This, the first volume in the five-volume series A History of Women in the West, is an early work in women’s history and brings together chapters from a range of academic historians under three broad categories; Feminine Models of the Ancient World, Traditional Rituals Women Share, and Yesterday and Today.
The first section has Nicole Loraux’ What is a Goddess, on the theology of Greece in which she argues that the gender of deities as secondary to their divinity, Guilla Sissa The Sexual Philosophies of Plato and Aristotle, and Yan Thomas The Division of the Sexes in Roman Law, both of which are pretty technical and detailed and Francois Lissarrague Figures of Women which examines the depiction of women on pottery and in murals and what activities are shown.
The second has Claudine Leduc Marriage in Ancient Greece, which begins with marriage as a kind of gift exchange and fundamentally economic arrangement which changed with social evolution and the establishment of city states, Aline Rousselle Body Politics in Ancient Rome, which deals with the regulation of sex and reproduction, concubinage and categories of children, Louise Bruit Zaidman Pandora’s Daughters and Rituals in Grecian Cities, John Scheid The Religious Roles of Roman Women, and Monique Alexandre Early Christian Women.
The last section briefly surveys the state of affairs in this earliest phase of women’s history. Stella Georgoudi on Creating a Myth of Matriarchy, Pauline Schmitt Pantel on Women and Ancient History Today.
Although a great deal of excellent work has followed on the footsteps of these historians, and some of the chapters will be too specialized for most readers, this volume has aged very well, and I will recommend it as a starting place.
~ review by Samuel Wagar
Editor: Pauline Schmitt Pantel
Belknap / Harvard University Press, 1992
572 pg. Paperback £29 / $53 Can / $37 US
