Cambridge Books Online

Cambridge Books Online
http://ebooks.cambridge.org/
Studying Gender in Classical Antiquity
Lin Foxhall
Book DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511980084
Online ISBN: 9780511980084
Hardback ISBN: 9780521553186
Paperback ISBN: 9780521557399
Chapter
Chapter 4 - Bodies pp. 68-89
Chapter DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511980084.004
Cambridge University Press

ch apter 4
Bodies
1 g ende r a nd the ‘natur al’ b od y

In the Greek world, to have a body defined the human condition.
Although gods were visually represented with bodies that appear human,
these were qualitatively different from those of people (Osborne 2011: 185–
215; Vernant 1991: 27–49), placing mortals lower in the cosmological hier-
archy, and tying them to the need to eat, drink, reproduce, grow up, grow
old and die. Gods, of course, did not eat food, though humans must. And
because gods were immortal they were not compelled to die or reproduce,
even though in myth they do quite a lot of reproducing. Indeed, when
gods presented themselves to humans they regularly took on the form of a
human body (e.g. Euripides Bacchae 4, 53–4; Homer Il. 4.86–7, 5.121–32;
Od. 7.20).
Gender construed as polar opposition played a powerful role in
shaping thought, belief and behaviour about the body in the classical
world; although Greeks and Romans acknowledged and named vari-
ous ‘in-between’ gendered behaviours and roles, these were usually char-
acterized as problematic in some way, and not ‘natural’. Many of these
ancient ideas about bodies (and the gendered characteristics believed to
be inherent in them) had a very long afterlife, and worked their way into
both western and Islamic thought, where they remained deeply lodged
into early modern times (Tarlow 2011: 70–1; eighteenth-century anato-
mists were explicitly rejecting ancient constructions of the body, though
the link between bodily decline and morality remained strong in popular
belief, 88–9).
An interesting example of the issues created by bodily gender ambi-
guity is the second-century ad orator Favorinus. Born into a prominent
and wealthy family in Gaul, he spent his early years in Arelate (Arles) and
Massalia (Marseilles), before moving east to study philosophy with rhetor
and sophist Dio Chrysostom and taking up a career as a lecturer in the
cities of Greece and Asia Minor, in particular Ephesus (Holford-Strevens
68
Downloaded from Cambridge Books Online by IP 130.209.6.50 on Wed May 08 21:02:14 WEST 2013.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511980084.004
Cambridge Books Online © Cambridge University Press, 2013
Bodies 69
2003: 98–130). he description of him by his contemporaries and biogra-
phers, as well as, apparently, his own view of himself, was that he was born
a eunuch. According to some sources (Philostratus, Lives of the Sophists
489; Polemo, Physiognomonia 1.162f, see Gleason 1995: 47), this meant
that he had a penis but no testicles. From an early age he proved to be
a talented scholar with a particular flair for Greek rhetoric, unusual in
the western empire where Latin was more important for a civic and pol-
itical career (Gleason: 1995: 3–5). However, his sexual indeterminacy was
probably a significant factor in his choice to avoid the ‘normal’ civic and
political route to a public career. On what was by this time a well-trodden
pathway for achieving masculinity, gender ambiguity would have been a
serious obstacle. As a freelance intellectual he could to a large extent create
his own persona, and make a feature of what, in the social and political
setting of the Roman Empire, would have been ‘by nature’ a serious flaw.
According to his third-century ad biographer Philostratus, Favorinus pre-
sented himself as a paradox:
He was born double-sexed, both male and female, as his appearance made
plain: his face remained beardless even into old age. His voice revealed the same
ambiguity, for it was penetrating, shrill and high-pitched, the way nature tunes
the voices of eunuchs. Yet he was also so hot-blooded when it comes to sex
that he was actually charged with adultery by a man of consular rank. hus he
used to speak in oracular riddles about the three paradoxes of his life: he was
a Gaul who spoke Greek, a eunuch who was prosecuted for adultery, and one
who quarrelled with the emperor and was still alive. (Philostratus, Lives 489; tr.
Gleason 1995: 3, 6)
Clearly this was a man who successfully compensated for what his
culture would have deemed fatal deficiencies by making his own myth
(Gleason 1995: xxviii). His sexual zeal enabled the label ‘double-sexed’
rather than ‘effeminate’. his was underpinned by the fact that he was
charged with the ‘hyper-masculine’ offence of moicheia (adultery, see
Chapter 2, section 5), which at least emphasized his maleness, although
it potentially left him open to the charge that he lacked the self-control
of a ‘real man’. His public presentation and behaviour were clearly
directed towards redefining his gender ambiguity in a positive way
which suited his ambitions. hat he was wealthy, from an elite and
powerful provincial family, as well as intelligent and well educated, pro-
vided the essential foundation for this life plan. A similarly ‘monstrous’
child from a poor family might well have been exposed (see Chapter 3,
section 3).
70 Studying Gender in Classical Antiquity
From our earliest Greek sources male bodies were represented as super-
ior to female. In Hesiod (heogony 535–616 and Works and Days 42–105)
the prototype of woman, Pandora, is a different kind of being from men.
She was made by the gods from earth like a clay pot, lovely on the outside
but full of bad things inside (Dean-Jones 1994: 42–3; King 1998: 23–7).
Other early Greek verse also presents women as a different species from
men, another kind of creature. Semonides’ misogynistic poem of the
seventh century bc begins: ‘From the first, god made the temperament
(nóon) of woman separately (choris)’ (Semonides f7.1–2). he meaning of
the word ‘separately’ in this passage is ambiguous – it could mean ‘sep-
arately from men’ or it could mean that different types of women were
made separately from each other; perhaps both meanings are intended.
he poem proceeds to compare different kinds of women to (mostly)
unpleasant animals and natural forces, perhaps implying that at one level
all women are subhuman, or at least closer to animals than human males.
For many reasons, including the fact that they were lower in the concep-
tual hierarchy, women’s bodies were construed as potentially more pollut-
ing than male bodies.
In Greek and Roman thought, the male body is the exterior manifest-
ation of the qualitative essence of a person, so a good body, well looked
after, makes a good person (see below, section 4). he condition of the
body was both reflective and constructing. A sound body did not simply
demonstrate moral soundness, but keeping the body in good condition
and pursuing a lifestyle that made the body better were deemed to enhance
the moral as well as the physical condition of the person. Concomitantly,
a strong and pleasing body suggested a man in control of his physical and
emotional appetites.
his contrasts with the representation of female bodies from Pandora
onwards, where a lovely exterior is likely to be a deceptive disguise to
conceal a corrupt and destructive interior. he balance between bodily
adornment and the potential of this for deception became a long-lasting
discourse in Greek and Roman understandings and representations of
femininity. he fourth-century bc writer Xenophon displays a typically
(male elite) philosophical distrust of feminine adornment when he por-
trays his character Ischomachos’ disapproval of his wife’s use of cosmet-
ics and clothing for beautification, because it is deceitful (Xenophon Oec.
10.2, 5–8), and Plutarch was still worrying about the same issues in the
second century ad (Plut. On Marriage [Conj.] 26, 30, 45).
Women were often portrayed as not being in control of their bodies
(as witnessed by such ‘uncontrollable’ physical processes as menstruation
Bodies 71
and childbirth), nor by extension were they in control of their appetites.
herefore, men’s attention to and concern with diet, regimen, physical
training and health in the classical world must be seen in this broader
moral and political context.
2 t h e ‘b i olo gy’ of gender a nd reprod uction

he way in which reproduction worked, and in particular, how and to
what extent the male and female parents contributed to the make-up of
their offspring, was much debated in the classical world. In Aeschylus’
Eumenides (658–66) Apollo argues that Orestes’ murder of his mother was
not a crime since a mother was not a real parent in the sense of contrib-
uting to the make-up of the child, but only the ‘field’ in which the seed
of the father grows. he goddess Athena is prepared to agree because, she
says, she has no mother (Aesch. Eum. 736–8). hese discussions are most
obviously visible in the writings of the philosophers and in the consider-
able body of Greek and Roman medical texts (Sissa 1990). But it is clear
from other sources that these specialist texts were often elaborating on
views of and debates about the ‘biological’ and ‘natural’ basis of gender
difference that were well established in wider classical culture, which in
turn became embedded in a long and complex literary tradition. here is
considerable evidence for a conflicting and contradictory range of ancient
viewpoints.
Aristotle attempts to define male and female near the start of the
Generation of Animals (716a):
Male is what we call an animal that generates into another [i.e. penetrates],
female is that which generates into itself. hat is why in the universe as a whole
the earth’s nature is thought of as female and mother, while the sky and sun
or such others are called begetters and fathers. (Arist. Gen. An. 716a; tr. Balme
1992: 23)
his fits closely with his ideas about form and matter as the universal struc-
turing principles or elements. For Aristotle, the ‘female’ was passive and
incoherent ‘matter’, while the male was active, structuring ‘form’ (Arist.
Gen. An. 729a–b). Form and matter are hierarchically related, form being
the ‘intelligent’, guiding element while matter is the element shaped by
form. his perspective informs his views on the nature of male and female
and their roles in generation.
Aristotle proceeds to consider the issue of the contribution of male and
female ‘seed’ to reproduction. Central to this problem for ancient thinkers
was the controversy over whether both male and female produced ‘seed’
or only males (Arist. Gen. An. 721b; see Dean-Jones 1994: 148–53 for a
review of these theories). Although cultural preference and ‘observation’
encouraged Aristotle’s view (shared by others) that only males produced
seed, he still had to explain the obvious fact that offspring might look like
and have characteristics of both their parents. Indeed, Aristotle believed
that children could inherit parents’ acquired bodily characteristics such as
modified versions of war wounds (Arist. Gen. An. 721b). He also observed
that characteristics could be inherited further down the line and might
skip one or more generations in both plants and people (Arist. Gen. An.
722a).
For Aristotle, females were ‘undercooked’, and therefore defective,
males, rather than an entirely different ‘species’. It has therefore been sug-
gested that gender for Aristotle is, at least in theory, a hierarchical con-
tinuum along which individuals of a single type of body are located (King
1998: 8–9; Gleason 1995: 390–1; Laqueur 1990: 28–34). For example,
he argues that the vaginal fluid produced by some women was not, as
Hippocratic doctors thought, ‘female seed’ (Arist. Gen. An. 727b–728),
but instead indicated their ‘undercooked’, incomplete nature. He com-
pares it to fluid emitted by pre-pubescent boys and infertile males:
In appearance too a boy is like a woman, and the woman is as it were an infertile
male; for the female exists in virtue of a particular incapacity, in being unable to
concoct seed out of the nutriment in its last stage … owing to the coldness of her
nature. (Arist. Gen. An. 728a; tr. Balme 1992: 49)
3 gre ek m edi cal texts and t he construction

o f gendere d h um a n bod ies
he so-called Hippocratic Corpus consists of texts by different authors,
many dating between the mid-fifth and the mid-fourth centuries bc, but
assembled as a collection in Alexandria in the third–second centuries bc
(Dean-Jones 1994: 5–6). A surprising number focus specifically on female
pathology, especially problematic aspects of reproduction. Naturally this
assortment of texts does not present a completely unified or consistent
understanding of human bodies. But it appears that the authors were
working in a relatively coherent intellectual and literary tradition, so gen-
eral patterns emerge. As such, they offer an invaluable source for classical
Greek views of male and female bodies. hese texts represent the ideas of
professional male doctors, and the views of women about their own bod-
ies might have differed in some respects. However, there is reason to think
Bodies 73
that these texts regularly drew upon beliefs about gendered bodies embed-
ded in the wider culture, which were accepted at least to some extent by
women as well as by men (Dean-Jones 1991; 1994: 37–40 and Hanson
1990; 1991 outline the debate on this point; cf. Faraone 2011).
he Hippocratic writers generally understood women’s bodies as quali-
tatively different from men’s, in contrast to the Aristotelian notion of
females as undercooked, inferior males. hey imagined that gender dif-
ferentiation took place at or shortly after conception, and attributed it to
a number of factors including location in the womb (right or left side),
which seed was ‘stronger’ (male or female), etc. But, as for Aristotle, gender
differentiation took on its real significance at puberty (Dean-Jones 1994:
46). Like Aristotle too, the Hippocratics believed the primary difference
between the sexes was that women were wet and spongy in consistency
while men were dry and dense (Dean-Jones 1994: 55–60); this was analo-
gous to views prominent in the wider culture of male and female trees and
wood (heophrastos History of Plants 3.9.6; Foxhall 1998). Hippocratic
treatises disagree about the temperature of men and women; most portray
women as cold, but some think of women as hot (because they are full
of blood and blood is hot, Dean-Jones 1994: 45–6). Also, many portray
the womb as hot, easily desiccated, and therefore attracted to moisture
(Dean-Jones 1994: 71).
Unlike Aristotle, the Hippocratic doctors generally believed that
women as well as men produce seed and thus contribute to the generation
of offspring (Aristotle argues specifically against them in the Generation of
Animals, see above). Despite their general acceptance of ‘female seed’, the
Hippocratics do not always seem to be certain about what it is (Dean-Jones
1994: 78–9; Hippocrates Peri gonês [Genit.] 4 [vii.474.14–18]).
Generally the Hippocratic doctors believed that the wet and spongy
nature of women was precisely what was inferior about them. heir wetness,
the result of sedentary lifestyles according to several treatises (Dean-Jones
1994: 58), was positively pathological and made them susceptible to spe-
cific kinds of illness, especially reproductive problems (Dean-Jones 1994:
58–9; King 1998: 28–9). At the same time, there were other diseases and
conditions thought to be particularly masculine. Aphorisms (6.28–30)
explains that gout does not afflict eunuchs, pre-pubescent boys or women
(unless they do not menstruate). hey acknowledged that individual men
and women might be wetter or drier (Dean-Jones 1994: 55–6), and they
believed that women (like men) dry out with age (King 1998: 9, 72), so
in theory gender should have been a sliding scale rather than a fixed con-
dition of male and female opposites. However, they were really not very
interested in the ‘in-between’ areas of the scale, and regarded individuals
who fell between male and female as pathological (e.g. women who on
abstinence from sex fatally developed masculine characteristics such as
beards, Hp. Epidemics 6.8.32).
One view shared by Aristotle and the Hippocratic texts is that the act
of sex is really for men. Dean-Jones (1994: 77–80) notes that these texts
make no mention of the clitoris. Except for one questionable reference in
Aristotle, virtually all discussion of the pleasurable feelings from sexual
intercourse attributed to women focus on the movement of the penis in
the vagina, and thus the stimulation of the interior of the vagina (thought
to produce the moisture which was ‘female seed’). As Hanson (1990:
314) succinctly put it, men’s experience of sex was transferred to women.
Moreover, the observation that women do not always produce vaginal
moisture and that some women do not produce it at all suggests that some
men at least did not take much account of their female partner’s bodily
state of stimulation or excitement, much less her feelings, when having
sex. If sexual pleasure was primarily felt to be something for men, then
what a woman felt did not necessarily matter too much, except insofar as
a willing sexual partner was more pleasurable (Artemidoros 1.78).
4 achi ev ing m as culi nit y: the regimen

he meaning of the Latin term regimen (diaitê in Greek) falls somewhere
between the modern English words ‘routine’ and ‘lifestyle’, but it is more
than either of these. he regimen is grounded in the minute details of an
individual’s practices of eating, drinking, having sex, exercise and training,
daily habits and pursuits, medical treatments (e.g. regular purgings) and
the coordination of these practices with such environmental factors as the
season of the year, the weather, the local climate and even the life stage of
the person (see Hp. Regimen i 2). he concept is based on the deep-seated
and long-standing beliefs in the classical world that 1) the state of the
body, and the way it is cared for, have moral implications and 2) illness,
for the most part, is the result of internal bodily imbalances. In essence, a
good body means a good person; while a body in poor condition reflects
a person’s moral negligence. Simultaneously, maintaining one’s body in a
healthy state or improving it by proper training and lifestyle also develops
the person as a whole. Hence the regimen played a crucial role in present-
ing and shaping both the body and the person. A good body maintained
by a good regimen indicated self-control, the hallmark of the autonomous
man. hrough the regimen, therefore, males achieved the full masculinity
Bodies 75
of manhood. his complex concept changed considerably in its particu-
lars over time, although there was strong continuity of the basic premises
underpinning it between the Greek and the Roman literary traditions.
Although the concept and mechanics of regimen are discussed in gory
detail by Greek and Roman medical writers, the general notion with its
moral implications regularly appears in philosophical and other kinds
of writings as well. Xenophon’s Socratic dialogue Oikonomikos explicitly
links Ischomachos’ healthy lifestyle with his prosperity and good citizen-
ship. here is a close match between the activities Ischomachos under-
takes and the prescribed activities for improving the not-quite-perfect
body in the Hippocratic Regimen i (25). Correspondences include: 1) the
benefits of walking and running before meals and in the early morning
(but not wrestling or massage – Ischomachos goes instead for horseman-
ship), 2) limited food and drink, and 3) rubbing down with oil (but not
bathing). he links between these two texts suggest that many of the basic
ideas and beliefs about the nature of the body and how to improve it
found in the medical texts were quite widespread in Greek culture. It is
possible that Xenophon is having a joke with the reader here by portray-
ing Ischomachos not as the best kind of man, but as a relatively ordinary
person who improves his body and mind (as he improves his property
holdings) through the hard work and self-discipline of a proper lifestyle
(Foxhall 2013b).
he regimen was particularly a concern of men, and most of the lengthy
discussions in the Hippocratic texts assume men to be the primary sub-
jects. Women’s allegedly more sedentary lifestyles were sometimes cited as
the reason for their inferior, cold and wet nature:
he males of all creatures are warmer and drier, and the females moister and
colder, for the following reasons: originally each was born (male or female) and
by such things grows, those born male use a more arduous regimen, so that they
are well warmed and dried, but females use a regimen that is moister and less
strenuous, and also purge the heat out from their bodies every month [i.e. men-
struating]. (Hp. Reg. i 34)
But the texts disagree on the extent to which the wet, cold nature of
women was the cause of their supposed inactivity and weakness or an
effect of it, which might in part be counteracted by a better regimen, as
suggested by the author of Regimen in Health: ‘For women a drier regimen
is required, for dry food is more suited to the softness of their flesh, and
less diluted drinks are better for the womb and for pregnancy’ (Regimen
in Health 6).
Women were also advised by both philosophers and doctors to look
after their bodies for the sake of their physical and moral well-being.
Xenophon’s character Ischomachos advises housework as the ideal activ-
ity to enable his wife to achieve beauty that is more than skin deep. His
advice is very much in the medical language of ‘regimen’, and the terms
he uses for exercise would normally be applied to men exercising in the
gymnasium as part of their physical training regime:
It seemed to me that these activities combined taking care of things (epimeleia)
and walking. I said mixing dough and kneading were excellent exercise (gymna-
sion), as were shaking and folding clothing and bedding. I said that when she had
exercised (gymnasmenên) like this she would eat more pleasurably, be healthier
and truly improve the appearance of her complexion. (Xen. Oec. 10.11)
Xenophon’s advice that women should engage in housework for

exercise had a long afterlife. Athenaeus of Attaleia was still making
this same recommendation in the first century ad (Oribasius Incerta
4.4.6–7), as was Clement of Alexandria (Paidagogos 3.49, 67) in the
third century ad (Gleason 1995: 95), and even as late as the seventeenth
century housework was presented as a remedy for female complaints
(King 1998: 203).
Roman thought and elite culture wholeheartedly adopted the Greek
notion of the regimen and adapted it to defining masculinity in Roman
social and political life (Gleason 1995: 84–7). In the first century ad, the
younger Pliny expressed admiration for his elderly friend Spurinna, living
proof of the benefits of a good regimen and a moderate lifestyle:
Every morning he stays in bed for an hour after dawn, then calls for his shoes
and takes a three-mile walk to exercise mind and body. If he has friends with
him he carries on a serious conversation, if he is alone a book is read aloud …
hen he sits down, the book is continued, or preferably the conversation, after
which he goes out in his carriage … After a drive of seven miles he will walk
another mile, then sit again or retire to his room and his writing … When sum-
moned to his bath (in mid-afternoon in winter and an hour earlier in summer)
he first removes his clothes and takes a walk in the sunshine if there is no wind,
and then throws a ball briskly for some time, this being another form of exer-
cise whereby he keeps old age at bay. After his bath he lies down for a short rest
before dinner … Dinner is … a simple meal but well served … Between courses
there is often a performance of comedy so that the pleasures of the table have
a seasoning of letters, and the meal is prolonged into the night … he result
is that Spurinna has passed his seventy-seventh year, but his sight and hearing
are unimpaired and he is physically agile and energetic. (Pliny Ep. 3.1.4–10; tr.
Radice 1969: 159, 161, 163)
Bodies 77
By the first century ad the notion that training the body from boy-
hood was essential for achieving the full status of manhood was embedded
in elite Roman culture. For Quintilian, Rome’s first professor of rhetoric
who taught Pliny, training in oratory included not only ‘book learning’
but also training in delivery, gesture and especially the physical training
of the voice (Quin. Institutio oratoria 11.3). Gleason (1995 103–30, 159–68)
convincingly demonstrates the role of vocal training as physical training
for the achievement of masculinity in the Roman world. he tradition of
voice-training as physical exercise beneficial to health which she explores
for the second century ad draws upon a tradition that goes back to the
Hippocratic writers (Hipp. Reg. i 36; Reg. iii 78), but its significance was
considerably elevated in Roman times.
5 rom a n portra i ture: pictur ing

th e i ndi v i dua l
he complex development of Roman portraiture provides another
useful window for viewing Roman perspectives on the body and its
representations, which are very different from the artistic traditions of
the Greek world. he Roman habit of making portrait statues prop-
erly emerges in the late second and even more in the first century bc
as a result of two cultural habits which come together at this time.
One is the elite Roman custom of making and displaying funeral
masks (Flower 1996), described in the second century bc by the Greek
first-hand observer Polybios:
When a Roman nobleman dies, he is carried, upright wherever possible, into the
Forum to the so-called rostra. An adult son, or in his absence, some other suit-
able relative, ascends to the rostra to speak on the virtues and achievements of
the dead man. he loss affects the crowd, not just the principal mourners. After
the interment they place an image of the deceased in the most conspicuous part
of the house, inside a wooden shrine. his image is a mask, reproducing with
remarkable fidelity the features and complexion of the deceased. hese images are
displayed at public sacrifices, when they are decorated with much care. When any
distinguished member of the family dies, the images are taken to the funeral, the
masks worn by men who bear the closest resemblance to the original in stature
and bearing. hese representatives wear togas, with a purple border if the deceased
were a consul or praetor, entirely purple if he had been a censor, and embroidered
with gold if he had celebrated a triumph. All the representatives of the dead ride
in chariots preceded by the fasces (rods of office), axes and other insignia appro-
priate to the office held by the deceased in life, and when they reach the rostra
they sit on a row of ivory chairs. here could not be a more ennobling sight for a
young man who aspires to fame and virtue. For who would not be inspired by the
sight of images of men renowned for their excellence, all portrayed together as if
they were alive and breathing? What spectacle could be more glorious than this?
(Polybios 6.53; tr. Walker 1995: 75–6)
Even as late as the mid-first century bc, the elder Pliny (Natural History
35.2–5) reports that within living memory such masks were brought out
for funerals by elite families, and that images of notable forbears adorned
the front of the house.
hese funeral masks (imagines) were not meant to be works of art
(C. Hallett 2005: 281). hey represented only men and celebrated mas-
culine careers and achievements. hey served an inspirational func-
tion, and, if we are to believe Polybios, at public occasions they were
paraded on living descendants dressed to a widely known code indi-
cating special status and achievement. Polybios the Greek, coming
from a culture in which bodies (including faces) were idealized in art,
remarks on how lifelike they were. If we are to judge them from the
few originals that survive and their probable successors – the ‘veris-
tic’ portrait heads of the first century bc – they were not flattering
images, and displayed all the flaws of individual countenances and the
ravages of age. Plainly, in the original wax masks, and perhaps also
in their sculpted successors, it was important that the face be a recog-
nizable likeness of the physical appearance of the person represented.
his is a completely different approach to commemorative and monu-
mental imagery than the visual representation of character, age, status
and gender often expressed through idealizing types found in classical
and early Hellenistic Greece (Foxhall 1995; S. Dillon 2006: 8–9; 2010:
103–6), which is why it impressed Polybios.
he second cultural habit to contribute to Roman portrait sculp-
ture was the custom of setting up honorific and funerary statues in the
Hellenistic Greek world. he custom of honouring rulers and benefac-
tors dated to before the time of Alexander the Great, and the veneration
of Hellenistic kings fine-tuned the art of honorific statuary. Although
it was largely men who were honoured as benefactors, a small but not
insignificant number of women were also celebrated for their services
to cities (van Bremen 1996; Boatwright 1991; S. Dillon 2010: 13, 38–41).
hese statues were situated in public places such as the agora or in sanc-
tuaries, but commemorative sculpture also marked tombs. Tanner (2000;
cf. C. Hallett 2005: 138–53) has persuasively argued that this euergetistic
Bodies 79
and honorific Greek tradition combined with the pre-existing culture of
patronage embedded in Roman society. As the Roman Empire grew in
influence and power, what could have been more natural than for Greek
communities to ‘thank’ prominent Roman leaders in the way they showed
gratitude to wealthy and generous citizens or Hellenistic monarchs – by
erecting a statue? Once portrait statues became a regular feature of pub-
lic monumental and elite funerary art, it was not long before the custom
was adopted by other groups for funerary monuments, especially pros-
perous and aspirational freedmen.
Many Roman portrait statues were constructed so that the person-
alized heads were made separately from much more standardized bod-
ies and the two parts were then attached. his provides an interesting
reminder of the importance that Roman culture attached to the head
and face as the ‘book’ for ‘reading’ the person, and probably provides
some insight as to how we should understand the significance of these
‘veristic’ portraits. Among the most intriguing of these are the nudes.
Given the repugnance to exposing any part of their bodies apparently
felt by most Romans, at least outside the confines of the bath, and the
ambivalent attitude towards Greek ‘gymnasium culture’ with its impli-
cations of licentiousness, it seems astonishing that any full-blooded elite
Roman male would allow himself to be represented in this way (Figure
4.1) (see Chapter 6, section 4; Tanner 2000: 22). he portrait heads
of mature Roman matrons attached to the voluptuous naked body of
Venus appear even more extraordinary (Figure 4.2). It seems astounding
that this mode of representation became so popular in Rome (C. Hallett
2005: 159).
he question of the popularity and persistence of these nude portraits,
which appear to contravene Roman moral conventions, has no simple
answer. C. Hallett (2005: 295) suggests that what modern viewers have
often seen as realistic heads on ‘idealized’ bodies might be better inter-
preted as two different kinds of ideals (literally) joined together. he
Romans, drawing on their own traditions of funerary portraiture and the
importance of the face for the head, have welded it to the Greek tradition
of the ‘heroic’ male nude body. his explanation, however, does not work
so well for the female nudes – why the nude Aphrodite rather than a staid
Juno? It seems probable that Roman ideas about how the values and life-
style of an individual shape the ‘actual’ face and should be expressed in the
ideals of gendered bodily perfection are likely to underpin these extraor-
dinary representations.
Figure 4.1 Portrait statue of a Roman man with a nude athlete’s body, from Delos
(National Archaeological Museum, Athens, 1828)
6 sexual behav i ou r a nd the p ol itical

bo dy i n ath ens
he moral qualities attributed to the body and its development served to
entwine politics and the practice of citizenship with sexuality and the treat-
ment of the body. his is exemplified in two speeches from fourth-century
bc Athens, Demosthenes 61 and Aeschines 1. hey represent two sides
of the same coin: the right way and the wrong way for a young man to
embark upon the political and sexual relationships appropriate to man-
hood as a citizen, epitomized by different ways of using the body. However,
the language and the terms of discourse of masculinity, sexuality and the
body appropriate for a politically active citizen are remarkably similar.
he positive example, Dem. 61, probably dates to the third quarter of
the fourth century bc, but it is unlikely that Demosthenes himself wrote
it (Worthington 2006: 17, 40). It was not intended for delivery in the
law courts or the Assembly, but appears to be a rhetorical ‘party piece’,
Bodies 81
Figure 4.2 Portrait statue of a Roman woman with a Venus-type body, from Frattocchia,
near Rome, later first century ad (Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptothek, 711)
possibly written for presentation at a symposium or similar social occasion

(Worthington 2006: 38), perhaps even one celebrating the athletic success
of its key personage, a young man named Epikrates. Certainly the speaker
implies that it was performed at a social gathering and that Epikrates him-
self was present (Dem. 61.1–2), and similar examples of ‘erotic’ speeches by
other writers suggest that the work is representative of a prose genre (Dem.
61.1; Worthington 2006: 40). In the first part of the speech this young man
(described as a ‘youth’, neos and neaniskos, Dem. 61.1–2) is eulogized by the
speaker, who was either having a love affair with him (and simply being
coy about it), or would like to have had one. In the second part, the writer
exhorts the young man to apply himself to the study of philosophy, that he
might develop himself into a worthy citizen and political leader.
he author’s praise of Epikrates highlights the qualities that make him
an exemplary young man with all the right qualities to become a future
leader. he starting point is his physical beauty, ‘which in human form has
a nature worthy of the gods’ (Dem. 61.11). his physical perfection con-
veys the inner virtue of Epikrates, because he has properly cultivated and
looked after his outstanding ‘natural’ gifts (Dem. 61.10–12). Indeed, the vis-
age (opsis) of Epikrates is so lovely that words hardly do justice to it, and
the speaker compares his beauty to an artistic representation (Dem. 61.16).
First, Greek visual representations of young men in this period tended to be
highly idealizing. hey often depicted a flawless type, but not a personalized
individual, in which even distinctions such as citizen/non-citizen, which
are important in the texts, are not apparent in the visual representations
(Osborne 2011: 105–14, 119–20; Foxhall 2013c). Second, the static nature of
even the most beautiful works of art, their lack of life and movement com-
pared to a living, breathing being (or even a song carried by human voices),
was already a well-rehearsed theme by the time of this speech (Steiner 1993;
Pindar Nem. 5.1–3). Epikrates’ athletic prowess is celebrated at some length
as an example of his andreia, ‘courage’, ‘manliness’ (Dem.61.22–9). he ath-
letic contest serves as a perfect venue for displaying his beautiful body in
the context of demonstrating competition, ambition and other masculine
virtues (Osborne 2011: 27–36), and cementing the link between cultivating
a well-toned body and developing excellence of character.
Aeschines 1, delivered in 346/5 bc against Timarchos, is a rich source
for Athenian social values, and one of the texts most frequently dis-
cussed in studies of Greek sexuality, homoeroticism and the figure of the
kinaidos, the despicable and unmanly man who is prepared to serve as
a passive homosexual partner for money even in adulthood (Davidson
2007: 451–60; Dover 1989: 19–109). It offers a particularly clear example
of the links between sexual morality, the body and the ideologies of citi-
zenship and political participation in fourth-century bc Athens. Aeschines
and Demosthenes were enemies, both prominent in the political life of
the city, and both participated jointly in the negotiations between Athens
and Philip of Macedon. he lawsuit from which this speech came is one
of many court battles between these rival politicians involving also their
close political associates. Demosthenes, with his colleague Timarchos, had
already brought a suit against Aeschines and the other envoys over the
negotiations with Philip. he prosecution of Timarchos for prostitution
and squandering his patrimony was Aeschines’ response, with the aim of
undermining this charge, by discrediting and disenfranchising Timarchos.
It was successful (Dover 1989: 19).
Bodies 83
Timarchos is made to appear as the perfect counterpart to Demosthenes
himself, whom Aeschines portrays as a pervert who wears soft, femin-
ine clothing and preys on vulnerable young men (Aeschin. 1.126, 31,
170–2). hough he never actually says so, the implication could be that
Timarchos was the sort of young man to whom Demosthenes might have
been attracted, but more degenerate than his usual victims. he problem
with Timarchos was not his sexuality but his sexual behaviour: Aeschines
depicts him as uncontrolled in his sexual appetites and prepared to accept
payment for unacceptable sexual acts.
he case against Timarchos rests largely on the sins of his youth twenty
years earlier, even though Aeschines claims that he had been mocked
because of his bad reputation while speaking in the Athenian Council
only the previous year (Aeschin. 1.79–80; cf. 1.157). he prosecution claim
was that Timarchos’ sleazy lifestyle and behaviour rendered him unfit to
carry out the roles and duties of an Athenian citizen or to hold office. Two
formal charges were put forward to justify disqualifying him from citizen-
ship and participation in politics: prostitution and squandering his patri-
monial property (Aeschin. 1.154; Lape 2006).
In contrast to Epikrates in Dem. 61, Timarchos had been a beautiful
boy who misused his natural gifts because of his lack of self-control, and
therefore grew up to be a defiled adult – miaros, ‘tainted’ or ‘polluted’
(Aeschin. 1.42). His immorality is depicted as manifest in the poor phys-
ical state and inappropriate use of his body:
Consider, men of Athens, how much Solon and the men I recalled a moment ago
differ from Timarchos. hey were ashamed to speak holding their arm outside
their clothing, but this man here, not long ago, indeed the other day, flung off
his cloak and performed the pankration naked in the Assembly. His body was in
such a bad and degenerate (aischrôs) state through drink and disgustingness that
right-minded men covered their eyes, ashamed on behalf of the city if we use
such men as these as advisers. (Aeschin. 1.26)
he pankration was an athletic event in which the two contestants

engaged in an (almost) no-holds-barred, fast-moving fight combin-
ing boxing and wrestling. he metaphor is clearly intended to compare
Timarchos’ unseemly gyrations in front of the Assembly, showing off his
degenerate body in the process, with real athletes whose good physical
condition (the result of dedicated physical training) brings honour, not
disgrace, to the city.
he poor moral and physical condition of Timarchos is portrayed as
entirely his own fault, the result of bad habits and self-indulgence: luxuries,
rich food, sex, gambling and riotous, disorderly and violent behaviour.
Worse yet, he has funded this appalling lifestyle through prostitution.
he nature of his sexual ‘degeneracy’ is coyly spelled out by Aeschines
(1.40). Even when he was an adult, says Aeschines, Timarchos continued
to take a sexual role appropriate to a boy. Moreover, instead of living at
home as a young man his family could be proud of, he lived in the houses
of unrelated (and often dodgy) men (Aeschin. 1.42, 75). In the subsequent
‘biographical’ sketch of Timarchos’ misdeeds, Aeschines (1.95, 111) portrays
him as an adult man engaging in ‘feminine’ sexual behaviour by living
as a ‘kept man’ for money. his is not because of his own sexual prefer-
ences, which, as Davidson (2007: 453) points out, are always depicted as
robustly heterosexual (Aeschin. 1.75, 107), but because it offered an easy
way to obtain money to satisfy his insatiable and uncontrolled desires
(Aeschin. 1.95).
he logic of the argument is that a man incapable of properly look-
ing after himself, his body and his property is incapable of looking after
affairs of state and should therefore not be trusted with civic responsibil-
ities since he has demonstrated his unworthiness to fulfil them. Moreover,
a man who has no self-control, no sophrosyne, and is a slave to his pas-
sions, is behaving in a feminine way that is inappropriate for true men
and citizens.
What emerges clearly from these two examples is that the body of a
man reflected his political status and moral values, and therefore his abil-
ity to serve the city. Although physical beauty was perceived as a natural
gift, for men, its maintenance depended upon athletic training and a
proper physical and moral regimen. Ideally, the physically sound body of
the athlete was also the morally sound body of the citizen. he right kinds
of sexual relationships, both homoerotic and heterosexual, enhanced the
development of the proper citizen body. he wrong kind perverted it and
undermined civic values.
7 v i olence and war fare

It is a truism to say that warfare was endemic in ancient societies. In fact
it was much more than that: war was a strongly gendered activity which
played a significant part in defining gender itself, founded on bodily
strength and physical force. It was certainly constitutive of the principles
that governed the ideals of masculine and feminine behaviours. To some
extent this may be related to the fact that violence and physical aggression
appear to be attributed almost entirely to men in classical sources, in both
positive and negative ways.
Bodies 85
Controlled violence, exerted under appropriate circumstances, was
acceptable for men. his might even include violence against women
(Schaps 1998: 169–70), for example in the case of nagging wives. In the
Iliad, Zeus threatens his wife Hera with violence when she questions and
chides him about his conversation with the goddess hetis, though the
threat is averted by the intervention of her adult son Hephaistos (Homer
Il. 1.536–89). Similarly, in Semonides’ misogynistic poem, the bitch-wife
deserves to be clouted for her nagging and snooping:
and the one made from a bitch, whining(?), just like her mother,
she who wants to hear everything and know everything
and everywhere peeking and prowling she barks, even if she sees no one.
A man could not stop her either with threats
nor if, angered, he knocked out her teeth with a stone,
nor by speaking to her sweetly, not even if she chances to be sitting among
guests,
but constantly she keeps up her unstoppable yapping.
(Semonides F7.12–19; tr. Gerber 1999: 305, 307)
Excessive and/or unseemly aggression was viewed negatively in Greek
sources as characteristic of the man who lacked proper self-control,
as shown in the example of Timarchos (Aeschin. 1). However, the vio-
lence associated with military activities was a different matter. Warfare
was legitimized as violence against outsiders on behalf of the commu-
nity, sanctioned by the state and in the interests of its defence, expansion
or as a means of acquiring wealth. War was thus a proper job for a real
man (Aristophanes Lysistrata 519–20). And participation in war was often
entwined with social roles and political status for men.
Women at war
Women, in contrast, are almost never depicted in written or visual sources
as engaging in any kind of violent behaviour beyond verbal abuse and
nagging. In war, they were more often victims than active participants
(Schaps 1982). At best, they might be seen to urge on their male relatives
(as Spartan women reputedly did), or support their men in other ways
(Loman 2004). he few exceptions are telling. he mythical and often
scary Amazons, described by Pindar (Olympian 13.87–90) as an ‘archered
army of women’, and ubiquitous in Greek and Roman art and literature,
were never believed to be either Greek or Roman. Although perspectives
on them changed over time (Hardwick 1990), from Homer onwards they
were always depicted as ‘foreign’ and ‘other’: armed women with a mascu-
line lifestyle utterly unlike that of ‘real’ Greek or Roman women.
he reactions of Greek and Roman writers to real women who were
also war leaders show how their gendered expectations were shredded
by characters perceived as contradictory, embodying two roles which
were incompatible, for example Herodotus’ portrayal of of the female
‘general’ Artemesia (Htd. 7.99, 8.87–8; Munson 1988). Likewise, Tacitus’
(Agricola 14–16; Annals 14.31, 35–7) depiction of Boudicca, the female
leader of the Iceni, a group based in the east of England near Colchester,
is reminiscent of the depictions of Amazons, descending rapidly into the
stereotypical female, barbarian ‘other’. According to Tacitus (Ann. 14.31),
Prasutagus, a client-king cooperating with the Roman authorities, left
his kingdom to the emperor jointly with his two daughters. However,
after his death, instead of the protection he had expected, his kingdom
was invaded by Roman soldiers, his daughters were raped and his widow,
Boudicca, was whipped. While the Roman governor Suetonius Paulinus
was attacking resisters on the island of Anglesey, off the coast of north
Wales, the Iceni rebelled under the leadership of Boudicca in response
to this outrage, for ‘they consider no distinction of sex among their rul-
ers’ (Tac. Agric. 16). Suetonius rushed back to the south-east to tackle
the rebels. In his account in the Annals, Tacitus purports to summarize
the speeches of Boudicca and Suetonius, in the dramatic moment before
the final battle in which the Icenian rebels were crushed. Boudicca’s
speech (Tac. Ann. 14.35) is personal and passionate. Tacitus depicts her
driving around in a chariot with her daughters, urging the Iceni to seek
revenge for her tortured body and her shamed daughters: ‘such was the
fixed intention of a woman, that men would live and be slaves’. his
final sentence highlights Boudicca’s contradictory gender roles: in clas-
sical warfare it was generally women who were captured alive as slaves,
while men were killed.
hat Boudicca is represented here as a woman behaving in an unchar-
acteristic way because she was also a barbarian is clear from the account of
Suetonius’ speech that follows (Tac. Ann. 14.36). he Roman commander
exhorts his men by pointing out how weak, chaotic and, in particular,
feminine, is the enemy they face. And, predictably, in Tacitus’ (Ann. 14.37)
description of the outcome of the battle, the Iceni are crushed, supposedly
with losses of around 80,000 in contrast to the 400 Roman fatalities, thus
demonstrating the inadequacy of female leadership in war. In the face of
defeat Boudicca takes the girly way out with poison, in contrast to one of
the legion commanders who falls on his sword having ignored his com-
mander’s orders and brought dishonour on his men, showing that even
bad Romans are real men after all.
Bodies 87
War, masculinity and communities

‘Manly courage’, andreia in Greek and virtus in Latin (van Wees 2007:
293; Lendon 2007: 509–12; Alston 1998: 206–7), was a key value deeply
embedded in ancient notions of successful masculinity and most obviously
and often demonstrated by prowess at war. In both Greek and Roman
societies these terms encompass a set of moral values and behaviours for
men. As we have seen in the previous section, these were qualities only
rarely attributed to women (Htd. 8.99; van Wees 2004: 39–40); indeed
both terms are rooted in the word for ‘man’ (anêr in Greek, vir in Latin).
It was on the battlefield that men showed they were ‘real men’ amongst
other men, and achieved status and honour which then spilled in various
ways over into political and communal life.
In classical times the Greek concept andreia implied fighting bravely in
the company and on behalf of one’s companions, normally in the ranks of
hoplite infantry, to the death if necessary (though this was not essential).
he key thing was not to break, flee or give up (unless a general retreat was
under way) – this would be to incur shame and derision from one’s fellow
soldiers for behaving in a womanly fashion (van Wees 2007: 293). he
politician Kleonymos, said to have demonstrated his cowardice by fling-
ing away his shield in fear, was repeatedly lampooned by Aristophanes in
his comedies for many years after the event was supposed to have hap-
pened (van Wees 2004: 193–4; though it must be said that early Greek
poetry also satirizes the value of bravery itself, Archilochos fr. 5). Andreia,
like so many aspects of Greek life, was competitive, incorporating both
positive and negative sides. On the one hand, the good (hoplite) warrior
should try to excel in valour and bravery in front of his peers and should
never desert the line; on the other hand, failure to behave up to the min-
imum standard of courage would incur social derision and possibly even
prosecution in court (e.g. Lys. 14 and 15).
Warfare thus offered men the opportunity to use their bodies to ‘prove’
themselves in front of other men: hucydides notes that at the beginning
of the Peloponnesian War many young men on both sides were keen to see
the outbreak of hostilities, since they had never fought in a war and wanted
the experience of battle (huc. 2.8.1). he organization of the Athenian
army in classical times meant that men were likely to be fighting side by
side with relatives, neighbours, friends and lovers, as well as fellow-citizens
(van Wees 2007: 291–2; P. Hunt 2007: 137; cf. Euripides Medea 244–51).
Other Greek cities, such as hebes (Davidson 2007: 492–5; P. Hunt 2007:
144–5), encouraged lovers to fight side by side especially in elite corps, on
the premise that erotic relationships produced the strongest bonds between
soldiers, who would strive to protect lovers and to excel in their presence.
he Latin version of ‘manly courage’, virtus, was far more cut-throat
than Greek andreia. Romans understood virtus as an inherited quality that
men either had or did not have. Traditionally the way to prove it was on
the battlefield in single combat. As a result, this remained an important
element of Roman fighting tactics (Lendon 2007: 509–10, 512–14; cf. Sabin
2000: 10–16; Sabin and de Souza 2007: 233). On the other hand, coward-
ice and bad behaviour (including sexual misdemeanours) were severely
punished, with fines, flogging and permanent disgrace (Plb. 6.37.7–38;
Alston 1998: 209–10). he physicality of fighting was therefore a key elem-
ent for achieving masculinity in Roman society.
An important consequence of the centrality of virtus founded on fight-
ing prowess in battle was that in Roman society of the Republican period,
and even later, military achievement was crucial to political success. In
contrast to the world of the classical Greek city state where generally war
was an offshoot of political life (van Wees 2007: 273, 291), in Republican
Rome war was the foundation on which politics was built (Lendon 2007:
510–11; Serrati 2007: 486–7).
In Rome under the Republic, as in classical Greek city states, citizen
men from the wealthiest five census classes (known as adsidui) were liable
for military service (Plb. 6.19). Unlike in classical Greece, though, Romans
could hold office only after serving in the requisite number of military
campaigns (Lendon 2007: 510). Polybios depicts the highest Roman
magistracy, the consulship, as being more military in character than pol-
itical (Plb. 6.12, 15, 19). His admiring description (Plb. 6.39.1–10) of how
the Romans inspired their young soldiers reveals the important role of
military service for achieving masculinity in Republican Rome, and shows
how essential it was for an aspiring Roman politician in Republican times
to distinguish himself in battle (Lendon 2007: 511).
By the beginning of the Principate, however, the relationship between
military service and masculinity had changed considerably (Alston 1998).
Military service as an officer still benefited the careers of the wealthy in the
late Republic and during the Principate to some extent. However, instead
of an army of citizens from property-holding families and allies who owed
military service to the state, Rome now commanded an army founded on
a much wider base, which went much further down the socio-economic
scale, became much more professionalized and socially segregated (Alston
1998: 212) and included (in the auxiliary forces) many non-citizens. he old
link between serving as a soldier and achieving masculinity was broken: a
Bodies 89
soldier’s body no longer manifested the manly bravery essential for an aspir-
ing politician. A military career could still enhance a soldier’s status, but the
acquisition of ‘real’ Roman masculinity remained reserved for the elite.
8 co nclusi o n
he body in classical antiquity was widely believed to manifest the social
and moral qualities of the individual. Bodies, like individuals, could be
improved or allowed to degenerate. he two predominant and norma-
tive forms of gendered human bodies were thus more than simply polar
opposites, but they were not generally envisaged by our ancient sources
as inhabiting a ‘sliding scale’. A better metaphor for how classical cultures
perceived gendered bodies might be to think of maleness and femaleness
as ‘rooms’ within which there are different, but restricted, positions and
spaces and limited individual variation and agency, including the varia-
tions contingent upon age, life stage, status and wealth. Gendered bodies
were thus constructed through ‘appropriately’ gendered bodily practices
and habits, especially self-control, itself a gendered virtue, with different
attributes for women than for men (Arist. Rhet. 1.5.6). here was room
for limited wandering within these gendered moral spaces that might
even cross the boundaries to a limited extent – women can sometimes
be brave and fathers can be gentle, just as men can be short and women
tall. However, the ideal that the gender of the body and the person had
to match each other closely, and that the acceptable degree of divergence
between them was limited, comes through loud and clear in our sources.
Generally to be a (free, adult and usually elite) man was to have (or to
acquire) the body of a ‘man’. Anti-hero figures included men like the
kinaidos (and his Roman equivalent, the cinaedus), who were perceived
to take on deliberately ‘feminine’, passive roles in sexual relationships
with other men and to live ‘degenerate’ lifestyles accompanying this sex-
ual behaviour (Winkler 1990b: 45–6: Williams 2010: 193–214). heir rela-
tively prominent presence in our sources suggests that not all individuals
achieved (or even wanted to achieve) the ideal, but even in this case many
sources use the degenerate body as a rhetorical device, not necessarily rep-
resentative of aspirations or even for the most part of practice, but rather of
fears (Winkler 1990b). From this perspective an exception like Favorinus
is all the more interesting, in terms of how he appears through high status,
wealth and education to have transformed the mismatch between his own
‘abnormal’ body and the ideal ‘man’ into a new, just about acceptable (if
somewhat dubious) role.

Cambridge Books Online

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

You might also like

Cambridge Books Online

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Cambridge Books Online

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Cambridge Books Online

Studying Gender in Classical Antiquity

Book DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511980084

Online ISBN: 9780511980084

Hardback ISBN: 9780521553186

Paperback ISBN: 9780521557399

Chapter 4 - Bodies pp. 68-89

Chapter DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511980084.004

Cambridge University Press

1 g ende r a nd the ‘natur al’ b od y

2 t h e ‘b i olo gy’ of gender a nd reprod uction

3 gre ek m edi cal texts and t he construction

4 achi ev ing m as culi nit y: the regimen

Xenophon’s advice that women should engage in housework for

5 rom a n portra i ture: pictur ing

6 sexual behav i ou r a nd the p ol itical

possibly written for presentation at a symposium or similar social occasion

he pankration was an athletic event in which the two contestants

7 v i olence and war fare

War, masculinity and communities

You might also like