Hector returns to the city
to command Hecuba, his mother, to assemble the aged dames of Troy, who
should go to Athena's temple and supplicate the goddess to have
compassion on them. At the gates the Trojans' wives and daughters gather
about him, inquiring of their loved ones. As he enters the royal palace,
his beautiful mother meets him and clasps him by the hand, and bids him,
weary of battle, pause to take refreshments. But Hector resists her
solicitous entreaties, urges her to gather the aged wives together, and,
with the most beautiful robe in the palace as an offering, to go to the
temple and supplicate Athena to have mercy. Hecuba does as he commands,
and the solemn procession mounts the citadel and implores the goddess to
have mercy on them and turn the tide of combat. The goddess, however, is
inflexible: she denies their prayer.

Hector, meanwhile, stops at the palace of Paris. He finds Helen seated
among her handmaidens, distributing to them their tasks, and Paris
polishing his beautiful armor. Hector severely rebukes his brother; but
words of scorn make but little impression on the smooth and courteous
Paris. Helen now addresses Hector, for whom she has a sisterly love and
admiration that contrasts painfully with her contempt for her cowardly
lord; and her words reveal the bitterness of her heart, because of her
evil destiny and because "even in days to come we may be a song in the
ears of men that shall be hereafter." Hector responds with sympathetic
regard to the sisterly confidence of Helen, and bids her rouse her
husband once more to enter the combat, while in the meantime he will go
to his own house to behold his dear wife and infant boy; for he knows
not if he shall return home to them again, or if the gods will now
overthrow him at the hands of the Achaeans.

When Hector comes to his palace, he finds not his beautiful wife,
white-armed Andromache, within; upon inquiry he learns that, through
anxiety because of the battle, like one frenzied, she had gone in haste
to the wall, and the nurse bearing the child was with her. Hector
hastens to the Scaean gates, and as he approaches them there came his
dear-won wife, running to meet him, and with her the handmaid bearing in
her bosom the tender boy, Hector's loved son Astyanax. Hector smiles and
gazes at the boy; while Andromache stands by his side weeping and clasps
his hand in hers, and urges him to take thought for himself and to have
pity on her, forlorn, and on their infant boy. Hector tells her that he
takes thought of all this, that his greatest grief is the thought of her
anguish in the day when some mail-clad Achaean shall lead her away and
rob her of the light of freedom, but it is his part to fight in the
forefront of the Trojans. He lays his son in his dear wife's bosom, and,
as she smiles tearfully upon the lad, her husband has pity to see her,
and gently caresses her with his hand and seeks to console her. He bids
her return to her own tasks, the loom and distaff, while he provides for
war. So part these heroic souls. Hector sets out for the battlefield;
and his dear wife departs to her home, oft looking back and letting fall
big tears. When she reaches her house, she gathers her handmaidens about
her, and stirs lamentations in them all. "So bewailed they Hector, while
yet he lived, within his house; for they deemed that he would no more
come home to them from battle nor escape the fury of the hands of the
Achaeans."

The closing scenes of the dramatic recital time and again present these
three women--Hecuba, Helen, and Andromache. Achilles continues to sulk
away from battle, in spite of Agamemnon's attempt at reconciliation. The
Trojans are winning victory after victory. Achilles's comrade Patroclus
finally gets permission to don the great warrior's armor, and he enters
the conflict. Hector, supposing him to be Achilles, engages with him in
combat and finally slays him. Achilles is overwhelmed with grief at the
death of Patroclus. His lady mother, Thetis, rises from the depths of
the sea to console him, and provides him a suit of armor fashioned by
Hephaestus. Agamemnon and Achilles are reconciled before the assembly of
the Achaeans, and fair-faced Briseis is restored to her lover. She utters
shrill laments over the body of Patroclus, who had been ever kind to
her. Achilles enters the combat, clad in the armor of Hephaestus. Hector
alone dares to face him, and he is slain, and his lifeless body is
dragged behind Achilles's chariot as he drives exultantly toward the
ships. Piteous wailings are heard from the walls, wailings of the aged
Priam, and of the sorrowful Hecuba, whose cry is the full bitterness of
maternal grief.

Within the city, in the inner chamber of her palace, a young wife is
engaged in weaving a double purple web and directing the work of her
handmaidens. Her thoughts are all of her warrior husband, and she has
had a servant set a great tripod upon the fire that Hector might have
warm washing when he comes home out of the battle--fond heart all
unaware how, far from all washings, bright-eyed Athena has slain him by
the hand of Achilles! But suddenly she hears shrieks and groans from the
battlements, and her limbs tremble and the shuttle falls from her hands
to earth. She dreads terribly lest Hector has met his fate at the hand
of Achilles. Accompanied by her handmaidens, she rushes to the
battlements, and beholds his lifeless body dragged by swift horses
toward the hollow ships. Then dark night comes on her eyes and shrouds
her, and she falls backward and gasps forth her spirit; and when at last
her soul returns into her breast, she bewails her own sad lot and that
of her child, deprived of such a husband and father.

The succeeding days are spent in gloom and sorrow, each side bewailing
the loss of a favorite warrior. King Priam finally recovers the body of
Hector from Achilles, and brings it back to Hector's palace, where the
women gather about the corpse--and among them white-armed Andromache
leads the lamentation, while in her hands she holds the head of Hector,
slayer of men. Hecuba, too, grieves for Hector, of all her children the
dearest to her heart; and, lastly, Helen joins in the sore lament,
sorrowing for the loss of the dearest of her brethren in Troy, who had
never spoken despiteful word to her, but had always been kind and
considerate. Here the long story reaches its natural conclusion. The
Iliad opens with a scene of wrath occasioned by man's passion for woman,
and closes with a scene of mourning--women grieving for the loss of a
slain husband and son and friend--knightly Hector.

Before we bid farewell to the martial tableaux presented to us in the
Iliad, and direct our attention to the domestic scenes of the Odyssey,
let us take a final glance at the heroines who have appeared in the
first Homeric epos.

Worthy of note is the atmosphere of beauty and delicacy and charm with
which the poet has enveloped Helen of Troy. She has committed a grievous
fault, but there is in the recital nothing which offends the moral
sense. This is because the poet has portrayed her with none of the
seductions of vice, but with all the allurements of penitence. She has
sinned, but it has been because of the mysterious and irresistible bond
which united her to the goddess of love; her moral nature has not been
perverted, and she is filled with shame and remorse because of the
reproach that has been cast upon her name. By a long and bitter
expiation, she has atoned for her fault; and memories of the days long
past abide with her in all their sweetness and purity. One can but
contrast the difference of attitude with which she addresses Priam and
Hector on the one hand, and Aphrodite and Paris on the other. For the
former she has the utmost consideration and respect, and in their
presence she feels most keenly how compromised is her position; for the
latter, the causes of her fall, she has nothing but the scorn and
contempt of a cultivated and high-spirited queen. In portraying the
regret of Helen for her first husband, and her contempt toward her
second; in representing Menelaus and the Greeks as fighting to avenge
"the longings and the groans of Helen"; and in subtly suggesting how
inevitable are the chains with which Aphrodite has bound her, the poet
wins for her our sympathy and admiration. Homer nowhere tells us of the
reconciliation of Menelaus and Helen, after the fall of Troy; but in the
Odyssey he presents a beautiful picture of Helen in Sparta, a queen once
more, beloved of husband and attendants, and presiding over her palace
with courtly grace and dignity; and in the prophecy of Proteus, the Old
Man of the Sea, the destiny of the fair queen is suggested in that of
her faithful spouse: "But thou, Menelaus, son of Zeus, art not ordained
to die and meet thy fate in Argos, the pasture land of horses; for the
deathless gods will convey thee to the Elysian plains and to the world's
end, where is Rhadamanthus of the fair hair, where life is easiest for
men. No snow is there, nor yet great storm, nor any rain, but always
ocean sendeth forth the breeze of the shrill blast to blow cool on men;
yea, for thou hast Helen to wife, and thereby they deem thee son to
Zeus."

Thus, because wedded to Zeus-begotten Helen, Menelaus himself is
deathless and immortal, and Homer meant, no doubt, to picture the royal
couple passing together in the Isles of the Blest the aeons of eternity.

Homer provided the literary types for all succeeding Greek poets, and it
is but natural that so bewitching a conception as Helen should be
frequently portrayed and adopted. But with the change in form of
government from monarchy to oligarchy, and from oligarchy to democracy,
the old epic conception of heroes and heroines frequently suffers
disparagement. In later periods, men began to meditate on moral
questions, and poets who sought to weigh the problems of human life and
destiny saw in Helen's career the old, old story of sin and sufering,
and they could not with Homeric chivalry gloze over that fatal step
which caused the wreck of empires and brought infinite woes to men.

Stesichorus was the first poet to charge Helen with all the guilt and
suffering of Hellas and of Troy; but for this offence against the
daughter of Zeus, says tradition, he was smitten with blindness, and did
not recover his sight until he had written the recantation beginning:
"Not true is that tale; nor didst thou journey in benched ships, nor
come to town of Troy,"--in which he adopted the theory that the real
Helen remained in Egypt, while a phantom accompanied Paris to Troy.

AEschylus searches into the dire consequences of Helen's sin, and on her
shoulders lays all the sufferings of Agamemnon and his descendants.
"Rightly is she called Helen," says he; "a hell of ships, hell of men,
hell of cities." He regards her as the very incarnation of evil, the
curse of two great nations. Yet even stern AEschylus yields due reverence
to her all-conquering beauty:

            "Ah! silent, see she stands;
      Each glowing tint, each radiant grace,
      That charm th' enraptur'd eye, we trace;
      And still the blooming form commands,
             Still honor'd, still ador'd,
      Though careless of her former loves,
      Far o'er the rolling sea the wanton roves."

He also represents her forsaken husband ever dreaming of her, enraptured
of her beauty:

      "Oft as short slumbers close his eyes,
      His sad soul sooth'd to rest,
      The dream-created visions rise
      With all her charms imprest:
      But vain th' ideal scene that smiles
      With rapt'rous love and warm delight;
      Vain his fond hopes; his eager arms
      The fleeting form beguiles,
      On sleep's quick pinions passing light."

AEschylus is not the only one of the early dramatists to whom Helen
furnished a worthy theme; the titles of four lost plays show that
Sophocles wrote of the Argive queen. There is no means of knowing,
however, how this master dealt with the romance. Judging from his
treatment of the Antigone legend, it is probable that Sophocles treated
Helen as a woman of rare beauty and power, more sinned against than
sinning, and subjected her character to the most profound analysis.

While AEschylus deprived Helen of something of the delicacy and charm
with which Homer had invested her, Euripides, in a number of his plays,
goes even further, and brings her down to the level of common life. Upon
her beautiful head were heaped the reproaches of the unfortunate maidens
and matrons of Greece and Troy for the woes they had to suffer, and we
must not always take the sentiments of a Hecuba or a Clytemnestra as
expressing the poet's own convictions. In the _Daughters of Troy_, he
represents her in violent debate with her mother-in-law, Hecuba, before
Menelaus, leaving with the reader the impression that she is a guilty,
wilful woman of ignoble traits, and in other plays he lays on her the
load of guilt for all the dire consequences of her act; yet in his
treatment of Helen there is always an ethereal element, hard to define,
but recognizable. She causes ruin and destruction, she is roundly abused
and reproached, yet she herself does not deal in invective and is proof
against all physical ill, being finally deified as the daughter of Zeus,
while suffering is invariably the fate of those who abuse and censure
her. And, like Stesichorus, Euripides in his old age makes a
recantation. In the _Helen_, he follows the Stesichorean version, and
dramatizes the legend that, after she was promised to Paris by
Aphrodite, Hera in revenge fashioned like to Queen Helen a breathing
phantom out of cloud land wrought for Priam's princely son; while Hermes
caught her away and transferred her to the halls of Proteus, King of
Egypt, to keep her pure for Menelaus. Thus it was for a phantom Helen
that Greek and Trojan fought at Troy; while the real Helen passed her
days amid the palm gardens of Egypt, eagerly awaiting the return of
Menelaus, and bewailing her ill name, though she was clean of sin. After
the war, she is happily reunited with her lord.

It is hard, however, to besmirch a conception of ideal beauty, and later
writers, casting aside the imputations of the dramatists, returned to
the Homeric type. The Greek rhetoricians found in Helen a fruitful
subject for panegyric, and made her synonymous with the Greek ideal of
beauty and feminine perfection. Isocrates praises her as the incarnation
of ideal loveliness and grace; beauty is all powerful, he says, and the
Helen legend shows how beauty is the most desirable of all human gifts.
Theocritus, in his exquisite _Epithalamium_, pays an unalloyed tribute
to her beauty and goodness. She is "peerless among all Achaean women that
walk the earth;--rose-red Helen, the glory of Lacedaemon;--no one is so
gifted as she in goodly handiwork;--yea, and of a truth, none other
smites the lyre, hymning Artemis and broad-breasted Athena, with such
skill as Helen, within whose eyes dwell all the Loves."

Quintus Smyrnaeus, of the fourth century of our era, who wrote a
_Post-Homerica_, emphasizes the demonic influence that controlled the
fate of Helen, and lays her frailty to the charge of Aphrodite. He gives
a beautiful picture of the queen as she is being led to the ships of the
Achaeans: "Now, Helen lamented not, but shame dwelt in her dark eyes and
reddened her lovely cheeks ... while round her the people marvelled as
they beheld the flawless grace and winsome beauty of the woman, and none
dared upbraid her with secret taunt or open rebuke. Nay, as she had been
a goddess, they beheld her gladly, for dear and desired was she in their
sight."

Thus the Helen legend became the allegory of Greek beauty, and so
exquisite an ideal, uplifting the spirit and satisfying one's longing
for higher things, strikes a responsive chord in the hearts of lovers of
beauty in every clime. The romance of Helen, after lying dormant for
centuries, came to life again in the legend of Faust. Marlowe treated
merely the external phases of the Faust legend; Goethe allegorized the
whole, and in the loves of Faust and Helen symbolized the passion of the
Renaissance for the Greek ideal of beauty; the fruit of the union of the
two is Euphorion, the genius of romantic art. Nor has Helen exerted less
influence on modern English poets. Landor, in numerous poems, portrays
the sweetness of her character and the omnipotence of her beauty and
charm; Swinburne dwells on the innocence and joyfulness of her
childhood; Tennyson speaks of her as

      "A daughter of the gods, divinely tall,
      And most divinely fair;"

and Andrew Lang has written a lengthy poem on the Helen legend, in which
he ascribes her frailty to the irresistible power of Aphrodite. Thus
Homer and the Homeric Age are inextricably entwined about the name of
Helen. It is significant in the study of Greek women that at the very
dawn of Greek civilization we should find such an ideal conception of
womanhood--one that universally captivates the fancy and has exerted an
influence through all succeeding ages.

Let us now pause a moment to contemplate the most lovable of all the
women of Homer, Hector's spouse, white-armed Andromache. Homer does not
devote much space to her--only the famous parting scene and the two
lamentations which she utters over her fallen husband. Yet, as the ideal
type of the soldier's wife, the loving mother, she has taken a hold on
the modern imagination and is the best known of all the female
characters of Greek epos. We know that she must have been beautiful,
though Homer uses only one epithet to describe her; we know that she
must have been brave and devoted and domestic, for Homer has painted for
us an ideal picture which portrays her with all these and many other
lovable attributes. Andromache is neither Trojan nor Greek; she is
universal; and wherever there are scenes of husband parted from wife, of
uncertainty as to the issue of the combat and the destiny of the
children, Andromache will be the great prototype. Andromache feels in
her heart that sacred Ilium is doomed, and, in those cruel times when
might was right, she knew but too well what was to be the fate of
herself and the lad Astyanax. Euripides tells us how the forebodings of
Andromache came true, and dwells on those sad days for the daughters of
Troy when the mailed hand of the Achaeans carried them off captive after
the fall of the city and determined their destiny by lot.

Andromache was apportioned to Neoptolemus, Achilles's valiant son, and
in Euripides's _Daughters of Troy_ she reappears, with her child in her
arms, haled forth to her new bondage. Sadly she bewails her lost Hector,
who could have warded off from her the curse of thraldom. The Greek
herald, Talthybius, demands from her the lad Astyanax, whom the Greeks
have decided to hurl from the battlements of Troy. The child is
ruthlessly torn from his mother's embrace, and she is led off to the
hollow ships. Neoptolemus takes her over sea to his home in Thessaly,
and loves her and treats her with a kindness and consideration that are
sweetly perfect. To him she bears a son in her captivity; but not of her
own will does she share his couch, for her heart is true to the memory
of Hector. After many years, Neoptolemus weds Hermione, daughter of
Menelaus and Helen, a princess of Sparta. To them no child is born, and
Hermione's heart is filled with anger and jealousy toward the thrall,
whom her husband still treats tenderly. With her father, Menelaus,
Hermione, during Neoptolemus's absence, plots the destruction of
Andromache and her boy, but the aged Peleus protects the defenceless
ones. Neoptolemus is slain at Delphi, and Thetis, who appears at the
close of the _Andromache_, thus solves the problem of fate:

      "And that war-captive dame, Andromache,
      In the Molossian land must find a home
      In lawful wedlock joined to Helenus,
      With that child who alone is left alive
      Of AEacus' line. And kings Molossian
      From him one after other long shall reign
      In bliss."

Readers of Virgil will recall how AEneas found Andromache in the
Molossian land, and how her heart yearned for the lad Ascanius, who
reminded her of the lost Astyanax. Euripides has been true, in the main,
to the Homeric conception of Andromache, and endows her in her captivity
with the same womanliness and domestic traits that won our hearts in the
Iliad; nevertheless, there is about her the infinite sadness that is
natural to one who has lost all that life holds dear. Yet Euripides
falls so infinitely below the master that the picture which will abide
longest in the memory is the parting scene in the Iliad.

Homer endows his minor characters with an interest that is no less real
to us than that given to Helen and Andromache. Of these lesser
characters, a few stand out insistent of our notice. At the threshold of
the story, Chryseis and Briseis appear as the innocent causes of the
quarrel of the chieftains. Chryseis is still a maiden, as far as can be
inferred, and had not lost kindred and friends when taken captive; for
her father, the priest of sacred Chryse, comes to beg her release, with
boundless ransoms. Hence her day of captivity is brief, and the aged
father joyously welcomes his beloved daughter. She must have been
beautiful and clever, for Agamemnon prized her far above Clytemnestra.

The story of Briseis is a much sadder one, and graphically illustrates
the fate of a gentlewoman who fell into the hands of the foe. She was a
captive widow, husband and kindred having been slain by Achilles. But
her captor loved her devotedly, and to him she was a wife in all but in
name; and Patroclus had promised her that she should in time become the
wedded wife of Achilles. The young warrior weeps bitterly when she is
taken from him, but at the close of the Iliad we see them happily
reunited. She is remembered because of the great passions that gathered
about her.

Homer presents two pictures of heroic motherhood in sorrow,--Hecuba and
Thetis; for the latter, though a goddess, is perfectly human in her
devotion to her fated son, Achilles. To her he goes for comfort, and she
is ever resourceful in responding to his wants. She weeps over his
destiny, but, since he has chosen the better part, she nobly supports
him in every struggle. Hecuba is truly the companion of her husband,
King Priam, associated with him in his projects, and sharing his
counsels. She has borne him nineteen children, and these she has seen
slain, one after another, by the hand of the foe. Hector is her favorite
son, in whose courage she recognizes the bulwark of Ilium. When she sees
him exposed to certain death, her anxiety overcomes her pride and she
beseeches him to come within the walls; and when at last her son has
succumbed, we find in her the same mingling of grief and of pride. Her
wild despair seems to be assuaged by the thought that her son died
gloriously. This heroic sentiment sustains her before the corpse of
Hector, and even in her lamentation she voices her calm courage.




IV

WOMEN OF THE ODYSSEY


Ten years have passed since the fall of Ilium, and the various heroes of
the Greeks have met with diverse fortunes. Agamemnon, king of men, has
returned to his fatherland, but merely to find treason and death at the
hands of AEgisthus, the new lord of Clytemnestra, his wife. Menelaus,
after long wanderings, especially in Egypt, has reestablished his
kingdom in Sparta, with Helen as his queen. Odysseus, King of Ithaca,
had the longest and most perilous voyage homeward, and, after meeting
with various misadventures, has been detained for nearly eight long
years, consuming his own heart, in the island paradise of Calypso,
Meanwhile, on his own island, Ithaca, things have begun to go amiss. The
island chiefs, men of the younger generation, begin to woo Penelope and
to harass her son, Telemachus. The wooers, after being rebuffed for
years by the fair queen, are becoming insolent, quartering themselves
upon her, and devouring her substance. At this time the action of the
Odyssey begins.

The determined time has now arrived when, by the counsels of the gods,
Odysseus is to be brought home to free his house, to avenge himself on
the wooers, and to recover his kingdom, Pallas Athena is the chief
agent in the restoration of Odysseus to his fatherland. She beseeches
Zeus that he may be delivered, and in accordance with this prayer Hermes
is sent to Calypso to bid her release Odysseus. Meanwhile, the goddess,
in human form, visits Telemachus in Ithaca, and urges the young prince
to withstand the suitors who are devastating his house, and to go in
search of his father. Touched by the words of the goddess, youth rapidly
gives way to manhood, and Telemachus determines to assert his rights and
to find his father.

After the departure of the goddess, the prince enters the court where
the suitors are gathered, listening to the singing of the renowned
minstrel Phemius; and his song was of the pitiful return of the Achaeans.
We now have our first vision of discreet Penelope. From her upper
chamber she hears the glorious strain, and she descends the high stairs
from her apartments, accompanied by two of her handmaids. "Now, when the
fair lady had come unto the wooers, she stood by the doorpost of the
well-builded roof, holding up her glistening tire before her face; and a
faithful maiden stood on either side of her." She begs Phemius to cease
from this sorrowful strain, which wastes her heart within her breast,
since to her, above all women, hath come a sorrow comfortless, because
she holds in constant memory so dear a head,--even that man whose fame
is noised abroad from Hellas to mid-Argos. Telemachus gently rebukes his
mother for interrupting the song of the minstrel, and bids her return to
her chamber and to her own housewiferies, the loom and distaff, and bid
the handmaids ply their tasks. Then in amaze she goes back to her
chamber, for she lays up the wise saying of her son in her heart. She
ascends to the upper chamber with the women, her handmaids, and there
bewails Odysseus, her dear lord, till gray-eyed Athena casts sweet sleep
upon her eyelids.

Telemachus begins to assert himself before the violent suitors. When
night falls and each goes to his own house to lie down to rest, the
young prince is attended to his chamber by the aged Euryclea, who had
nursed him when a little one. She bears the burning torches, and
prepares the chamber for her young master; and when he takes off his
soft doublet, she folds and smooths it and hangs it on a pin by the
jointed bedstead. Then she goes forth from the room, and there, all
night long, wrapped in a fleece of wool, Telemachus meditates in his
heart upon the journey that Athena has shown him.

The next day, after a stormy meeting of the assembly, Telemachus
secretly sets sail for Pylus, accompanied by the goddess Athena, in the
form of Mentor. Only Euryclea, the youth's faithful nurse, knows of his
journey, and she has taken a great oath not to reveal it to his mother
till the eleventh or twelfth day. Nestor graciously receives Telemachus
at Pylus, and, as he himself has no news of Odysseus, sends him on to
Sparta, to King Menelaus, in the company of his own son, Pisistratus.
The young men are graciously received by Menelaus and Helen, and
Telemachus learns that Odysseus was a captive on an island of the deep
in the halls of the nymph Calypso.

Meanwhile, the suitors in Ithaca learn of Telemachus's departure and lay
an ambush to intercept him on his return. Discreet Penelope, too, learns
by chance of his absence, and of the plots of the wooers, and her heart
melts within her at the thought of danger to her child. The good nurse
Euryclea tells her of Telemachus's plan, and lulls her queen's grief.
Penelope returns to her chamber and prays to Athena to save her dear son
and ward off from him the malice of the suitors. As she lies there in
her upper chamber, fasting, and tasting neither meat nor drink, and
musing over the fate of her dear son, gray-eyed Athena makes a phantom
in the likeness of Penelope's sister, Iphthime, and sends her to comfort
Penelope amid her sorrow and lamenting. Reassured by the phantom
concerning her son, the devoted matron begs for news of her husband,
pleading to know whether he be alive or dead, but this information is
denied her. Yet the heart of the disconsolate wife and mother is
cheered, so sweet was the vision that came to her in the dead of night.

Homer now transports us to an assembly of the gods. Athena tells the
tale of the many woes of Odysseus, and Zeus commands Hermes, the
messenger god, to bid Calypso release Odysseus and start him on his
voyage to the Phaeacians, who are destined to return the wanderer to his
own dear country. Hermes quickly reaches the far-off isle of Ogygia,
where was the grotto of the nymph of the braided tresses. The fair
goddess at once knows him, and, after giving him entertainment, inquires
his message. Calypso regretfully and well-nigh rebelliously receives the
command of Zeus, and complains of the jealousy of the gods, who forbid
goddesses openly to mate with men. Yet, as none can make void the
purpose of Zeus, she will obey the command. Hermes departs, and the
nymph goes on her way to the great-hearted Odysseus. She finds him
sitting on the shore; his eyes were never dry of tears, his sweet life
was ebbing away as he mourned for his return, and through his tears he
looked wistfully over the unharvested deep. Calypso bids him sorrow no
more, for she will send him away, and directs him how to prepare a barge
on which to make the voyage. Four days are devoted to the making of the
barge, and on the fifth the goddess sends him on his way, providing him
with food and drink for his journey, and causing a gentle wind to blow.

Goodly Odysseus joyously sets his sail to the breeze, and keeps his eye
on the star Orion, which the fair goddess had bidden him to keep ever on
his left as he traverses the deep.

Seventeen days he sails placidly along, and on the eighteenth appear the
shadowy hills of the land of the Phaeacians, whither he is bound. Then
spies him his old enemy, Poseidon, and the earth shaker gathers the
clouds and rouses the storms, and down speeds night from heaven. The
great waves smite down upon Odysseus, and he loses the helm from his
hand and the mast is broken. He is thrown from his raft; but, again
clutching it, clambers upon it, avoiding grim death. Woman is again
destined to be the means of salvation for the hero. Ino of the fair
ankles, daughter of Cadmus, in time past a mortal maiden, but now a sea
nymph, Leucothea, marks his dire straits and takes pity upon him, and
gives him her veil to wind about him when he throws himself into the
deep. When his raft is at last broken asunder, he wraps the veil about
him; and for two days and nights it bears him up until at length he
makes the rugged shore. Throwing the veil into the stream, to be wafted
back to fair-ankled Ino, Odysseus, bruised and battered, clambers among
the reeds on the bank. He finds a resting place underneath two olive
trees, and Athena sheds sweet sleep upon his eyelids.

That same night, the daughter of the king of the Phaeacians, Nausicaa,
beautiful like the goddesses, was sleeping in a sumptuous chamber. For
it was to the island domain of King Alcinous, Scheria, land of the
Phaeacians, that Odysseus had come. To the palace of the king went
Athena, devising a return for the great-hearted Odysseus.

"She betook her to the rich-wrought bower, wherein was sleeping a maiden
like to the gods in form and comeliness, Nausicaa, the daughter of
Alcinous, high of heart. Beside her, on each hand of the pillars of the
door, were two handmaids, dowered with beauty from the Graces, and the
shining doors were shut.

"But the goddess, fleet as the breath of the wind, swept toward the
couch of the maiden, and stood above her head."

In the semblance of Nausicaa's favorite girl friend and comrade, the
goddess addresses her:

"'Nausicaa, how hath thy mother so heedless a maiden to her daughter?
Lo! thou hast shining raiment that lies by thee uncared for, and thy
marriage day is near at hand, when thou thyself must needs go
beautifully clad, and have garments to give to them who shall lead thee
to the house of the bridegroom. And, behold, these are the things whence
a good report goes abroad among men, wherein a father and lady mother
take delight. But come, let us arise and go a-washing with the breaking
of the day, and I will follow thee to be thy mate in the toil, that
without delay thou mayst get thee ready, since truly thou art not long
to be a maiden. Lo! already they are wooing thee, the noblest youths of
all the Phaeacians, among that people whence thou thyself dost draw thy
lineage. So come, beseech thy noble father betimes in the morning to
furnish thee with mules and a wain to carry the men's raiment, and the
robes, and the shining coverlets. Yea, and for thyself it is seemlier
far to go thus than on foot, for the places where we must wash are a
great way from the town.'"

So spake the gray-eyed Athena, and departed to Olympus, seat of the
gods.

"Anon came the throned Dawn, and awakened Nausicaa of the fair robes,
who straightway marvelled on the dream, and went through the halls to
tell her parents, her father dear and her mother. And she found them
within, her mother sitting by the hearth with the women, her handmaids,
spinning yarn of sea-purple stain, but her father she met as he was
going forth to the renowned kings in their council, whither the noble
Phaeacians called him. Standing close by her dear father, she spake,
saying: 'Father, dear, couldst thou not lend me a high wagon with strong
wheels, that I may take the goodly raiment to the river to wash, so much
as I have lying soiled? Yea, and it is seemly that thou thyself, when
thou art with the princes in council, shouldst have fresh raiment to
wear. Also, there are five dear sons of thine in the halls, two married,
but three are lusty bachelors, and these are always eager for new-washen
garments wherein to go to the dances; for all these things have I taken
thought.'

"This she said, because she was ashamed to speak of glad marriage to her
father; but he saw all and answered, saying:

"'Neither the mules nor aught else do I grudge thee, my child. Go thy
ways, and the thralls shall get thee ready a high wagon with good
wheels, and fitted with an upper frame.'"

So, in obedience to the king's command, the mule team is made ready in
the courtyard, and the maiden and her mother store in the wagon the
raiment, a basket filled with all manner of food, and wine in a goatskin
bottle, and olive oil in a golden cruse, that the princess and her
maidens might anoint themselves after the bath. Then Nausicaa herself
takes the whip and the reins, and she and her attendants start off for a
joyous holiday. When they reach the stream of the river, the maidens
unharness the mules and turn them loose to graze on the honey-sweet
clover. Then they take out the garments, wash and cleanse them from all
stains, and spread them out along the shore to dry. Work over, they
bathe, anoint themselves with olive oil, and partake of their noonday
meal on the river banks. Now for an afternoon of maidenly pastime. They
indulge in the choral game of ball, laying aside their headdresses, and
among them Nausicaa of the white arms, who outshone in beauty her maiden
company, began the song.

But Athena is overruling this girlish frolic, for the rescue of her
hero. The princess throws the ball at one of her companions, but it
misses her and falls into the eddying river, whereat the maidens all
raise a piercing scream, as only maidens can. Odysseus is awakened, and,
sitting up, wonders into what sort of land he is come; surely it was the
shrill cry of maidens, but whether of nymphs or of mortals he cannot
tell. He will make essay, however; and, tearing a leafy bough from a
tree to cover him, he sallies forth from the thicket like a
mountain-bred lion. Loathsome and terrible, being disfigured by the
brine of the sea, does he appear to the maidens, and they flee cowering
here and there about the shore. Only Alcinous's daughter stands firm,
for Athena gives her courage of heart and takes all trembling from her
limbs. Odysseus does not venture to approach in the attitude of a
suppliant, but, standing aloof, beseeches her compassion with sweet and
cunning words:

"I supplicate thee, O queen, whether thou art a goddess or a mortal! If
indeed thou art a goddess of them that keep the wide heaven, then to
Artemis, the daughter of great Zeus, I mainly liken thee, for beauty and
stature and shapeliness. But if thou art one of the daughters of men who
dwell on earth, thrice blessed are thy father and thy lady mother, and
thrice blessed thy brethren. Surely their souls ever glow with gladness
for thy sake each time they see thee entering the dance, so fair a
flower of maidens! But he is of heart the most blessed beyond all other
who shall prevail with gifts of wooing, and lead thee to his home. Never
have mine eyes beheld such an one among mortals, neither man nor woman;
great awe comes upon me as I look on thee.

"But, queen, have pity on me; for, after many trials and sore, to thee
first of all am I come, and of the other folk who hold this city and
land I know no man. Nay, show me the town, give me an old garment to
cast about me, if thou hadst, when thou camest here, any wrap for the
linen. And may the gods grant thee all thy heart's desire: a husband and
a home, and a mind at one with his may they give--a good gift; for there
is nothing mightier and nobler than when man and wife are of one heart
and mind in a house, a grief to their foes, and to their friends great
joy, but their own hearts know it best."

Then Nausicaa of the white arms answered him, and said: "Stranger,
forasmuch as thou seemest no evil man nor foolish--and it is Olympian
Zeus himself that giveth weal to men, to the good and to the evil, to
each one as he will, and this thy lot doubtless is of him, and so thou
must in any wise endure it:--now, since thou hast come to our city and
our land, thou shalt not lack raiment, nor aught else that is the due of
a hapless suppliant, when he has met them who can befriend him. And I
will show thee the town, and name the name of the people. The Phaeacians
hold this city and land, and I am the daughter of Alcinous, great of
heart, on whom all the might and force of the Phaeacians depend."

The princess then calls her maidens and bids them give the stranger meat
and drink, and olive oil for his bath, and raiment to put on. And when
he had bathed and anointed himself, and had put on the raiment, Athena
"made him greater and more mighty to behold, and from his head caused
deep, curling locks to flow, like the hyacinth flower," shedding grace
about his head and shoulders.

"Then to the shore of the sea went Odysseus apart, and sat down, glowing
in beauty and grace; and the princess marvelled at him, and spake among
her fair-tressed maidens, saying:

"'Listen, my white-armed maidens, and I will say somewhat. Not without
the will of all the gods who hold Olympus hath this man come among the
godlike Phaeacians. Erewhile he seemed to me uncomely, but now he is like
the gods that keep the wide heaven. Would that such an one might be
called my husband, dwelling here, and that it might please him here to
abide! But come, my maidens, give the stranger meat and drink.'"

Food is set before the famishing Odysseus, and, after his hunger is
appeased, Nausicaa prepares for the homeward return. She addresses the
hero, and gives him full directions how to reach her father's palace;
part of the way he may accompany her, but not when they approach a
populous part of the city; for she dreads the unfriendly comments of
loungers and passers-by.

[Illustration 80 _CIRCE After the painting by Henri P. Motte. The myth
of Circe turning the companions of Ulysses into swines shows the
religious belief, in ancient Greece, in magical transformation of human
beings into animals._]

"And some one of the baser sort might meet me and say: 'Who is this that
goes with Nausicaa, this tall and goodly stranger? Where found she him?
Her husband he will be, her very own. Either she has taken in some
shipwrecked wanderer of strange men, for no men dwell near us; or some
god has come in answer to her instant prayer; from heaven has he
descended, and will have her to wife for evermore. Better so, if herself
she has ranged abroad and found a lord from a strange land; for verily
she holds in no regard the Phaeacians here in this country, the many men
and noble who are her wooers.' So will they speak, and this would turn
to my reproach. Yea, and I myself would think it blame of another
maiden who did such things in despite of her friends, her father and
mother being still alive, and was conversant with men before the day of
open wedlock. But, stranger, heed well what I say, that as soon as may
be thou mayst gain at my father's hands an escort and a safe return.
Thou shalt find a fair grove of Athena, a poplar grove near the road,
and a spring wells forth therein, and a meadow lies all around. There is
my father's demesne, and his fruitful close, within the sound of a man's
shout from the city. Sit thee down there, and wait until such time as we
may have come into the city and reached the house of my father. But when
thou deemest that we are got to the palace, then go up to the city of
the Phaeacians, and ask for the house of my father Alcinous, high of
heart. It is easily known, and a young child could be thy guide, for
nowise like it are builded the houses of the Phaeacians, so goodly is the
palace of the hero Alcinous. But when thou art within the shadow of the
halls and the court, pass quickly through the great chamber, till thou
comest to my mother, who sits at the hearth in the light of the fire,
weaving yarn of sea-purple stain, a wonder to behold. Her chair is
leaned against a pillar, and her maidens sit behind her. And there my
father's throne leans close to hers, wherein he sits and drinks his
wine, like an immortal. Pass thou by him, and cast thy hands about my
mother's knees, that thou mayst see quickly and with joy the day of thy
returning, even if thou art from a very far country. If but her heart be
kindly disposed toward thee, then is there hope that thou shalt see thy
friends, and come to thy well-builded house and to thine own country."
The clever maiden had already learned where lies the real seat of
authority.

Soon stranger and maiden part, and Nausicaa drives to the gateway of the
palace, and her brothers loose the mules from the car and carry the
raiment within; then the maiden passes to her chamber, where her
attendant Eurymedusa meets her and prepares her supper. And at this
point Nausicaa slips out of the main thread of the story, for maidens
were not allowed to take part in the public functions with which the
king entertained his guest.

When Odysseus has met with a favorable reception from the royal pair,
the queen recognizes the garments which he wears, and this leads to the
story of his rescue, but as yet he withholds his name. Alcinous is
inclined to censure his daughter for not bringing the rescued one to the
house when she returned with her maidens, but Odysseus gallantly defends
the blameless maiden. And Alcinous, moved by his princely bearing,
expresses the wish that so goodly a man would wed his daughter, and be
called his son, there abiding. But the king does not insist, and the
invitation was probably merely a courteous form of expression customary
in those early days.

Only one more glimpse do we have of the Princess Nausicaa. After a day
of athletic contests and various entertainments, Odysseus has arrayed
himself for the evening, and is going to join the chiefs at their wine.

"And Nausicaa, dowered with beauty by the gods, stood by the doorpost of
the well-builded hall, and marvelled at Odysseus, beholding him before
her eyes, and she uttered her voice and spake to him winged words:

"'Farewell, stranger, and even in thine own country bethink thee of me
upon a time, for that to me first thou owest the ransom of life.'

"And Odysseus of many counsels answered her, saying: 'Nausicaa, daughter
of great-hearted Alcinous, yea, may Zeus, the thunderer, the lord of
Hera, grant me to reach my home and see the day of my returning; so
would I, even there, do thee worship as to a god, all my days for
evermore, for thou, lady, hast given me my life.'"

Thus delicately did Odysseus make a patron saint of the pure-hearted
maiden, who had so innocently shown her fondness for him.

Royally was Odysseus entertained by King Alcinous and his noble-hearted
queen, Arete, daughter of his brother, who "was honored by him as no
other woman in the world is honored, of all that nowadays keep house
under the hand of their lords. Thus she hath, and hath ever had, all
worship heartily from her dear children and from her lord Alcinous and
from all the folk, who look on her as on a goddess, and greet her with
reverent speech when she goes about the town. Yea, for she, too, hath no
lack of understanding. To whomsoever she shows favor, even if they be
men, she ends their feuds."

After the feast, Demodocus the minstrel sang the story of the Wooden
Horse; and at the memory of all he had suffered, the heart of Odysseus
melted and the tears wet his cheeks beneath his eyelids. His host marked
his grief, and begged him to tell the story of his adventures. Odysseus
complied by giving an account of his wanderings, from the fall of Troy
up to his arrival among the Phaeacians. The hero had struggled time and
again against men, against giants and monsters, against the forces of
nature, and finally against an adversary yet more powerful--the love of
goddesses.

Among his adventures was the story of his trip to the isle of AEa, where
dwelt Circe, an awful goddess, of mortal speech, own sister of the
wizard AEetes, and aunt of the more terrible enchantress Medea. She dwelt
in a house of polished stone, and all round her palace mountain-bred
wolves and lions were roaming, whom she herself had bewitched with evil
drugs. As half his band approached the house, they heard Circe singing
in a sweet voice as she passed to and fro before the great web,
imperishable, such as is the handiwork of goddesses, fine of woof and
full of grace and splendor; truly a fascinating goddess was she, though
rather gruesome in her surroundings. When the comrades of Odysseus
called to her, she graciously invited them in. "So she led them in and
set them upon chairs and high seats, and made them a mess of cheese and
barley meal and yellow honey with Pramnian wine, and mixed harmful drugs
with the food to make them utterly forget their own country. Now, when
she had given them the cup and they had drunk it off, presently she
smote them with a wand, and in the sties of the swine she penned them.
So they had the head and voice, the bristles and the shape, of swine,
but their mind abode even as of old. Thus were they penned there
weeping, and Circe flung them acorns and mast and fruit of the cornel
tree to eat, whereon wallowing swine do always batten."

Only one had been wise enough not to enter, and he rushed back to tell
the tale to his lord. Odysseus started off alone to rescue his comrades;
and Hermes met him on the way, in the likeness of a young man, and gave
him _moly_, a magic herb, and full directions for its use, to ward off
enchantment.

Fair Circe receives him most graciously and prepares also for him the
magic potion, but for once her charm fails. He draws his sword to slay
her, and then she becomes the suppliant. She has found her match, and at
once, as if she were a mortal, falls in love with him. Her bonhomie is
now her greatest charm. She swears a great oath not to harm him or his
companions, and restores to the natural form those whom she had already
bewitched. Royal entertainment and gracious hospitality and words of
counsel are now the order of the day--attendant nymphs, delicious
baths, and sumptuous banquets. So there they remained for a full year,
feasting on abundant flesh and sweetest wine.

Lady Circe proved herself to be the counsellor and friend of Odysseus,
and showed him how to carry out his fond desire of visiting the realm of
Hades, to seek the spirit of Theban Tiresias, that he might unfold to
the wanderer his future. Then, clad in a great, shining robe, light of
woof and gracious, with a fair golden girdle about her waist, and a veil
upon her head, she bade farewell to Odysseus and his crew, and sent a
favoring wind as a kindly escort to the dark-prowed ship.

During his descent into Hades, Odysseus discourses with the Theban seer,
who makes known to him his destiny, and also with the wraith of his
mother, who tells him that faithful Penelope abides with steadfast
spirit in his halls, and wearily for her the nights wane always and the
days in the shedding of tears; and how she herself was reft of sweet
life through her sore longing for him.

And, after her, there appears a great company of the famous women of
heroic times, wives and daughters of mighty men, who had been beloved of
gods and illustrious mortals,--Tyro, ancestress of Nestor's house; and
Antiope, mother of Amphion and Zethus, founders of seven-gated Thebes;
and Alcmene, mother of Heracles; and Epicaste, mother of Oedipus, who
was wedded to her own son; and lovely Chloris, wife of Neleus; and Leda,
mother of Castor and Pollux; and Iphimedia, and Phaedra, and Procris, and
Maera, and Clymene, and hateful Eriphyle, and innumerable other wives and
daughters of heroes,--Homer's _Catalogue of Famous Women_, who had
exerted mighty influence in heroic times.

Upon Odysseus's return to the island of AEa, Circe greets them, and once
more they enjoy meat and bread in plenty and dark red wine. And our
hero Circe leads apart and makes him sit down, and lays herself at his
feet and asks all his tale. She then warns him of the dangers he has yet
to encounter, and tells him how to meet them. Then, with words of
farewell, she sends the travellers on their voyage with a favoring
breeze. First, Odysseus encounters the Sirens, whose enchanting strains
he enjoys while he is bound tight to the mast, and the ears of his
companions are deafened with wax; he evades the Clashing Rocks, escapes
Scylla and Charybdis; and at last, on the Isle of the Sun, his comrades
slaughter and devour the sacred cattle of Helios--in violation of the
warnings of Tiresias and Circe. All are in consequence lost in a
shipwreck, save Odysseus, who, after floating about for ten days on a
raft, reaches the island of Ogygia, abode of the fair nymph Calypso, who
holds him as her beloved for eight long years and would make him
immortal.

Thus the tale ended--all are spellbound throughout the shadowy halls at
the story, and Alcinous and his courtiers offer all manner of gifts to
Odysseus. The next day, a ship is got ready for its voyage to far-off
Ithaca; the gifts are stored on board, a farewell feast is held, and
Odysseus bids farewell to his gracious hosts:

"My lord Alcinous, most notable of all the people, pour ye the drink
offering, and send me safe upon my way; and as for you, fare ye well.
For now have I all that my heart desired, an escort and loving gifts.
May the gods of heaven give me good fortune with them, and may I find my
noble wife in my home with my friends unharmed, while ye, for your part,
abide here and make glad your gentle wives and children; and may the
gods vouchsafe all manner of good, and may no evil come nigh the
people!"

Then, after a grateful farewell to Queen Arete, the hero is conducted to
the waiting ship, and there left reclining upon the soft rugs that have
been spread for him, and soon a sound sleep, very sweet, falls upon his
eyelids.

When Odysseus awakes, he is in his dear native land, though he does not
recognize it until the goddess Athena appears and tells him how he is to
regain wife and kingdom. For us, the rest of the story centres about
Queen Penelope, who for so many, m'any years has been awaiting the
return of her lord.

Odysseus, disguised by the goddess in the form of an aged beggar, goes
to the hut of the swineherd Eumaeus, with whose aid the plot for the
destruction of the wooers is to be carried out; and Athena summons
Telemachus to return from Lacedaemon to meet his father and bear his part
in the final scenes. When the young man returns to the palace, after his
interview with his father, "the nurse Euryclea saw him far before the
rest, as she was strewing skin coverlets upon the carven chairs; and
straightway she drew near him, weeping, and all the other maidens of
Odysseus, of the hardy heart, gathered about him, and kissed him
lovingly on the head and shoulders. Now wise Penelope came forth from
her chamber, like Artemis or golden Aphrodite, and cast her arms about
her dear son, and fell a-weeping, and kissed his face and both his
beautiful eyes, and wept aloud, and spake to him winged words:

"'Thou art come, Telemachus, sweet light of mine eyes; methought I should
see thee never again, after thou hadst gone in thy ship to Pylus,
secretly, and without my will, to seek tidings of thy dear father. Come
now, tell me, what sign didst thou get of him?'"

Telemachus tells his mother of his journey, and his friend Theoclymenus,
who has the gift of second-sight, prophesies the speedy return of
Odysseus. Soon the hero himself appears as a beggar in his own halls,
and is roughly treated by the haughty wooers. He soundly whips the
braggart beggar Irus, and the story of his presence is noised throughout
the house.

Constant Penelope is ever anxious to hear some word of her lord, and
every wandering stranger with a tale to tell could win rich gifts from
her by devising some story of Odysseus. She has heard of the beggar in
her halls, and summons him to her presence and questions him, and tells
him of her grief and her longing for more news of the absent one. When
crafty Odysseus fashioned a story of his entertaining her lord in Crete,
her tears flowed as she listened, and she wept for her own lord who was
sitting by her. The disguised hero had compassion for his wife; but he
craftily hid his tears, and described the appearance of Odysseus so
fully that she could not deny the certain likeness.

Then the aged nurse Euryclea, who had tended him in his youth, is asked
to wash the feet of the old man. As the crone makes ready the caldron, a
sudden fear seizes Odysseus lest when she handles his foot she might
know the scar of the wound that the boar had dealt him with its white
tusk in his boyhood. When the old woman took the scarred limb, she knew
it by the touch, and grief and joy seized her, and she called him
Odysseus, her dear child. Then would she have revealed the glad news to
Penelope, had Odysseus not seized her by the throat and made her swear
to keep his presence secret until the slaying of the lordly wooers.

Next day occurs the famous trial of the bow of Odysseus, which none of
the suitors can draw; then Odysseus gets the bow into his hands, strings
it, sends the arrow through the axheads, and finally, leaping on the
stone threshold, deals his shafts among the wooers. The wretched
company are all slaughtered, the faithless women of the household are
hanged, and ominous silence reigns over the palace of Odysseus.

Euryclea hastens to the upper chamber to bring to Queen Penelope the
good news that Odysseus has surely come and has slain the haughty
wooers. The fair lady can with difficulty believe the tidings, but she
is finally persuaded to go down to see the wooers dead and him that slew
them.

"With the word, she went down from the upper chamber, and much her heart
debated whether she should stand apart and question her dear lord or
draw nigh and clasp his head and hands. But when she had come within and
had crossed the threshold of stone, she sat down over against Odysseus,
in the light of the fire, by the further wall. Now, he was sitting by
the tall pillar, looking down and waiting to know if perchance his noble
wife would speak to him, when her eyes beheld him. But she sat long in
silence, and amazement came upon her soul, and now she would look upon
him steadfastly with her eyes, and now again she knew him not, for that
he was clad in vile raiment. And Telemachus rebuked her, and spake and
hailed her:

"'Mother mine, ill mother, of an ungentle heart, why turnest thou thus
away from my father, and dost not sit by him and question him and ask
him all? No other woman in the world would harden her heart to stand
thus aloof from her lord, who, after much travail and sore, had come to
her in the twentieth year to his own country. But thy heart is ever
harder than stone.'

"Then wise Penelope answered him, saying: 'Child, my mind is amazed
within me, and I have no strength to speak, or to ask him aught, nay, or
to look on him face to face. But if in truth this be Odysseus, and he
hath indeed come home, verily we shall be aware of each other the more
surely; for we have tokens that we twain know of, even we, secret from
all others.'

"So she spake, and the steadfast, goodly Odysseus smiled, and quickly he
spake to Telemachus winged words: 'Telemachus, leave now thy mother to
make trial of me within the chambers; so shall she soon come to a better
knowledge than heretofore.'

"Meanwhile, the housedame Eurynome had bathed the great-hearted Odysseus
within his house, and anointed him with olive oil, and cast about him a
goodly mantle and a doublet. Moreover, Athena shed great beauty from his
head downwards, and made him greater and more mighty to behold, and from
his head caused deep, curling locks to flow, like the hyacinth flower.
And as when some skilful man overlays gold upon silver, one that
Hephaestus and Pallas Athena have taught all manner of craft, and full of
grace is his handiwork, even so did Athena shed grace about his head and
shoulders; and forth from the bath he came, in form like to the
immortals. Then he sat down again on the high seat, whence he had
arisen, over against his wife, and spake to her, saying:

"'Strange lady, surely to thee, above all womankind, the Olympians have
given a heart that cannot be softened. No other woman in the world would
harden her heart to stand thus aloof from her husband, who, after much
travail and sore, had come to her, in the twentieth year, to his own
country.--Nay, come, nurse strew a bed for me to lie all alone, for
assuredly her spirit within her is as iron.'

"Then wise Penelope answered him again: 'Strange man, I have no proud
thoughts, nor do I think scorn of thee, nor am I too greatly astonished,
but I know right well what manner of man thou wert when thou wentest
forth out of Ithaca, on the long-oared galley.--But come, Euryclea,
spread for him the good bedstead outside the stablished bridal chamber
that he built himself. Thither bring ye forth the good bedstead, and
cast bedding thereon, even fleeces and rugs and shining blankets.'

"So she spake and made trial of her lord, but Odysseus in sore
displeasure spake to his true wife, saying: 'Verily, a bitter word is
this, lady, that thou hast spoken. Who has set my bed otherwhere? Hard
would it be for one, how skilled soever, unless a god were to come that
might easily set it in another place, if so he would. But of men there
is none living, howsoever strong in his youth, that could lightly
upheave it; for a great marvel is wrought in the fashion of the bed, and
it was I that made it, and none other. There was growing a bush of
olive, long of leaf, and most goodly of growth, within the inner court,
and the stem as large as a pillar. Round about this I built the chamber,
till I had finished it, with stones close set, and I roofed it over well
and added thereto compacted doors fitting well. Next I sheared off all
the light wood of the long-leaved olive, and rough-hewed the trunk
upwards from the root, and smoothed it around with the adze, well and
skilfully, and made straight the line thereto and so fashioned it into
the bedpost, and I bored it all with the auger. Beginning from this
headpost, I wrought at the bedstead till I had finished it, and made it
fair with inlaid work of gold and of silver and of ivory. Then I made
fast therein a bright purple band of oxhide. Even so I declare to thee
this token, and I know not, lady, if the bedstead be yet fast in its
place, or if some man has cut away the stem of the olive tree and set
the bedstead otherwhere.'

"So he spake, and at once her knees were loosened, and her heart melted
within her, as she knew the sure tokens that Odysseus showed her. Then
she fell a-weeping, and ran straight towards him and cast her hands
about his neck, and kissed his head and spake, saying:

"'Murmur not against me, Odysseus, for thou wert ever at other times the
wisest of men. It is the gods that gave us sorrow, the gods who were
jealous that we should abide together and have joy of our youth and come
to the threshold of old age. So now be not wroth with me hereat nor full
of indignation because I did not welcome thee gladly as now, when I
first saw thee. For always my heart within my breast shuddered for fear
lest some man should come and deceive me with his words, for many there
be that devise gainful schemes and evil. Nay, even Argive Helen,
daughter of Zeus, would not have lain with a stranger, and taken him for
a lover, had she known that the warlike sons of the Achaeans would bring
her home again to her own dear country. Howsoever, it was the god that
set her upon this shameful deed; nor ever, ere that, did she lay up in
her heart the thought of this folly, a bitter folly, whence on us, too,
first came sorrow. But now that thou hast told all the sure tokens of
our bed, which never was seen by mortal man, save by thee and me, and
one maiden only, the daughter of Actor, that my father gave me ere yet I
had come hither, she who kept the doors of our strong bridal chamber,
even now dost thou bend my soul, all ungentle as it is.'

"Thus she spake, and in his heart she stirred yet a greater longing to
lament, and he wept as he embraced his beloved wife and true. And even
as when the sight of land is welcome to swimmers, whose well-wrought
ship Poseidon hath smitten on the deep, all driven with the wind and
swelling waves, and but a remnant hath escaped the gray sea water and
swum to the shore, and their bodies are all crusted with the brine, and
gladly have they set foot on land and escaped an evil end; so welcome
to her was the sight of her lord, and her white arms she would never
quite let go from his neck.

"Now when the twain had taken their fill of sweet love, they had delight
in the tales which they told one to the other. The fair lady spake of
all that she had endured in the halls at the sight of the ruinous throng
of wooers, who for her sake slew many cattle, kine, and goodly sheep;
and many a cask of wine was broached. And, in turn, Odysseus, of the
seed of Zeus, recounted all the griefs he had wrought on men, and all
his own travail and sorrow; and she was delighted with the story, and
sweet sleep fell not upon her eyelids till the tale was ended."

Filled with incidents of domestic life in heroic times, the Odyssey
presents us a galaxy of women, if not more impressive, at any rate more
brilliant than that of the Iliad. Of these attractive figures, who
should first merit our consideration, if not the heroine of the poem?

Queen, wife, mother, the sentiment which most characterizes Penelope is
love of husband, child, and home; her chief intellectual trait is
prudence. We find in her the rare combination of warmth of temperament
and sanity of judgment. Her sense of prudence does not exclude depth of
devotion, longings for the absent one, and outbursts of indignation at
the wrongs inflicted on her son. Her love for Odysseus is intense and
constant. There is a beautiful legend that when Odysseus came to carry
off his bride, her father entreated her to remain with him in his old
age. The chariot is ready to bear her away, and the maiden pauses just a
moment, hesitating 'twixt love and duty. Odysseus gives her her choice;
but, drawing down her veil, she signifies that where her lover goes
there will she go. This intensity of affection marks the twenty long
years of separation. Every night, she bewails Odysseus, her dear lord,
till gray-eyed Athena casts sweet sleep upon her eyelids. She ever longs
for, though at times despairs of, his return; and she inquires of every
stranger, that she may learn something of the wanderer. Penelope is also
a devoted mother. Ever anxious about her son, she grieves for him when
absent, and when at home guards him as far as possible from the
insolence of the wooers. In her obedience to her son, she seems to have
followed the Greek custom expected of a widow.

In her relations with the wooers, Penelope adopted the only attitude
which was possible for a woman who would wait indefinitely for the
return of her lord. Parents and son, Greek custom and precedents, all
expected that a widow should remarry after so long an interval. And the
wooers were insolent, overwhelming the palace and rapidly making away
with the patrimony of Telemachus. Hence, only by coquettish dallying
could she postpone the evil day.

In all things Penelope was a model housewife, ever engaged in feminine
tasks, overseeing her maidens at their work, watching over the younger
servants with the solicitude of a mother, and observing toward the aged
slave the deference of a daughter. But when the uncivil Melantho is
deficient in respect, the queen calls her severely to a sense of her
duty. When her husband returns, for whom she has waited during twenty
long years of widowhood, she does not throw herself straightway into his
arms. She fears a god may deceive her, and, the better to preserve for
Odysseus the treasures of the tenderness stored up in her heart, she
devises every cunning test to make sure it is really he. Never was there
in woman's heart a more ardent flame of love and devotion; never in a
woman's head intelligence so subtle, judgment so sure. When we fully
appreciate the charm of Penelope's character, we better understand how
the hero should sacrifice the devotion of a goddess for the love of such
a woman.

"These two meet at last together, he after his long wanderings, and she
after having suffered the insistence of suitors in her palace; and this
is the pathos of the Odyssey. The woman, in spite of her withered youth
and tearful years of widowhood, is still expectant of her lord. He,
unconquered by the pleasures cast across his path, unterrified by all
the dangers he endures, clings in thought to the bride whom he led
forth, a blushing maiden, from her father's halls. O just, subtle, and
mighty Homer! There is nothing of Greek here more than of Hebrew, or of
Latin, or of German. It is pure humanity."

Closely interwoven with the plot of the Odyssey is the aged and touching
figure of the faithful slave Euryclea, who by her devotion has become a
member of the family she serves. Taken captive in her girlhood, she had
nursed Odysseus in his childhood, and, later, his own son, Telemachus.
Thus she is to both a second mother. She assists the queen in managing
the house, in bringing up her son, in succoring the stranger. When she
recognizes her master, how ravishing is her joy, how she longs to share
it with her mistress! Yet she knows how to keep a secret.

Circe and Calypso are styled goddesses, yet they are brought down to
earth in their love for Odysseus, and are thoroughly human in their
traits. Calypso feeds on ambrosia and nectar, and lives in a mysterious
grotto on an enchanted island; yet she loves like any mortal woman, and
bitter is her wail when she receives the command of the gods to let
Odysseus go. The enchantress Circe is much more dangerous, and takes a
ghoulish delight in metamorphosing men into swine; yet, when she falls
in love with Odysseus, she is the queenly lady, considerate of his
comrades, and in every way his guide, philosopher, and friend. Unlike
Calypso, she seeks not to detain Odysseus against the will of the gods,
but after the expiration of a year sends him on his way.

To return to the domestic heroines: Queen Arete of Phaeacia is, like
Penelope, an example of the elevated position held by women in the royal
houses of heroic times. She exerts over the subjects of her husband the
same influence she exercises in the family circle. Her children share
the reverence and affection she has from husband and people. To her
Odysseus makes supplication; for if he win her favor, sure is his return
to his native land; she bids her people prepare gifts for her guest
friend at his departure, and to her Odysseus extends the pledging cup in
saying farewell.

Where can one find phrases sufficiently subtle, expressions sufficiently
delicate, to reproduce the sweet picture of Nausicaa? Of all the
creations of poetic fancy, none equals her in perennial charm. "She is
simply," says Symonds, "the most perfect maiden, the purest, freshest
lightest-hearted girl of Greek romance." This immortal child of the
poetic imagination will, with two real women,--Lesbian Sappho, and Mary,
Queen of Scots,--have lovers in every age and in every clime. Though
merely a poet's fancy, Nausicaa is absolutely human and full of life,
and thus differs from the heroine of _The Tempest_, who of all poetic
creations most resembles her. Note her naive grace and charm, her
girlish vivacity and joy, at the beginning of the scene; and when the
occasion demands it, the girl becomes the woman, and with unaffected
simplicity and dignity she addresses the hero. No wonder that Odysseus
should seem the Prince Charming for whom she had been waiting; and there
may have been a slight chill of disappointment when, in expressing his
gratitude for his deliverance, he made her his patron saint instead of
his sweetheart. Yet, no doubt, she soon learned that the unknown hero
was the great Odysseus, husband of faithful Penelope, and hers was too
buoyant, too healthy a nature to pine away and die at the shattering of
a dream. Then, even if he had been a widower, he was too old for this
bright beauty. But what an ideal father-in-law he would make! And if the
young Telemachus should only come to Scheria!--and how do we know that
he did not later arrive there, sent a-courting by Odysseus after the
restoration of his realm? Eustathius preserves a tradition, based on
such good authorities as Hellanicus and Aristotle, that Telemachus
actually did wed the Princess Nausicaa; and the Athenian orator
Andocides claimed to be a descendant of this illustrious pair.

So beautiful a legend could not escape treatment by later poets. Alcman,
one of the earliest lyric composers, describes in a poem the meeting of
Odysseus and Nausicaa, and Sophocles wrote a drama entitled _Nausicaa_,
or _The Washers_; and there is a tradition that, contrary to his usual
custom, the poet himself "appeared as an actor, winning much applause by
his beauty and grace in the dancing and rhythmic ball play, in the
character of Nausicaa herself." Lucian names her among the heroines of
mythical times who, through their goodness of heart, humanity,
gentleness of demeanor, and compassion toward the needy, deserve to rank
as patterns of womanly virtue.

With such brilliant pictures of domestic life--the queens Penelope,
Helen, and Arete, exerting a womanly influence in the palaces, the
goddess-lovers Circe and Calypso on their enchanted islands, the slave
Euryclea tenderly caring for mistress and young master, and the maiden
Nausicaa, engaged in occupation and in pastime with her girl
friends--the Odyssey is a mirror reflecting the character of the Heroic
Age of Greece.




V

THE LYRIC AGE


From the fascinating visions of the heroic past as they are presented in
the Homeric poems, we must now prepare to descend to the actualities of
life as they disclose themselves at the dawn of Greek history. Hesiod,
the epic poet of Boeotia, constitutes the bridge, as regards social
conditions, between the Heroic Age and the early historical periods of
the various peoples and cities of Greece. He describes the actual
conditions about him, and gives us glimpses of the life of the Greek
people which prepare us for the great changes that have taken place
through the overturning of monarchies, the spread of commerce and
colonization, and the awakening of the common people to a sense of their
rights and their power. Hence we may expect to find in his poetry much
light on the status of woman in remote times.

Hesiod is usually ascribed to the second half of the ninth century
before the Christian Era. He lived at Ascra, near Mount Helicon, in
Boeotia, the original home of the AEolians. Amid agricultural
surroundings the poet grew up. Defrauded by his brother Perses of part
of his inheritance, he experienced hardships that quickened his sympathy
for the plain people and led him to reflection on life and its problems.
He was commissioned by the Muses, who appeared to him on Mount Helicon,
to _utter true things to men_--a phrase which strikes the keynote to his
poetry, for he dealt in realities and sought to alleviate the social
conditions of his times. His principal works are the _Works and Days_
and the _Theogony_; there was also a Hesiodic _Catalogue of Women_,
attested by many allusions in classical writers, but, unfortunately for
our purpose, altogether lost to us. Very probably in this work, Hesiod
or his school told of the aristocratic women of Greek mythology, from
whose union with gods had sprung heroes. Lacking this, Hesiod is to us
"the poet of the Helots," and we gain from him only knowledge of the
common people of Boeotia and their manner of life.

Hesiod's estimate of women is vastly inferior to that of Homer. Homer,
who sang for aristocratic ladies at the court of kings, has introduced
us into a society where women presided over their houses with grace and
dignity, and softened and refined the rough, warlike manners of men.
Hesiod, the poet of the plain people, is impressed with the hopelessness
of the conditions about him. The people are oppressed by the nobles; it
is impossible for them to obtain justice; the world seems all wrong. And
in seeking the causes of existing evils, the poet traces them back to
the one great evil which the gods have inflicted upon men; and that
is--woman.

This indictment first finds expression in his version, of the myth of
Pandora, the Mother Eve of Greek legend.

Hesiod tells us in this poem that in old days the human race had the use
of fire, and in gratitude to the gods offered burnt sacrifice. But
Prometheus had defrauded the gods of their just share of the sacrifices
and had compelled Zeus to be content with merely the bones and fat; and,
in return for this deception, Zeus devised grievous troubles for mortals
by depriving them of fire. Prometheus then stole fire from heaven.
Zeus, angered at being outwitted by the crafty Prometheus, determined to
inflict on men a bane from which they would not quickly recover. He
straightway commanded Hephaestus to mix earth and water, to endow the
plastic form with human voice and powers, and to liken it to a heavenly
goddess--virginal, winning, and fair. Athena was commanded to teach her
the domestic virtues; Aphrodite, to endow her with beauty, eager desire,
and passion that wastes the bodies of mortals; and Hermes, to bestow on
her a shameless mind and a treacherous nature. All obeyed the command of
Zeus, and in this manner was fashioned the first woman. Then Athena
added a girdle and ornaments; the Graces and Persuasion hung their
golden chains over her body, and the Hours wove for her garlands of
spring flowers. The name given this fascinating creature was Pandora,
because each of the gods had bestowed on her gifts to make her a fatal
bane unto mortals.

Hermes then led her down to earth to present her to Epimetheus, whom his
brother Prometheus had bidden never to receive any presents from
Olympian Zeus. Epimetheus, however, was captivated by Pandora's beauty
and received her, and only after the evil befell did he remember his
brother's command. Until the advent of woman, men, it is said, had lived
secure from trouble, free from wearisome labor, and safe from painful
diseases that bring death to mankind. But now Pandora with her hands
lifted the lid from the great jar with which the gods had dowered her,
the great jar wherein these evils had been securely imprisoned, and let
them loose upon the earth. With the sorrows, hope had been confined; but
when they were loosed, hope flew not forth, for too soon Pandora closed
the lid of the vessel. Hence, laments Hesiod, hopeless is the lot of
humanity, while innumerable ills pass hither and thither among hopeless
men. Such is the mythus of the fall of man, as imagined by the early
Greeks. Man was punished for rebelling against the will of heaven. Woman
is the instrument of his chastisement, thrust upon him by the angry
deity. She possesses every charm, every allurement, but her very
fascination is a chief cause of ill to man. He in his folly receives
her, and thence befall him all the ills of life. The whole argument of
Hesiod in this passage indicates that he regarded woman as "a necessary
deduction from the happiness of life," as "the rift in the lute that
spoils its music." Contrasted with the Hebrew story, the Greek
represents woman as closing the door of hope to man; while the Hebrew
version sees in her seed the hope of the salvation that is to overcome
the evils of the fall. Even stronger is Hesiod's invective against the
female sex in the _Theogony_, where he repeats the story of Pandora, and
concludes with the following reflections:

      "From her the sex of tender woman springs;
       Pernicious is the race; the woman tribe
       Dwells upon earth, a mighty bane to men;
       No mates for wasting want but luxury;
       And as within the close-roofed hive, the drones,
       Helpers of sloth, are pampered by the bees;
       These all the day, till sinks the ruddy sun,
       Haste on the wing, 'their murmuring labors ply,'
       And still cement the white and waxen comb;
       Those lurk within the covered hive, and reap
       With glutted maw the fruits of others' toil;
       Such evil did the Thunderer send to man
       In woman's form, and so he gave the sex,
       Ill helpmates of intolerable toils.
       Yet more of ill instead of good he gave:
       The man who shunning wedlock thinks to shun
       The vexing cares that haunt the woman-state,
       And lonely waxes old, shall feel the want
       Of one to foster his declining years;
       Though not his life be needy, yet his death
       Shall scatter his possessions to strange heirs,
       And aliens from his blood. Or if his lot
       Be marriage and his spouse of modest fame
       Congenial to his heart, e'en then shall ill
       Forever struggle with the partial good,
       And cling to his condition. But the man
       Who gains the woman of injurious kind
       Lives bearing in his secret soul and heart
       Inevitable sorrow: ills so deep
       As all the balms of medicine cannot cure."

This passage contains in brief Hesiod's general ideas concerning woman.
Pandora brought infinite ills to mortals, for from her sprang the tribe
of woman, "a mighty bane to men." If a man marry, he will be sorry; and
if he refrain from marriage, he will regret it. A wretched old age
awaits the bachelor; and his possessions, at his death, are dissipated
by indifferent kindred. Even if he marry, and get a good wife, sorrows
and blessings are mingled in his lot; while if his wife be bad, ills so
deep are his "as all the balms of medicine cannot cure." So woman is a
being whose presence is a necessary evil; without her, man's destiny is
not complete, but he must endure the ills she brings for the sake of the
possible blessing that may come by sharing one's lot with her. A man,
says the bard of Ascra, cannot be too cautious in choosing his helpmate,
as the following sage counsel indicates:

      "Take to thy house a woman for thy bride
       When in the ripeness of thy manhood's pride;
       Thrice ten thy sum of years, the nuptial prime;
       Nor fall far short nor far exceed the time.
       Four years the ripening virgin shall consume,
       And wed the fifth of her expanding bloom.
       A virgin choose: and mould her manners chaste;
       Chief be some neighboring maid by thee embraced;
       Look circumspect and long; lest thou be found
       The merry mock of all the dwellers round.
       No better lot has Providence assigned
       Than a fair woman with a virtuous mind;
       Nor can a worse befall than when thy fate
       Allots a worthless, feast-contriving mate.
       She with no torch of mere material flame
       Shall burn to tinder thy care-wasted frame;
       Shall send a fire thy vigorous bones within
       And age unripe in bloom of years begin."

The vein of contempt for woman which runs through the verses of Hesiod
finds many echoes in later writers, which indicates that in this
transition period, especially in Ionian Greece, evil influences were at
work, causing men to rebel against the shackles of wedded life and to
fail to realize the happiness they desired in the home and in the
family. It seems strange that Hesiod, in describing farm duties, should
not tell us more of the important function of the housewife. Yet in one
passage he merely emphasizes the importance of starting with "a house,
a wife, and an ox to plow," and in other passages speaks disparagingly
of woman and her work. So that even in lines where he might well have
commended her virtues the words of praise are left unsaid.

The two centuries of Greek history following Hesiod are chiefly known to
us through the lyric poets, as epic poetry declined and the writing of
history had not yet begun. Lyric poetry is an index to the hearts of the
people: for in lyric poetry are expressed the thoughts and feelings of
reflective man. Woman is the great mainspring of existence; she it is
who is the general cause of man's thoughts, emotions, passions, joys,
and sorrows. Hence, as lyric poetry is the poetry of the heart, we find
recorded in the verses of Grecian lyrists man's attitude toward woman in
this period of "storm and stress" in the development of Greek
nationality.

Archilochus is the father of iambic poetry, and he made it the medium of
expression of personal passion and satire. With all the ardor of his
nature, he loved Neobule, daughter of Lycambes, of the island of Paros,
where the poet had made his home. Certain fragments of his poems, still
extant, indicate the intensity of the flame with which he was consumed.
Archilochus has left us an exquisite picture of his loved one, clad in
all the beauty and grace a poetic lover could portray, with a rose and a
myrtle branch in her hand, and her tresses falling caressingly over her
shoulders. He sighed "were it to touch but her hand," and she seems at
first to have returned his affection. The lovers were betrothed, but
suddenly the father objected, and the match was broken off. Love
immediately turned into hate, and passion changed into rage. Thereupon,
as Horace says:

      _"Archilochum proprio rabies armavit iambo,"_

Archilochus used the iambic metre as his weapon of attack. As his love
had been ardent, so, when betrayed, his rage was uncontrollable. Every
possible taunt was cast at those who had deceived him. "Each verse he
wrote was polished and pointed like an arrow head. Each line was steeped
in the poison of hideous charges against his sweetheart, her sister, and
her father. The set of poems which he produced, and, as it would appear,
recited publicly at the festival of Demeter, was so charged with wit and
fire that the country rang with them. The daughters of Lycambes,
tradition avers, went straightway and hanged themselves--unable to
endure the flight of fiery serpents that had fallen upon them; for, to
quote the words of Browning, Archilochus had the art of writing verse
that 'bit into the live man's flesh like parchment,' that sent him
wandering, branded and forever shamed, about his native fields and
streets."

Archilochus's verses indicate that, in the eighth century before our
era, there was in Greece a certain freedom of intercourse between the
sexes, and that love was, at times at least, the basis for betrothal; it
also shows the absolute control of the father over the hand of his
daughter. The poet's story is also the earliest we have of love
betrayed, and the name of Neobule is inextricably intertwined with the
rise of satiric verse.

A different note is struck by Archilochus's contemporary, Semonides of
Amorgus, who takes up and continues the tradition of Hesiod in speaking
of woman in tones of contempt and disparagement. He composed a
celebrated satire on woman, in which her various temperaments are
ascribed to a kinship with different domestic animals,--the hog, the
fox, the dog, the ass, the mare, the ape,--or are compared to mud, sea
water, and the bee.

Semonides first deals with the class of women of the hog variety: "God
made the mind of woman in the beginning of different qualities; for one
he fashioned like a bristly hog, in whose house everything tumbles about
in disorder, bespattered with mud, and rolls upon the ground; she,
dirty, with unwashed clothes, sits and grows fat on a dungheap."

The woman like mud is thus satirized: "This woman is ignorant of
everything, both good and bad; her only accomplishment is eating: cold
though the winters be, she is too stupid to draw near the fire."

Here is the poet's picture of the woman who resembles the sea: "She has
two minds; when she laughs and is glad, the stranger seeing her at home
will give her praise--there is nothing better than this on the earth,
no, nor fairer; but another day she is unbearable, not to be looked at
or approached, for she is raging mad. To friend and foe she is alike
implacable and odious. Thus, as the sea is often calm and innocent, a
great delight to sailors in summertime, and oftentimes again is
frantic, tearing along with roaring billows, so is this woman in her
temper."

The woman who resembles a mare offers other disagreeable qualities: She
is "delicate and long-haired, unfit for drudgery or toil; she would not
touch the mill, or lift the sieve, or clean the house out! She bathes
twice or thrice a day, and anoints herself with myrrh; then she wears
her hair combed out long and wavy, dressed with flowers. It follows that
this woman is a rare sight to one's guests; but to her husband she is a
curse, unless he be a tyrant who prides himself on such expensive
luxuries."

The ape-like wife is perhaps the worst of the lot: "This one, above all,
has Zeus given as the greatest evil to men. Her face is most hateful.
Such a woman goes through the city a laughing-stock to all the men.
Short of neck, with narrow hips, withered of limb, she moves about with
difficulty. O wretched man, who weds such a woman! She knows every
cunning art, just like an ape, nor is ridicule a concern to her. To no
one would she do a kindness, but every day she schemes to this end,--how
she may work some one the greatest injury."

But at last we reach the bee: "The man who gets her is lucky; to her
alone belongs no censure; one's household goods thrive and increase
under her management; loving, with a loving spouse, she grows old, the
mother of a fair and famous race. She is preeminent among all women, and
a heavenly grace attends her. She cares not to sit among the women when
they indulge in lascivious chatter. Such wives are the best and wisest
mates Zeus grants to men."

Only one woman in ten has been found in some measure desirable, and the
poet concludes with a lengthy and comprehensive dunciad of the female
sex, the gist of which is as follows: "Zeus made this supreme
evil--woman: even though she seem to be a blessing, when a man has
wedded one she becomes a plague."

How much truth is there in Semonides's views on the women of his time?
The poet agrees with Hesiod in regarding woman as a necessary evil. Nine
women out of ten he finds altogether bad, and the tenth is prized only
for her domestic virtues. Industrious, quiet, economical, the mother of
children, she is merely the good housewife, which seems to have been the
primitive ideal of the perfect woman. The poem treats of women of the
middle class, and is important in showing the freedom of movement, and
appearance in public, of the married woman. She is not shut up in the
harem; but in the use of her tongue, and in her capacity as a busybody,
there seems to be no restraint upon her. Semonides's range of vision was
narrow, and he probably knew not much beyond his own little island, but
we may credit him with expressing the prevalent views of the honest
burghers of Amorgus.

Phocylides of Miletus, a successor of Semonides by rather more than a
century, composed in the same strain an epigrammatic satire on woman. It
is manifestly an imitation of the tirade of Semonides.

"The tribe of women," says he, "is of these four kinds,--that of a dog,
that of a bee, that of a burly sow, and that of a long-maned mare. This
last is manageable, quick, fond of gadding about, fine of figure; the
sow kind is neither good nor bad; that of the dog is difficult and
snarling; but the bee-like woman is a good housekeeper, and knows how to
work. This desirable marriage, pray to obtain, dear friend."

The bitterest of all the observations against woman by the iambic
writers, however, is that of Hipponax, a brilliant satirist of the sixth
century before Christ, He says:

"Two happy days a woman brings a man: the first, when he marries her;
the second, when he bears her to the grave."

Theognis is another of the poets of Greece who took a gloomy view of
life, and was not happy in his matrimonial ties. He laments that
marriages in his native town of Megara are made for money, and avers
that such marriages are the bane of the city. Says Theognis:

"Rams and asses, Cyrnus, and horses, we choose of good breed, and wish
them to have good pedigrees; but a noble man does not hesitate to wed a
baseborn girl if she bring him much money; nor does a noble woman refuse
to be the wife of a base but wealthy man, but she chooses the rich
instead of the noble. For they honor money; and the noble weds the
baseborn, and the base the highborn; wealth has mixed the race. So, do
not wonder, Polypaides, that the race of the citizens deteriorates, for
the bad is mixed with the good."

To sum up this cursory survey of the iambic poets, we find that in their
period woman is still regarded as the determining factor of man's weal
or woe, but that there exists in the sex every variety of woman which
lack of education and, especially, lack of appreciation can produce.
Woman is prized by man only for her domestic virtues; and any endeavor
she may make to step beyond the narrow circle of the home is resented by
the lords of creation. Man looks down on her as his inferior, and gives
her no share in his larger life. Among the aristocratic the bane of
wealth has entered, and marriages of convenience are the prevailing
custom.

When we pass from the iambic to the elegiac poets, we begin to note the
causes why wedded life, especially among the Ionian Greeks, does not
present the beautiful pictures of domestic bliss and conjugal
comradeship so attractive in heroic times. The martial elegists show
how woman could still inspire man to deeds of valor, but the erotic
poets give us glimpses of the root of the evil that was undermining the
very foundations of domestic life. The Greek woman did not develop under
enlarged conditions with the same rapidity as the Greek man; the wife
was expected to be merely the mother of her husband's children and the
keeper of his house; for companionship and pleasure he looked elsewhere.
The free woman, or the hetaera, has entered upon the stage. Poets were
inspired by love, but romantic love between husband and wife is being
replaced by the love of the beautiful and highly educated "companion,"
or the natural place of the highborn woman is being invaded by the baser
passion for "those fair and stately youths, with their virgin looks and
maiden modesty "--two classes that were to play so large a role in
society in the greatest days of Greece, and who were to bring about its
downfall.

In the fragments of Alcman are many allusions to his passion for his
sweetheart Megalostrata; and many of the elegies of Mimnermus are said
to have been addressed to a flute player, Nanno, who, according to one
account, did not return his passion. The following, translated by
Symonds, shows the intensity of his love:

      "What's life or pleasure wanting Aphrodite?
       When to the gold-haired goddess cold am I,
       When love and love's soft gifts no more delight me,
       Nor stolen dalliance, then I fain would die!
       Ah! fair and lovely bloom the flowers of youth;
       On man and maids they beautifully smile:
       But soon comes doleful eld, who, void of ruth,
       Indifferently afflicts the fair and vile.
       Then cares wear out the heart; old eyes forlorn
       Scarce serve the very sunshine to behold--
       Unloved of youths, of every maid the scorn--
       So hard a lot gods lay upon the old."

Even from Solon the Sage, maker of constitutions, we possess some
amorous verses, of so questionable a character that it would hardly be
fitting to present them in this volume. They are ascribed to his early
youth. They afforded much comfort to the libertines of antiquity, who
were glad to be able to cite so respectable an exemplar; but the good
people were scandalized by these couplets.

Ibycus resembles Sappho in the intensity of his passion and in his
conception of Eros as a concrete existence. "Love once again looking
upon me from his cloud-black brows, with languishing glances drives me
by enchantments of all kinds to the endless nets of Cypris. Verily, I
tremble at his onset as a chariot horse, which hath won prizes, in old
age goes grudgingly to try his speed in the swift race of cars."

Anacreon, to English readers the best known of the erotic poets of
Greece, had as his mistress the golden-haired Eurypyle. He was very
susceptible to the influence of love, and, owing to the grace and
sweetness and ease of expression in his verses, has won an enduring
fame. Many of his verses and numerous imitations of his poems are
extant, and in these love is the constant theme.

Stesichorus was the composer of love poems with a plot, which were
highly popular among the ladies of ancient days. As forerunners of the
Greek Romance they possess unique literary importance, and as love
stories of an early day they throw much light on the status and ideals
of woman. Aristoxenus had preserved an outline of the plot of the
_Calyce:_ "The maiden Calyce having fallen madly in love with a youth,
prays to Apollo that she may become his lawful wife; and when he
continues to be indifferent to her, she commits suicide." Ancient
critics favorably comment on the purity and modesty of the maiden, and
the story indicates that marriages were not always a matter of
arrangement, that love at times determined one's choice, and that to the
ancient highborn maiden death was preferable to dishonor. Another of
these romantic poems, called _Rhadina_, tells also a tale of unhappy
love, how a Samian brother and sister were put to death by a cruel
tyrant because the sister resisted his advances.

Yet we cannot hold that woman had in this period universally assumed a
lower status than that accorded her in the Homeric poems. Among Ionian
peoples, this was doubtless true; but among AEolians and Dorians, woman
had not only attained a greater degree of freedom than was permitted her
in the Heroic Age, but had also shown herself the equal of man in
literary and aesthetic pursuits. In this transition age, the name of one
woman--Sappho--presents itself as the bright morning star in the history
of cultured womanhood.




VI

SAPPHO


Toward the close of the seventh century before Christ, a singular
phenomenon presented itself in the history of Greek womanhood.
Heretofore Greek women have been beautiful; they have been fascinating;
they have exerted great influence on the course of events; but it cannot
be said that they have been intellectual. At the time mentioned, there
occurred an unusual movement in the intellectual realm. This remarkable
movement centres about the name of the first great historical woman of
Greece--Lesbian Sappho, "the Tenth Muse." In the history of universal
woman, Sappho holds a position altogether unique; for she is not only
regarded as the greatest of lyric poets, but she was also the founder of
the first woman's club of which we have any record. Sappho consecrated
herself heart and soul to the elevation of her sex. As poetry and art
constitute the natural channels for the aesthetic cultivation of woman,
she trained her pupils to be poets like herself. The result of her
lifelong devotion to the service of Aphrodite and the Muses was that she
herself not only achieved an immortal reputation as a poet, but through
her inspiring influence her pupils carried the love of poetry and of
intellectual and artistic pursuits back to their distant homes. Hence,
it is not surprising to learn that from this time there were to be
found here and there in the Greek world women who in intellectual
pursuits were the peers of their male compeers, and that there should be
found among women the nine terrestrial Muses, so called as a counterpart
to the celestial Nine.

Sappho's unique greatness is best appreciated when we consider how she
has been regarded by the great men of antiquity and of modern times.

Among the Greeks, she possessed the unique renown of being called "The
Poetess," just as Homer was "The Poet." Solon, hearing one of her poems,
prayed that he might not see death until he had learned it. Plato
numbered her among the wise. Aristotle quotes without reservation a
judgment that placed her in the same rank as Homer and Archilochus.
Plutarch likens her "to the heart of a volcano," and says that the grace
of her poems acted on her listeners like an enchantment, and that when
he read them he set aside the drinking cup in very shame. Strabo called
her "a wonderful something," and says that "at no period within memory
has any woman been known who, in any way, even the least degree, could
be compared to her for poetry." Demetrius of Phaleron adds his word of
praise: "Wherefore Sappho is eloquent and sweet when she sings of beauty
and of love and spring, and of the kingfisher; and every beautiful
expression is woven into her poetry besides what she herself invented."

Writers in the Greek Anthology continually sing her praises, calling her
"the Tenth Muse," "pride of Hellas," "comrade of Apollo," "child of
Aphrodite and Eros," "nursling of the Graces and Persuasion." Nor have
modern critics been less restrained in their praises, notwithstanding
the fact that they possess merely a handful of fragments by which to
judge "The Poetess." Addison, for example, says: "Among the mutilated
poets of antiquity there is none whose fragments are so beautiful as
those of Sappho." John A

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