Review: The Joy of Sexus by Vicki León

Vicki León has been out collecting ancient trivia again and this time her subject is sex.  In her latest collection of the obscure, she has assembled anecdotes about ancient aphrodisiacs, wandering wombs, practitioners of erotic mysteries and victims of doomed love.

By reading her book I learned about Callipygia worship - a fixation on a person's derriere - and divine gender-bending that affected such ancient prophets as Teiresias the Seer.  I think my favorite passage from the book, though, was a retelling of the story of Pherenike of Rhodes.

I have not studied ancient Greece as extensively as I have studied Republican Rome so, although I knew that the ancient Greek Olympics were conducted in the nude and that women were not allowed to attend, I had never read any background material to explain why.  León provided me with all the information I could have hoped for in her passage about Pherenike of Rhodes.

Diskobolos (discus thrower) 2nd century CE Roman copy of  450-440 BCE 

Greek bronze by Myron recovered from Emperor Hadrian's Villa in Tivoli, 

Italy.  Photographed by Mary Harrsch at the Body Beautiful exhibit at the 

Portland Art Museum, Portland, OR.

It seems that Pherenike was a young woman born into a family of Olympic victors.  Her father was a champion boxer at the Olympic Games in 464 BCE.

"Her big burly brothers continued the winning streak.  In boxing and the ferocious boxing-wrestling event called the pancratium, Pherenike's brothers swept six different Olympic Games." - Vicki León, The Joy of Sexus

León goes on to surprise me by observing that Pherenike probably watched her athletic family compete in the games when she was a young girl and later before her marriage.  Apparently, young virgins were allowed to watch the games - just not married matrons!

Then León continues saying Pherenike also married a famous athlete named Callianax and bore two sons who also trained for the Olympics.  Pherenike's older son, Eucles, won his boxing event but, because Pherenike was now married, she was not able to witness his victory.

A few years later, Pherenike's younger son Pisodorus entered his name as a contender for the boys boxing competition but before he could complete his ten months of training, Pherenike's husband died.  So, secretly Pherenike took up the mantle and resumed training her son dressed in the male garb of an official trainer.  When his time came to report for the 388 BCE Olympics, his mother went with him disguised in the full length robe of a trainer and carrying the traditional wooden staff.

Boxer Resting 1st century BCE Roman copy of 3rd century 

Greek original by Apollonius.  Photographed at the Palazzo

Massimo in Rome, Italy by Mary Harrsch.

When her son was ultimately victorious, Pherenike, forgetting her precarious situation since a woman attending the forbidden event faced the death penalty of being thrown from the Typaeum cliffs, let out a high-pitched whoop and jumped over the fence to run and kiss her son.

"Either the high-pitched sound of her voice, or perhaps what her jump over the fence revealed, blew her disguise." - Vicki León, The Joy of Sexus

Fortunately for Pherenike, the ten Olympic judges decided not to punish her because of her illustrious family's contributions to the games, but forever after both trainers and athletes were decreed to appear in the nude.

So now I know why athletes are always depicted in the nude on all of those red and black-figure vases!

I also learned about Koan silk, a sheer see-through fabric.  I guess I hadn't kept up on all the latest discoveries and still thought silk worms were a closely guarded secret until much later in history than ancient Greece.  León reveals that some silk worms were purloined by the ancient Persians and made their way to the Greek islands of Amorgos and Kos.  Unlike the Chinese, who killed the worm to harvest the silk from their cocoons, the Greeks let the worm emerge naturally, breaking the threads as it went.  Then, using the same method they used with flax known as hackling, the women produced a gossamer silk that commanded a premium price.  The silk was so popular that Aristophanes referred to it in his play Lysistrata where women go on a sex strike to keep their men from going to war and sexually tease their husbands by prancing around "naked in their Amorgian chitons."

Apparently, in a surviving letter from Plato, the famous philosopher (and León questions "cheapskate?") orders three tunics for the daughters of a host but says "not those expensive Amorgian ones!" (I always love little tidbits that reveal what kind of person  a famous ancient was!)

The fashion eventually reached Rome and León found a quote from Pliny who called Koan silk "the vestments that cover a woman while at the same time revealing her naked charms."

These wonderful little glimpses about the truly personal lives of the ancients is what makes León's book so enjoyable.

There were only a couple of missteps that made me say "What?"  In her chapter about Alexander and Hephaestion, León explains that the Macedonians defeated the Persians at the battle of Issus. Then in the next sentence she says Persian King Darius was killed and his queen Statira captured. (p. 69 - 70) She may have been simply trying to condense the chapter but it makes it sound like Darius was killed at the battle of Issus and, of course, he wasn't.  Darius was killed some time after he fled the battle of Gaugamela and was assassinated by his own officers, who hoped to impress Alexander.  Alexander was not impressed with their treachery and ordered their execution.

Roman emperor Caracalla by Italian sculptor
Cavaceppi 1750 CE after ancient original.
Photographed by Mary Harrsch at the
J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, CA

León made another confusing statement about the Roman emperor Caracalla.  She alluded to his death being the result of too many mistresses and a gladiator.  Although Caracalla may have dallied with too many mistresses and maybe a gladiator, too, this sounded much more like Commodus.  Caracalla was killed by a member of his own body guard when he stopped to relieve himself while marching with his army near Carrhae during a war with Parthia.  Historian Cassius Dio said the assassin, Martialis, was disgruntled for not being promoted to the rank of centurion.

But, I salute Vicki for such a revealing and fascinating look at lust, love and longing in the ancient world!

If you enjoyed this post, never miss out on future posts by following me by email!

Were Sparta's "Happy Helots" a template for Roman slavery?

Lacedaemonian furniture appliqué depicting

a nude swordsman 550 - 525 BCE, Bronze.

Photographed at the Getty Villa in Malibu, CA
by Mary Harrsch.

While doing some housekeeping up on Blogger I happened to notice a post by historian Helen P. Schrader entitled "Sparta's Happy Helots: A Closer Look at Helot Society".  Of course I was intrigued because I have always envisioned Sparta's helots as a generally downtrodden lot always looking over their shoulder for an up and coming Spartan youth out to make his first kill.  But Schrader paints a much different picture of helot society and as I read the article I immediately recognized similarities in the slavery practiced by the Spartans in comparison to Roman slavery.

Although there were obvious differences such as the fact that in Sparta the state owned all slaves that in turn were attached to particular governmental activities or particular parcels of land managed by a Spartiate elite while Roman slaves were the property of individual Roman patriarchs, I was astonished to learn that the ancient sources report that some helots became wealthy and were able to purchase their freedom just as in Roman society.

I have studied Greek history to some degree but this is the first time I had heard this.  Schrader explains that Spartan helots, although unable to own land, were often entitled to up to 50% of the produce from the land that they worked.  She also pointed out that helots were able to maintain a family unit and may have benefited from inheritance laws that channeled family wealth to the "tenant-in-chief" who in turn passed it on to a single recognized heir.  If a helot had more than one son, the younger sons were forced to seek employment elsewhere within the boundaries of Lacedaemon to support themselves and their families.

"Some younger sons would have been apprenticed to learn crafts scorned by the perioikoi and prohibited to the Spartiates. Through apprenticeship to those that had taken this path before them, they would have become tanners and tinkers, cobblers and coopers, masons and dyers. As a master craftsman, able to retain 100% of their earnings, these helots would have been in a position to found families, build houses and accumulate wealth." 

"Other young men unable or unwilling to embark on such a slow, hard career, would have sought employment as laborers for the Spartan army or state, or to individuals. Thus they could have become the personal attendants to Spartan hoplites or agricultural day-laborers, going from estate to estate.  Others would have worked for wages as teamsters and mule-drivers for the Spartan army or as construction workers, bath attendants, gardeners and repairmen for the Lacedaemonian government. Still other could have found employment in perioikoi factories and business - as miners, quarry workers, rowers, etc." - Helen Schrader, Sparta's Happy Helots: A Closer Look at Helot Society

This ability for helots to accumulate wealth and purchase their freedom is clearly reflected in the Roman approach to slavery and manumission.  Schrader did not delve into Spartan laws that may have regulated such manumissions, however.  The Romans, being consummate legislators, developed over time an exhaustive body of laws regulating not only when manumission could be granted but the social status of those manumitted.  One such law was the Lex Aelia Sentia of 4 CE.  Portions of it were cited in a textbook written by an unknown jurist named Gaius in the 2nd century CE.  I found the sections on the manumission of gladiators and former gladiators particularly interesting:

   

"The Lex Aelia Sentia requires that any slaves who had been put in chains as a punishment by their masters or had been branded or interrogated under torture about some crime of which they were found to be guilty; and any who had been handed over to fight as gladiators or with wild beasts, or had belonged to a troupe of gladiators or had been imprisoned; should, if the same owner or any subsequent owner manumits them, become free men of the same status as subject foreigners (peregrini dediticii)."

" 'Subject foreigners' is the name given to those who had once fought a regular war against the Roman People, were defeated, and gave themselves up."
"We will never accept that slaves who have suffered a disgrace of this kind can become either Roman citizens or Latins (whatever the procedure of manumission and whatever their age at the time, even if they were in their masters' full ownership); we consider that they should always be held to have the status of subjects."

Citizens

"But if a slave has suffered no such disgrace, he sometimes becomes a Roman citizen when he is manumitted, and sometimes a Latin."

"A slave becomes a Roman citizen if he fulfils the following three conditions. He must be over thirty years of age; his master must own him by Quiritary right; and he must be set free by ajust and legitimate manumission, i.e. by the rod (vindicta) or by census or by Will. If any of these conditions is not met, he will become a Latin." - Gaius, 2nd century CE, - More 

It would be interesting to compare and contrast the development of manumission over time between the Spartans and the Romans!

Related articles

• Products of the Spartan Agoge (spartareconsidered.blogspot.com)
• 'End Of Sparta' Mixes History With Invention (npr.org)

If you enjoyed this post, never miss out on future posts by following me by email!

Developer of Course Materials about late antiquity garners award

"Michele Salzman, professor of history at UC Riverside, is one of five UC researchers honored by the American Philological Association for developing course materials for sixth- and seventh-grade social studies teachers about the world of late antiquity.

The 2007 APA Prize for Scholarly Outreach, presented at the international association’s annual meeting in Chicago in early January, recognizes the work of the University of California Multi-Campus Research Group in the History and Culture of Late Antiquity.

“This is an important affirmation of our efforts to share information and new insights into late antiquity with middle school teachers,” Salzman said. “The teachers have been really excited and appreciative of our efforts to explore the ancient world. And it is rewarding to receive this recognition from the American Philological Association since this is the only award they give for outreach.”

Other members of the group include Claudia Rapp of UCLA, Emily Albu of UC Davis, Harold Drake of UC Santa Barbara and Susanna Elm of UC Berkeley.

The team began working in 1999 to develop instructional materials for middle-school social studies teachers about the world of late antiquity, including the fall of the multicultural Roman Empire and the rise of Christianity and, to a lesser extent, Islam.

The group offered one-day workshops – including at UC Riverside and California State University San Bernardino – and provided teachers with course materials such as extensive maps, images, bibliography and directions for further study.

“The group's project was intellectually valuable for demonstrating with rigor, clarity, and imagination the enormous breadth of the world of the Roman Empire and its eventual division into East and West,” Helene P. Foley, chair of the prize committee, said in the citation announcing the winning project.

The project filled a gap in the middle-school curriculum and introduced an important and novel global perspective to the study of the ancient world, she said." If you enjoyed this post, never miss out on future posts by following me by email!