Certainly there is no cause to blame Trojans and well-greaved Achaeans if they endure lengthy hardships for such a woman. In her face she is amazingly like the immortal goddesses. Still, even though she is like this, let her return in the ships, and not stay here as a plague to us and our descendants.1
THESE ARE the sentiments of the Trojan elders about the beautiful Greek queen Helen, in the tenth year of a war in which many of their sons had been killed and which was to culminate in the destruction of their city. The epic poem—the Iliad—from which this passage is taken is the earliest extant work of European literature; the dramatic date is 1184 B.C., the later Bronze Age. Without a doubt, there is no period in Greek history for which our evidence of the experience of women is more fascinating or as contradictory.
Bronze Age societies are reflected in an oral tradition of epic poems sung by illiterate bards. Succeeding generations of poets preserved the basic outline and formulaic vocabulary of the epics, but each gave his own flavor to the retelling. Thus, through the ages, the traditional elements of the epics have not only been preserved, but have also taken on the values, mores, and biases of each generation of poets. As far as women are concerned, this ahistorical oral tradition has produced a rich portrait—though filled with inconsistencies.
There were many epic cycles about the Bronze Age, several of which served as the bases for tragedies, histories, and other literature written by later Greek authors. Tradition tells us that a blind bard of exceptional talent, Homer, who was familiar with the legends surrounding the capture of Troy and the return of the victorious Greek heroes, shaped the tales into the monumental epics known as the Iliad and the Odyssey. Homer himself was illiterate. According to the most plausible theory, he worked in the eighth century B.C.; his poems continued to be transmitted orally by bards from generation to generation until sometime in the sixth century B.C. when they were set down in written form. Although the vagaries of the transmission of these epics need not concern us here, it should be remembered that, because they were oral documents, the Iliad and the Odyssey cannot profitably be regarded as accurate histories of the late Bronze Age. They are ultimately poetic legends derived from the actual historical event of the capture of Troy, but they are also poetic reflections of the evolving societies and cultures of Greece.
Of course, the personage of Helen stands apart in the Trojan epic—the most beautiful woman in the world, for whom a war was fought. But the Bronze Age legends are pervaded with powerful female figures,2 such as Clytemnestra, Hecuba, Andromache, and Penelope, who figure prominently in the war between Greece and Troy. Among the Greek queens are Helen, her sister Clytemnestra, and Penelope. Similar themes can be traced in the lives of all three. They were all married: Helen to Menelaus in Sparta, Clytemnestra to Menelaus’ brother Agamemnon in Mycenae, and Penelope to Odysseus in Ithaca. Helen abandoned Menelaus and sailed off with the handsome Trojan prince Paris. Led by Agamemnon, the Greeks made war against the Trojans for ten years in order to punish them, and also to bring Helen back.
This is the traditional explanation for the war, based on the apparently fictional belief that Helen’s father had made all her suitors, before they were even allowed to woo her promise to bring her back should she ever be stolen. But Greek historians of the Classical period found it incredible that men would fight a protracted war over a woman—even if she were the most beautiful woman in the world. Herodotus, writing in the fifth century B.C., contended that the Trojans would not have been so foolish as to fight ten years for the sake of a foreign woman. Following an alternative lyric tradition, found in the work of Stesichorus, a poet of the mid-sixth century B.C., Herodotus suggested that Helen was not present in Troy at all, but rather in Egypt, and that the besieging Greeks would not be dissuaded by the Trojans’ protests that Helen was not within their walls.3 Likewise, Thucydides in the fifth century B.C.—generally a period of depressed prestige for Greek women—did not recognize that marriage to a woman like Helen might have had political and economic implications. He rejected the story that the loss of Helen was the primary cause of the war and took the position that the Greeks fought the Trojans to extend their political and economic domination over the eastern Mediterranean world.4
Though a definitive analysis of the causes of the Trojan War is impossible from this vantage point, the significance of Helen and the other royal women of the Bronze Age in the popular mind—transmitted through the centuries as integral elements of the epic tradition—is undeniable. But the dramatic importance and emotional influence of women should not at all be mistaken for evidence of their equality; the political power of even the queens of ancient Greece was a sometimes transient, nearly always double-edged blessing.
Heroic Greek society differed from that of later periods in many interesting ways, which in turn shaped the roles of women within the society. Politically, the major concern of that time was defense: military preparedness and strength were vital for survival. Men served their families and citadels as warriors; women were expected to bear and rear future warriors. Thus heroic Greek society demanded that all mature women be married, and destined all young women for that end. In the Odyssey, upon meeting the princess Nausicaa, who is of marriageable age, Odysseus almost immediately expresses the polite wish that she find a husband and enjoy a harmonious marriage.5
Marriages could serve as links between powerful families. In the case of a marriage between residents of different localities, where the couple would live was determined by tradition and by a complex variety of economic, political, and military considerations which took into account the advantages to both parties to the marriage agreement. Thus the two patterns of marriage, which coexisted, were the patrilocal and the matrilocal.
In the patrilocal pattern the suitor brought back a bride to his own house, and the bride was used as a bridge in a new alliance between the houses of her husband and of her father. Brides were not purchased by grooms, but gifts were customarily exchanged on the occasion of a wedding. Hence Penelope’s father and brothers urged her to marry the suitor who presented the most gifts.6 Marriage by capture was a variant of patrilocal marriage. For instance, Briseis was enslaved during the Trojan War and became the property of Achilles. He referred to her as his “bedmate,” but she was led to expect to celebrate a ceremony of legal marriage with him when the couple returned to Achilles’ home in Greece.7
In the matrilocal pattern it was often a roving warrior who married a princess and settled down in her kingdom. The husband was attracted by the expectation of inheriting his bride’s father’s realm; hence the succession to the throne in this case was matrilineal. Sometimes fathers gave their daughters in marriage to notable warriors to obtain them as allies. Achilles boasted that he had his choice among the daughters of many Greek chieftains.8 Since the prize was the kingdom, the princess’ father often held a contest for her hand, thereby assuring himself that he found the strongest or most clever son-in-law. Thus Odysseus participated in athletic competitions with the young men of Scheria for the hand of the princess Nausicaa—although he ultimately rejected her; Penelope herself decided to marry the victor of the contest of the bow; and Neleus arranged a prenuptial contest for the hand of his daughter.9
In other Bronze Age sagas not narrated by Homer, the marriages of Hippodamia, Atalanta, and Jocasta also illustrate matrilineal succession to the throne. Pelops won the hand of Hippodamia by defeating and killing her father in a chariot race. Similarly, Atalanta married Hippomenes when he defeated her in a footrace. Jocasta married Oedipus when he successfully competed in the prenuptial ordeal of finding the answer to the riddle of the sphinx, demonstrating he had the excellence necessary to defend the royal house.
Marriage by capture or by contest were clearly two patterns in which the bride’s wishes could not be consulted. Homer does not usually indicate the bride’s views, but it was implied that Nausicaa would have some choice in the selection of her husband;10 and despite the attempts of her male relatives to influence her. Penelope retained the prerogative of choosing among her suitors, or of not remarrying at all. Clytemnestra and Helen freely chose to abandon Agamemnon and Menelaus, and their subsequent marriages to new husbands were regarded as genuine.
Though free choice of husbands was not always a part of Greek marriage customs, the matrilineal and matrilocal pattern of marriage did give the woman the benefit of remaining within the strongly supportive environment of her close relatives and friends, while her husband was essentially an alien. Moreover, the woman who became queen in her father’s land would seem to have been in a strong position compared to her brothers. There are alternative versions of many of our succession myths, but if we accept the stories that show that the throne could pass to the warrior who marries the princess of the realm despite the presence of her brothers—e.g., Helen had two brothers, Jocasta one, and Nausicaa several—we are led to suppose that the princess was a person of prestige not only to her husband but to her brothers. Familial blood ties figure prominently in many of the ancient epics. The power of the mother’s brother and the close bond between brother and sister—common features of matrilineal societies—appear most significantly in the Oedipus myth. Jocasta’s brother Creon ruled as regent between his sister’s marriages, and Antigone, daughter of Jocasta and Oedipus, risked her life because of her affection for her brother.
Knowledge of the marriage patterns prevalent in Bronze Age Greece allows us to return to the Homeric epics better prepared to understand the social and political functions that marriage and women as wives served in that age. For instance, the marriage of Menelaus and Helen was matrilocal and matrilineal. Since Menelaus is red-haired in Homer, it is evident that he was a northerner, while Helen was the daughter of Tyndareus, the reigning king of Sparta. Helen was the most beautiful woman in the world, and Menelaus naturally was insulted that she preferred Paris to him. However, we can be fairly certain—knowing the political stakes of a matrilineal marriage—that the Trojan War was provoked by more than Menelaus’ personal jealousy. Since Menelaus was king by virtue of his position as Helen’s husband, he might lose the throne if he lost her. Therefore he refused to accept the validity of her change in husbands and determined to recover her, as the essential prerequisite to his claim to the throne of Sparta. When Troy was captured, Menelaus could not take vengeance on Helen, although she had behaved treacherously toward the Greeks. Thus Helen, who was responsible for the war, ironically suffered the least. We meet her again in the Odyssey enjoying a mature married life with Menelaus. But Homer tells us that she knew of drugs that would cause men to forget pain. These potions, along with her fabulous beauty, must have been useful in regaining the favor of her original husband.
A similar pattern may be observed in the case of Helen’s sister Clytemnestra. When her husband Agamemnon went to Troy, he left Clytemnestra in the care of a herald. Incensed because Agamemnon had slaughtered their oldest daughter Iphigenia as a requisite sacrifice for the expedition against Troy, she got rid of the herald and took Agamemnon’s cousin Aegisthus as a new husband. Homer, in a formulaic passage, reports that “Aegisthus took her off to his own house,” but all the stories show them living together in the palace. When Agamemnon returned from Troy, they killed him, and Aegisthus, as Clytemnestra’s husband, became king.
On the other hand, Penelope’s marriage to Odysseus was patrilocal. She remained faithful to her husband for twenty years, but was besieged by suitors as though she were a prisoner in her house. Odysseus’ aged father was powerless, his mother had died, Penelope’s male relatives were not near at hand, and her son was immature. The plight of Penelope and Telemachus in the absence of a man of heroic stature in the house to defend them is comparable to the wretched widowhood envisioned by Hector’s wife Andromache. Andromache also married in a patrilocal arrangement and was stranded after Hector died. When she laments her husband’s death, she compares the life of her son to that of a boy whose parents are still living.11 Evidently “parents” really means father, for without a father the son loses his friends, his share in the men’s banquets, and the lands he stands to inherit.
Homer’s attitude toward women as wives is obvious in his regard for Penelope and Clytemnestra. Penelope wins the highest admiration for her chastity, while Homer entrusts the ghost of Agamemnon to describe Clytemnestra’s infidelity in reproachful terms. Even the virtuous members of the sex are to be forever sullied by Clytemnestra’s sin.12 This generalization is the first in a long history of hostility toward women in Western literature.
However, it is by no means certain that Homer’s judgments on Clytemnestra and Penelope reflect the attitude of Bronze Age Greece in general toward women. Above all, the Bronze Age citadel was in constant need of defense against raids and conquest, and in the politically unstable climate of society a heroic leader was requisite for its survival.13 The citadel of Mycenae under the rule of Clytemnestra and Aegisthus was far more secure than Ithaca in the hands of Penelope alone. Odysseus, whose intelligence prompted him to resist joining the Trojan expedition, returned from the war to find his palace in chaos, most of his slaves unfaithful, and his possessions depleted.
The problem of strong, effective leadership brings up the intriguing question of matriarchy during the Bronze Age. Although the two concepts are distinct, ever since the influential writing of the social philosopher John Jacob Bachofen in the nineteenth century matriarchy has often—and wrongly—been associated with matriliny. Matriarchy can be loosely defined to cover a fairly wide range of situations—from that in which women dominate men outright to a more or less egalitarian relationship between the sexes. Because of the aristocratic bias of Greek epic, the only formal marriages that we can consider occur between kings and queens, and within the Homeric epics there are only two instances where matriarchy seems possible. In the kingdom of Scheria, Nausicaa, in her determination to help Odysseus, advises him to approach and supplicate her mother Arete before he goes to her father, the king.14 In the subsequent narrative it is apparent that Arete exercises considerable power, giving judgments to the people and taking measures concerning Odysseus. No doubt in peaceful societies like that of Scheria, women might have exercised more influence than in a besieged city, where martial prowess was a more significant quality of leadership for the survival of a group. Still, even Arete’s prestige is only noteworthy when compared with “other women who keep house subordinate to their husbands.” 15
Another place where the queen may exercise power greater than or equal to that of the king is in the home town of Andromache, Thebe under Place. Andromache’s mother was said to rule (basileuō), although her father was also said to have been lord (anassō).16 Tablets from Mycenean Greece refer to a great king as anax, while a subordinate ruler is called basileus. On the other hand, Homer does use the verb basileuō to describe ruling by kings in other instances. Just possibly we have here a conflict between a tradition reporting the reign of a queen, and an addition by a poet who could not conceive of a female ruling a city. Yet, whether the example of a powerful queen like Arete or Andromache’s mother had any implications for other women in the domain is simply not known. No one would call Renaissance Britain a matriarchy just because of the reigns of Mary Stuart, Mary Tudor, and Elizabeth. Accordingly, the question of Bronze Age matriarchy remains the subject of tantalizing speculation.
Concern for the continuity of strong leadership probably contributed to the decline in matriliny by the end of the Bronze Age. Menelaus, for example, insisted on a male heir even though he already had a legitimate daughter. The succession in Ithaca was also ambiguous. Penelope’s suitors originally sought to marry her and succeed to Odysseus’ place as king. However, when Telemachus matured the suitors’ intent changed: they began to speak of either taking Penelope back to their own palaces or challenging Telemachus directly to assert his right to his father’s title and possessions.
A special pattern of matriliny occurs in the Greek epics—that of heroes who trace their descent through the union of a mortal woman with a god. In reality, the custom may have served the social function of legitimizing the offspring of extramarital relationships—a necessary response to the moral fluidity and personal autonomy characteristic of the age. The best-known Homeric example is Sarpedon, the child of Laodamia and Zeus. Many gods had offspring, and in general it appears that women of heroic status could have children outside of marriage and claim a god as the father. But that they might simply not be believed is shown in the non-Homeric myth describing the scorn heaped on the unwed Semele when she was pregnant with Dionysus, even though she claimed Zeus as her child’s father.
Matriarchal societies—in the sense of totally female, rather than female-dominated, societies—are described in Greek literature and art of all periods. The Amazons, a group of warrior women, were said to live in northern Anatolia, or even farther east in the barbarian world. One explanation of their name is that it is derived from a (without) mazos (breast). According to this fanciful etymology, they cut off their right breasts in order to draw their bows more easily. They resorted to men of neighboring tribes for sexual intercourse. Females were reared, but male children were sent away, or crippled to be used as servants. Many Bronze Age heroes are said to have fought against them, in all cases successfully. Achilles slew the Amazon queen Penthesilea, who had come to Troy as Priam’s ally. Bellerophon and Priam fought against them once.17 One of Hercules’ labors was to obtain the girdle of an Amazon queen. The Athenian hero Theseus similarly had to campaign against and vanquish the Amazons. According to Plutarch’s Life of Theseus, the Amazons even followed Theseus to Athens and engaged him in battle. Theseus married one of their queens (either Antiope or Hippolyte), but slew her when she became enraged at his plan to discard her in favor of a new marriage to Phaedra.
Whether the Amazons had a historical existence is unprovable. It appears not to be beyond the realm of possibility that exclusively female societies existed. Herodotus relates that the Amazons succumbed to the Scythians, whose historical reality has never been questioned, and that the Amazons and Scythians together thus became the ancestors of the Sauromatae. The Amazons yielded to the Scythians partially because they preferred sex to victory. Herodotus adds the interesting detail that the women were able to learn the language of the men, but the men could not understand the Amazons’ language.18
On the other hand, the fact that many Greek heroes had to test their strength against them leads one to suspect that the Amazons could have been either a totally mythical fiction or a group whose eccentricities inspired many false tales. Thus we find that Alexander the Great consorted with an Amazon, and that even in the twelfth century A.D. Adam of Bremen was still writing about Amazons living in the East.
Amazons appear frequently in the visual arts, where they are shown in short tunics of the type worn by the goddess Artemis, or in loose Oriental trousers, sometimes with one breast bare but never with one missing. [Plate 1] The figure of the Amazon was an idiom through which the Greek artist could portray young athletic females without offending sensibilities by suggesting they were Greeks.
There are many representations of battles of Greeks against Amazons, called amazonomachies, scattered throughout the Greek world. Often, as on the Parthenon metopes, an amazonomachy is paired with a sculptural representation of a battle of Greeks against Centaurs. The Centaurs were lustful creatures with the heads of men and the bodies of horses. There were, practically speaking, only male Centaurs, but no females, at least until the fourth century. Perhaps the Greek mind, with its penchant for combining symmetry and alternatives, may have fictionalized the two groups, the Centaurs male and lustful, the Amazons female and chaste.
Another exclusively female society supposedly existed for a brief period in the Bronze Age on the island of Lemnos. The Lemnian women had been shunned by their husbands because they were cursed with an offensive odor. With the sole exception of Hypsipyle’s rescue of her father, the women killed every man on the island in one night. They welcomed the Argonauts, who were passing through, and bore many children to repopulate the island. Like some Amazons, the Lemnian women were so delighted by the Greek heroes that they tried to detain them. However, the Argonauts ranked duty above pleasure, and continued their quest for the Golden Fleece.
The society depicted by Homer and his comments upon it clearly reflect a strong system of patriarchal values, but the code of behavior is less rigid than in some later Greek societies. In an atmosphere of fierce competition among men, women were viewed symbolically and literally as properties—the prizes of contests and the spoils of conquest—and domination over them increased the male’s prestige.
Women, free or slave, were valued for their beauty and accomplishments. Thus Agamemnon announced that he preferred Chryseis to Clytemnestra, for the slave girl was in no way inferior in figure, bodily stature, intelligence, and accomplishments.19 We see that contests for valuable women provoked murderous quarrels among men.
Interestingly, it was a quarrel with Agamemnon over a valuable slave woman that precipitated Achilles’ withdrawal from the fighting at Troy and provided the theme for the Iliad. The Trojan elders undeniably saw Helen as a worthy cause for fighting, though they recognized the cost of keeping her, while on the Greek side the loss of Helen spurred the soldiers not only to destroy the Trojans’ city but also to savor the rape of their wives in requital.20 In less monumental contests related by Homer, a skilled slave woman was offered as the prize in a footrace honoring Patroclus, and Eurymedousa was selected by the Phaeacians as a special trophy for King Alcinous.21 In the sense of conquest, an extra measure of prestige accrued to the warrior who possessed a slave who was once the wife or daughter of a man of high status. Thus, after the fall of Troy, the women of the Trojan royal family were allotted as special prizes to the heroes of the Greek army.
Generally, when towns were conquered or raided, male prisoners were either ransomed by their relatives or put to death by the victors, but women and children were enslaved (in this context the ransoming of Andromache’s mother was very unusual).22 Hence there were large numbers of female slaves in the camp of the Greek army, who were brought home to serve their conquerors in Greece. The picture given by Homer is confirmed by Mycenaean tablets listing large numbers of women and children, sometimes with their places of origin.23 The women and children are probably slaves, and males are recorded as sons of the women, indicating that they were born in an informal union. The fathers may have been male slaves, when such unions were countenanced by the owners. However, it is more likely that the fathers were free men who consorted with the slave women for pleasure.
The availability of slave women facilitated a sexual double standard in epic society. Kings were heads of patriarchal households which included slave concubines available for their own use or to be offered to itinerant warriors to earn their support. When Agamemnon returned to Clytemnestra after a ten-year absence, he fully expected her to welcome his concubine as well as himself. He had, moreover, kept at least one slave concubine in the camp at Troy. We are also told that Menelaus, desiring an heir, managed to father a son, Megapenthes, on a concubine. The fact that Laertes did not consort with his slaves from fear of his wife was considered worthy of comment: Laertes was partial to Eurycleia, but did not sleep with her because he feared his wife. However, Eurycleia must have given birth to a baby somehow, without incurring her master’s displeasure, for she became wetnurse to Laertes’ son Odysseus, and in her old age remained on affectionate terms with Odysseus’ family.24
Needless to say, women were not permitted the same sexual liberties as men. As we have noted, the infidelity of Helen and Clytemnestra produced critical political threats to their kingdoms. As is customary in patriarchy, the virginity of unmarried girls and their good reputations were prized possessions. Nausicaa slept with a handmaiden guarding her on either side, and Penelope and Nausicaa both took pains to avoid becoming the subject of gossip.25 On the other hand, the penalties for the loss of virginity were not so severe as they were later to become in Greece. Homer mentions without criticism two girls who had illegitimate babies, claiming impregnation by immortals. The girls subsequently married heroes, with the usual honors.26 A slave of either sex was actually the property of the master and was not permitted sexual relationships without the master’s consent. This restriction was in force throughout antiquity. Thus it is not surprising that after Odysseus killed Penelope’s suitors, he brutally executed twelve of his slave women who had been fornicating with them. Homer does not indicate that the slaves had any choice, but he does acknowledge that they could have feelings. The lamentation of Briseis at leaving Achilles for Agamemnon is famous. Less well known but equally interesting is the story of Phoinix’s quarrel with his father. The father had fallen in love with a concubine, and Phoinix’s mother urged Phoinix to have intercourse with the girl first so that she would detest the older man. He followed his mother’s suggestion, and earned his father’s curses.27
The same patriarchal structure that has been seen in the Greek royal families can be found among the Trojans, with some interesting minor variations. Women were monogamous, men were polygamous. King Priam had numerous wives and concubines, the foremost of whom was his wife Hecuba. In general, the offspring of concubines were free, but of lower status in the heroic hierarchy. We have noted, however, the efforts of Menelaus to bequeath his throne to his illegitimate son, since Helen had borne him only a daughter. But according to a tale told by Odysseus, an illegitimate son was allotted a smaller share of an inheritance than the sons of a freeborn wife.28 The fate of illegitimate daughters is not specifically indicated, either in Greece or Troy.
Thus it is Hecuba’s children—among them Hector, Paris, Troilus, Polyxena, and Cassandra—who play the leading roles in the Trojan myths. She had nineteen children, but Priam’s household included a total of fifty sons, with their wives, in addition to his twelve daughters and their husbands. Here we may observe an interesting combination of matrilocal and patrilocal marriage.
The value of the son in the eyes of both parents, a primary symbolic feature of patriarchal society, is emphasized in both the Iliad and the Odyssey. Penelope’s protectiveness of Telemachus is evident in her concern for his embarking on the dangerous voyage described at the beginning of the Odyssey. Similarly, she devised the contest of the bow when she began to suspect that her suitors were plotting against her son’s life. But maturity requires a reversal of this protectiveness—Telemachus first asserted his manhood by ordering Penelope from the public rooms of the palace, also indicating to the suitors his intention to assert his claim to his father’s throne.29 The dependence of mothers on their sons’ devotion to them is made clear elsewhere in Homer, as in Anticleia’s statement that she died not of illness but of longing for her son Odysseus.30 Hecuba displayed the depth of her love for her son Hector by baring her aged breasts in an attempt to dissuade him from entering battle, again when she entreated him to rest and refresh himself, and vengefully when she expressed her wish to eat Achilles’ liver after he had slain Hector.31
The strength of father-son relationships is clear, for example, in the immediate rapport that develops between Telemachus and Odysseus upon the latter’s return to Ithaca, even though they have not seen each other for twenty years. More brutally, the affinity between father and son receives Homer’s praise even in the case of Orestes, who avenged his father’s death by killing his mother.32 On the other hand, relationships between parents and their female progeny, for example between Nausicaa and her parents or Priam and Hecuba and their daughters, show less dependence of the elder generation on the younger.
Although women suffered disabilities under the patriarchal code, they were not considered inferior or incompetent in the Homeric epic. When Agamemnon and Odysseus sailed to Troy, they had no qualms about leaving their wives to manage their kingdoms in their absence, although Agamemnon did leave a herald to look after Clytemnestra. Likewise, in Scheria, Queen Arete gave judgments to the people, and her opinions were heeded. Hector was concerned by what the Trojan women would think of him, since his overambitious strategy had resulted in heavy casualties.33 Yet the dependency of women on men is unequivocally stated. Penelope’s need for Odysseus and her feeling that she has been besieged by the suitors in her own house are poignantly expressed when Homer compares her feelings on being reunited with Odysseus to the sensation of a shipwrecked person upon viewing land.34 This simile is a dramatic indication that Odysseus, though shipwrecked literally, has been more comfortable on his travels than Penelope has been at home with her suitors.
In Troy we see women in a besieged city and in an army camp, certainly a situation where women would be dependent on their warrior sons and husbands, and on other male protectors. Andromache and Briseis declare their dependence on Hector and Achilles as complete because of the deaths of all other members of their families.35 Andromache begs her husband not to make her a widow and wishes to die after Hector’s death. Yet Andromache reveals her strength, independence, and competence when she actually offers Hector some practical advice on military strategy. She tells Hector to draw up the Trojan troops near the fig tree, where the walls were weakest and where, it had been prophesied, the enemy would break through. Hector, however, reminds Andromache that war is the business of men, and that she should go back to her house and work on the loom.36 Hector was not insulting Andromache but stating a fundamental fact about the separation of male and female spheres in antiquity.
In their daily lives, royal women and female slaves were engaged in similar tasks, the significant distinction being that royal women worked of their own volition, while slaves worked under compulsion. The distinction between free men and male slaves is more definitely demarcated: free men may engage in the same chores as slaves, but only free men carry weapons and defend their cities. The duties of women revolve around the household. The Homeric epithet “white-armed” and Bronze Age frescoes that show women with white skin and males with suntanned flesh both testify to the indoor orientation of women’s work. The lady of the house managed the household. The households of Alcinous and Odysseus had many female slaves.37 There was a much smaller number of male slaves, and these worked outdoors. All food was prepared in the house by slave women and served by them.
Clothing was made, from start to finish, in the home, and in this task royal women and even immortals were engaged, as well as slave women. Mature women customarily sat by the hearth as they wove or spun. The hearth was in the center of the main room of the house. Thus, as the obvious examples of the Homeric queens Helen, Penelope, and Arete indicate, sitting by the hearth meant that a woman was totally involved in whatever was happening in her entire household. It is quite common to find a royal woman weaving while entertaining her guests, much as women today knit or embroider in public. In some instances, the ceaseless weaving acquires a magical quality, as though the women were designing the fate of men. Arete, though a queen, was able to recognize that clothing worn by Odysseus had been made in her own household.38 The Nausicaa episode demonstrates that even a princess considered the laundering of clothes an obligation as well as an accomplishment that would earn praise.
Women were also in charge of bathing and anointing men. Homer’s lack of prudishness is nowhere more obvious, for this task was not reserved to slave women, nor to females like Calypso who were intimate with the men they bathed. Polycaste, Nestor’s virginal young daughter, bathed Telemachus and massaged him with olive oil, and Helen relates that at Troy she herself had bathed and anointed the disguised Odysseus.39
Independent historical evidence also bears testimony to the usual chores of Bronze Age women. Tablets from Pylos written in the Mycenaean Linear B script list among the tasks of women fetching water and furnishing baths, spinning, weaving, grinding corn, and reaping. They also tell us that the food allotment for men was two and a half times the ration of women.40
Compared with subsequent Greek literature, epic gives a generally attractive impression of the life of women. They were expected to be modest, but were not secluded. Andromache and Helen walk freely through the streets of Troy, though always with escorts, and women are shown on the shield of Achilles helping to defend a city’s walls.41 The rendezvous of a boy and girl outside the walls of Troy is referred to.42 Wives, notably Helen, Arete, and Penelope, may remain within the public rooms in the presence of male guests without scandal. Not only concubines but legitimate wives are considered desirable, and there is little trace of the misogyny that taints later Greek literature.