An Italian encyclopedia of women (www.enciclopediadelledonne.it) records a great number of women, from Catherine of Siena to Tina Pica, including many who have been unjustly forgotten. Yet back in 1690, Gilles Ménage wrote, in his history of women philosophers, about Diotima the Socratic, Arete of Cyrene, Nicarete of Megara, Hipparchia the Cynic, Theodora the Peripatetic (in the philosophical sense of the word), Leontia the Epicurean, and Themistoclea the Pythagorean, about whom we know very little. It is right that many of these have now been rescued from oblivion.
What’s lacking is an encyclopedia of wives. It is said that behind every great man is a great woman, starting from Justinian and Theodora and arriving, if you wish, at Obama and Michelle. It’s curious that it isn’t true the other way around—witness the two Elizabeths of England—but wives are generally not mentioned. From antiquity onward, mistresses counted more than wives. Clara Schumann and Alma Mahler became known for their extra- or postmarital activities. In the end, the only woman always referred to as a wife is Xanthippe, wife of Socrates, and then only to be maligned.
I happened to come across a piece by the journalist and novelist who wrote under the pseudonym Pitigrilli. He crammed his stories with erudite quotes, often getting the names wrong, writing “Yung” instead of “Jung,” and using anecdotes he had picked up from who knows what periodicals. Here he recalls the advice of Saint Paul: Melius nubere quam uri, “Get married if you can’t hold out any longer”—which is my advice to pedophile priests—though he observes that most great men, such as Plato, Lucretius, Virgil, and Horace, were bachelors. This isn’t true, however, or at least not entirely true.
As far as Plato is concerned, we know from Diogenes Laërtius that he wrote epigrams only for pretty boys, though his disciples included two women, Lasthenia of Mantinea and Axiothea of Phlius, and though he also declared that the virtuous man should take a wife. We can see that Socrates’s unsuccessful marriage had an effect on Plato. Aristotle had first married Pythias, and after her death became attached to Herpyllis, whether as wife or concubine is not clear, and he lived with her more uxorio, and remembered her affectionately in his will. She also bore him a son, Nicomachus, who later lent his name to one of the Ethics.
Horace had neither wife nor children, but I suspect, considering what he wrote, that he allowed himself the occasional fling, and it seems Virgil was so timid that he didn’t dare propose, though it was rumored he had a relationship with the wife of Lucius Varius Rufus. Ovid, however, married three times. As for Lucretius, the ancient sources tell us almost nothing; a remark by Saint Jerome suggests that he had committed suicide because a love potion had driven him mad (though Jerome had every motive for declaring a dangerous atheist mad). Later on, medieval and humanist tradition embroidered the story of a mysterious Lucilia, a wife or a mistress, enchantress or woman in love, who had asked a sorceress for the potion. It is also said that Lucretius had procured the potion himself, but in any event Lucilia doesn’t make a favorable impression. That is, unless Pomponio Leto was right, according to whom Lucretius had killed himself because of his unrequited love for a boy called Astericon.
Moving ahead through the centuries, Dante continued to dream about Beatrice, but was married to Gemma Donati, though he never wrote about her. Everyone thinks Descartes was a bachelor, having lived a busy life and dying too young, but in fact he had a daughter, Francine, who died when she was just five. Her mother was a servant, Helena Jans van der Strom, whom Descartes had known in Holland and kept as a companion for several years, acknowledging her only as a domestic. Contrary to certain false accusations, however, he had recognized the daughter, and it seems also had other affairs.
In short, assuming that members of the clergy were celibate, along with those who more or less admitted their homosexuality, such as Cyrano de Bergerac and Wittgenstein, the only great bachelor we can be sure about was Kant. One might not think it, but even Hegel was married—indeed was something of a womanizer—and had a natural daughter as well as a passion for food. Marx was married too, and devoted to his wife, Jenny von Westphalen.
One problem remains: what was the influence of Gemma on Dante, of Helena on Descartes, not to mention the many other wives about whom history remains silent? And might Aristotle’s works have been by Herpyllis? We will never know. History, written by husbands, condemns wives to anonymity.
2010