Western Civilization

Women were kept under strict control. Since they

were married at fourteen or fifteen, they were taught

about their responsibilities at an early age. Although

many managed to learn to read and play musical

instruments, they were often cut off from any formal

education. And women were supposed to remain at

home, out of sight, except when attending funerals or

festivals. If they left the house, they were to be

accompanied.

Male homosexuality was also a prominent feature of

Athenian life. The Greek homosexual ideal was a rela-

tionship between a mature man and a young male. It is

most likely that this was an aristocratic ideal and not

one practiced by the common people. Although the

relationship was frequently physical, the Greeks also

viewed it as educational. The older male (the “lover”)

won the love of his “beloved” by his value as a teacher

and by the devotion he demonstrated in training his

charge. In a sense, this love relationship was seen as a

way of initiating young men into the male world of po-

litical and military dominance. The Greeks did not feel

that the coexistence of homosexual and heterosexual

predilections created any special problems for individu-

als or their society.

Chapter Summary

The earliest Greek-speakingpeople migrated into Greece

about 2000B.C.E., and by 1600B.C.E. they had established a Greek

civilization, known as Mycenaean civilization from Mycenae, one

of its major cities. After its collapse in the twelfth centuryB.C.E.,

Greece entered a Dark Age. With the end of the Dark Age around

800 B.C.E., the era of thepolis, or city-state, began. Thepoliswas

a community of citizens ruled by its male citizens. The two most

famous city-states were Sparta, a militaristicpolisruled by an oli-

garchy, and Athens, which became known for its democratic

institutions in spite of the fact that many slaves and women had

no political rights.

The Greek city-states flourished and reached their height in

the classical era of the fifth centuryB.C.E. The century began with

the Persian wars, which tem-

porarily unified the Greeks,

who were victorious against

the powerful Persian Empire.

But the growth of an Athenian

empire led to a mighty conflict

with Sparta—the Peloponnesian War—that weakened the Greek

city-states and ultimately opened the door to an invasion by Phil-

ip II of Macedonia that put an end to their freedom in 338B.C.E.

The civilization of the ancient Greeks was the fountainhead of

Western culture. Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle established the

foundations of Western philosophy. Herodotus and Thucydides

created the discipline of history. Our literary forms are largely

with races and wrestling and discus and javelin throw-

ing, so that the embryos formed in them would have a

strong start in strong bodies and develop better, and

they would undergo their pregnancies with vigor and

would cope well and easily with childbirth. He got rid of

daintiness and sheltered upbringing and effeminacy of

all kinds, by accustoming the girls no less than the

young men to walking naked in processions and dancing

and singing at certain festivals, when young men were

present and watching.... The nudity of the girls had

nothing disgraceful in it for modesty was present and

immorality absent, but rather it made them accustomed

to simplicity and enthusiastic as to physical fitness, and

gave the female sex a taste of noble spirit, inasmuch as

they too had a share in valor and ambition.

Q In what ways were the lifestyles of Athenian and Spartan

women the same? In what ways were they different?

How did the Athenian and Spartan views of the world

shape their conceptions of gender and gender roles,

and why were those conceptions different?

Sources: Xenophon,Oeconomicus. Reprinted by permission of the publishers and the Trustees of the Loeb Classical Library fromXenophon, Memorabilia and Oeconomicus, Loeb Classical

Library Vol. IV, translated by E. C. Marchant and O. J. Todd, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, Copyrightª1930, by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. The Loeb Classical

Library is a registered trademark of the President and Fellows of Harvard College. Xenophon,Constitution of the Spartans, Aristotle,Politics, and Plutarch,Lycurgus. FromAncient Greece: Social

and Historical Documents from Archaic Times to the Death of Socrates. Edited by Matthew Dillon and Lynda Garland. London: Routledge, 1994, pp. 393–95. Copyright 1994 Matthew Dillon and

Lynda Garland.

(Opposing Viewpoints continued)

70 Chapter 3 The Civilization of the Greeks

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