An Enviable Life or Worse than Death? Reconstructing Women's Experience of Marriage and Sex in Classical Athens

Robson, James (2025). An Enviable Life or Worse than Death? Reconstructing Women's Experience of Marriage and Sex in Classical Athens. In: Clark, Anna and Williams, Elizabeth W. eds. Sources and Methods in the History of Sexuality. Routledge Guides to Using Historical Sources. London and New York: Routledge, pp. 102–118.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781032655826-12

Abstract

The art and literature of classical Athens provide plenty of rich material for scholars of ancient sexuality to explore: from vase paintings of weddings and erotic encounters, to the (sometimes highly sexualized) portrayal of women on the comic stage, to courtroom speeches full of domestic detail and family feuds, to philosophical discussions of marital relations, affection (philia) and sexual desire (erōs). Our sources are not always easy to interpret, however. Vase painters work within certain artistic conventions; comic plays include elements of fantasy and caricature; legal speeches present a partial view of their speakers’ and opponents’ actions; and philosophers often deal in abstractions while writing their works for a literate, cultural elite. This chapter will attempt to paint a picture of the realities of sexual and married life for a group of Athenians whose views, if they are captured at all, are routinely filtered through the works of male writers and artists: namely, Athenian wives (a group who, according to Medea in Euripides’ play of the same name, could either enjoy a life that was enviable or worse than death, depending on the husband they were married to). Crucially, the discussion will involve engaging with a range of different evidence-types relating to Athens in the fifth and fourth centuries BCE as well as being sensitive to the ways in which social attitudes towards sex and sexuality constantly shifted throughout the classical era.

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