Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-mlc7c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-08T07:59:41.708Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

‘That Was No Lady, That Was …’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

J. W. Fltton†
J. W. Fltton†
Affiliation:
University of Exeter
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The tradition that Socrates had two wives at once, Xanthippe and Myrto, though an established one among ancient scholars, has met with blank incredulity in modern times. It impugns the character of Socrates, who has been established by Plato's martyrology as the unimpeachable patron saint of Western philosophy. And it appears to cast a slur on Greek marriage—not that the guiding lines of this somewhat ramshackle institution are perfectly known.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 20 , Issue 1 , May 1970 , pp. 56 - 66
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1970

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

page 56 note 1 Especially among philosophical writers. Among historians the position is better. See Jones, J. W., The Law and Legal Theory of the Greeks, 185Google Scholar; Harrison, A. R. W., The Law of Athens (Oxford, 1968), 15–17.Google Scholar

page 56 note 2 Zeller, , Socrates (trans. 1868), 57: ‘Such a thing is incompatible with the character of Socrates’. Of course the one thing missing from the vapid accounts of Zeller and others (e.g. Cornford) is any appreciation of Socrates' character: they are so busy making him chief knight in quest of the Holy Grail that his actual personality ceases to matter.Google Scholar

page 56 note 3 Zeller, ibid.: ‘(It) would most undoubtedly have caused a great sensation … the laws of Athens never allowed bigamy.’

page 56 note 4 Panaetius in Schol. Aristophanes, , Frogs, 1491 (commenting on Aristophanes' dig at Socrates' chatter): It is a fair inference that Panaetius used this strategy elsewhere.Google Scholar

In like manner Sappho was (1) a great poetess; (2) engaged in erotic relationships with girls. Therefore there were two Sapphos: (1) a poetess and (2) a courtesan (Aelian, , VH 12. 19).Google Scholar

page 56 note 5 e.g. Burnet, , Greek Philosophy, 129 n. 2: ‘The scandal-monger Aristoxenos tried to fix a charge of bigamy on Sokrates. He said he was married at the same time to Xanthippe and to Myrto, the daughter of Aristeides’. A fine piece of journalism on Burnet's part. The latter statement is false, as Aristoxenos said Myrto was the grand-daughter of Aristides.Google Scholar

page 56 note 6 Zeller, 58: ‘Now none were more celebrated for their spotless virtue and their voluntary poverty than Aristides and Socrates. Accordingly the writer brought the two into connection. Socrates was made to marry a daughter of Aristides …’

page 56 note 7 Wehrli, , Aristoxenos, 66–7Google Scholar: ‘Der Dialog [the ] sollte mit der phantastischen Erfindung wohl dartun, was wahre sei, wie darin weder dem Weisen kleinbürgerliche Herkunft noch seiner Gattin die Armut Abbruch tue. Fur eine solche Deutung spricht Plutarch Kara (Stobaeus, , Eel. iv 29. 22), wo der arme Aristeides an über Midas, Sokrates über Sardanapallos gestellt wird’. The latter reference might explain why Socrates and Aristides would be brought into the discussion, but not why they would be said to be linked by a marriage. If I understand ‘seiner Gattin’ aright, I take it that Aristotle is supposed to have said something resembling ‘Socrates married Myrto a descendant of Aristides’ as a (presumably whimsical) paraphrase for ‘a low condition is married to poverty’. Either Aristotle did say something resembling it, in which case he was lying and we are back at Zeller's position; or he made a statement about poverty, etc., in which case the followers of Aristotle were idiots to misinterpret it. I do not believe they were such idiots.Google Scholar

A further variant on the ‘parable’ explanation has been given me by David Harvey in conversation. Aristotle may have said: ‘If Socrates the perfectly wise man had married Myrto the daughter of Aristides the perfectly just man, what wonderful would have resulted’. This is about as plausible as one can make it. But (i) was the description of Myrto in Aristoxenos: this weakens the ‘parable’ effect; and (2) we are still assigning stupidity to the followers of Aristotle (not all of them hostile to Socrates) for being unable to distinguish a hypothetical from a categorical statement.

page 57 note 1 Two wives at the same time: Gellius, , Nocd. Att. 15. 20; consecutively in the Genos and in the Suda.Google Scholar

page 57 note 2 Athenaeus adds: ‘not Aristides the Just but his grandson’.

page 57 note 3

page 57 note 4 seems odd: John Gould points out to me that gives Socrates' reason for marrying, i.e. it goes grammatically with But the sandwiching of between and is awkward. Possibly read for

page 57 note 5 P. 57.

page 57 note 6

page 58 note 1 Plut, . AT. 27:Google Scholar

page 58 note 2 Zeller of course says it is spurious. Ross and Rose include the as a genuine work of Aristotle's.

page 58 note 3 Plato, , Phaedo, 60 a, 116 b. See Burnet ad loc. for the inference that Lamprocles was the eldest. At any rate two out of three sons are infants at the time of death, and since Myrto produced two of the three, at least one of the infants must be Myrto's.Google Scholar

page 58 note 4 is the phrase used by Plutarch and perhaps became In Athenaeus the reading is

page 59 note 1 In the Porphyry passage (Wehrli, fr. 51, quoted from Cyril) the text is uncertain but it is clear that Aristoxenos is being set aside as biased (and Menedemos ‘older than Aristoxenos’ is followed instead).

page 59 note 2

page 59 note 3 Cyril, quoted by Wehrli, fr. 54a:

Spintharos may have been the father of Aristoxenos: Diog. Laert. 2. 20; Sextus, , adv. Math. 6. 1.Google Scholar

page 59 note 4 Plut, . de Herod, malig. 9. 856 c:Google Scholar

page 59 note 5 Schol. Plato, Apol. 18 b = Wehrli, fr. 60.

page 59 note 6 In Theodoretus, Therap. 4. 56, Porphyry (probably following Aristoxenos) says that Socrates after a disorderly youth removed these characteristics by instruction and assumed the impress of philosophy— In Theodoretus 12. 174 = Wehrli 54b seems to mean ‘at first irascible etc‘in the first place’. The stories in Theodoretus 12. 175 (cf. 1. 8) about Socrates' naughty childhood and the turning-point at the age of seventeen come from Porphyry (and probably Aristoxenos): the framework is

page 59 note 7 Aristoxenos, fr. 54a Wehrli: Spintharos said (anger), Further on, the term is used, but qualified. With this, contrast Theodoretus' rhetorical summing up (12. 175), all without qualification.

page 59 note 8 Anon. Com. frag. 386 (Edmonds 3. 417); cf. Plat, . Symp. 215Google Scholar a, 221d (of Eros). This duality links up with the Silenus and Marsyas image; in art (Gardner, E., Handbook of Greek Sculpture, 398) such figures as Marsyas were used to express the duality of human and feral natures.Google Scholar

page 59 note 9 In Plat, . Symp. 215b Socrates is compared to (i) a Silenus (with a special interior), (2) the satyr Marsyas. The supposed ugliness of Socrates would suit only (1), as Marsyas in fifth and fourth-century art is (wild but) handsome. Socrates is disorderly and a charmer like Marsyas. At the same time, says Plato (making the best of it), he is restrained, not wild, inside. It is often thought that Socrates' appearance put people off; in fact it was an asset. He was accepted by Alcibiades as a lover before any philosophical conversion (Symp. 217a). His influence derived from his physical magnetism: that is why Aristophanes and others thought he was so dangerous.Google Scholar

page 59 note 10 In the Phaedrus especially. Sensual elements in Socrates' love-relationships with men cannot be ignored; cf. Gould, T., Platonic Love, 193 (note). It was of course an ‘ideal’ homosexuality, but ideal in the way that the heterosexuality of a modern marriage is supposed to be ideal. It is amusing that the ancients (e.g. Ath. 219 a ff.) thought Plato unfair to Socrates in telling scandalous stories about him. Plato the bowdlerizer was thus further bowdlerized and the process has gone on into modern times, ending with the absurd concept of non-sexual sexuality (which is what ‘Platonic love’ seems to mean).Google Scholar

page 60 note 1 Porphyry (ap. Theodoret. Therap. 1.8), presumably following Aristoxenos, said that Socrates was i.e. he had plenty of natural ability but was ineducable (there was a change at the age of 17). (a marginal variant in one out of the eight MSS. of Theodoretus, which is on the same cretinous level as for for in the Theodoretus passage quoted by Wehrli, fr. 54b. is read by Zeller, 64).

page 60 note 2 See above, p. 59 n. 1.

page 60 note 3 In this rendering I have taken the to divide women into two exclusive classes: either Socrates used married women alone (and no others) or he used prostitutes alone (and no others). The prostitutes thus belong to the period before marriage. But John Gould has suggested to me that the point may simply be that Socrates did not seduce unmarried girls. This may well be right.

page 60 note 4 One might have preferred and appears as a variant in Theodoretus (3 out of 8 MSS.). I suppose no one thought that Socrates took two wives in one fell swoop. So the text means that he ‘came to have’ two wives at once.

page 60 note 5 LSJ A. IV does not give quite this sense, cf. LSJ A. m (‘ordinary’ of things). Basically the word (as when combined with affable) means that a person associates with others, is not exclusive.

page 61 note 1 Porphyry's reading was (as given by Cyril: Wehrli, fr. 54a), which Theodoretus changed to (Wehrli, fr. 54b) to make parallel to I also take to be Cyril's (stupid) improvement of (Wehrli, fr. 54a, line 4) and not a MSS. error: ‘Xanthippe secretly embraced him.’

page 61 note 2 I am indebted to David Harvey for this joke.

page 61 note 3 Or perhaps an abbreviation for was expanded to

page 61 note 4 LSJ II: in Hom. Il. 24. 497 it is used of a concubine. There are of course many instances where is used of females attached but not married to a man, e.g. Hom. Il. 2. 226 (women in Agamemnon's tent).

page 62 note 1 The fourth-century attitude is summed up by Ps.-Dem. 59. 122: ‘We have courtesans for pleasure, concubines for the daily needs of our bodies, and wives to keep house for us and bear legitimate children’. Note that the passing of money from the other woman's parents to the husband meant that she was acquiring a status near to that of a wife (Isaeus 3. 39).

page 62 note 2 In Ath. 556 d Hieronymos is said to have quoted the decree; we do not know if any of the other authorities mentioned there made anything of it.

page 62 note 3 Jones, J. W., The Law and Legal Theory of the Greeks, 185, concludes that the losses in the war ‘led to permission for the legitimation, and consequent recognition as citizens, of children born to a citizen by a concubine openly maintained as such by him’.Google Scholar

page 62 note 4 Sparta is at the height of her power (1. 449), so probably not 424–418 B.C. A hint of war-weariness (1037 ff.), so later than 429; and if the (471) and arams (475) allude to the Cleon-Nicias rivalry, this pushes it towards 425–4 (as perhaps the allusion to Argos, 734–5; for Athenian overtures to Argos cf. Ar. Eq. 465–7, dated 424). About 426 B.C. seems a fair guess.

page 63 note 1 In the same ode we hear of Helen pursuing her other man Paris and so the ‘double marriage’ could mean one-woman plus two men (cf. Andromache herself). But here is specific enough.

page 63 note 2 The main obstacle to this view is the allegation that the Andromache was not produced at Athens but elsewhere (so Schol. Andr. 445); but this may be an erroneous inference (so Wilamowitz). I find it surprising in view of the pièced'occasion appearance, and the attack on strategoi 493 ff., esp. 699–700, which fits an Athenian context so well.Google Scholar

page 63 note 3 A wife without a dowry is practically a concubine: Plautus, , Trinummus, 690Google Scholar—1—people may say ‘I have given my sister into concubinage rather than into matrimony, if I give her without a dowry’ (cf. PI. Stick. 562Google Scholar, Ter, . Phormio, 650–8). Here the concern about the wife's position (expressed by ‘matrimonium’) may be more Roman than Greek.Google Scholar

page 63 note 4 So Burnet ad loc.

page 63 note 5 Theodoretus (12. 175) but in this passage Theodoretus is laying it on thick.

page 63 note 6 Aristotle, This may be Socrates complimenting his mother-in-law. Perhaps my mention of this passage will spur someone to devise a new explanation of the Myrto story as a misunderstanding of it. I do not see that any clear inference can be made, and it would be easy to imagine a context in the dialogue where someone picked up this statement of Socrates and went into the of his sons.

page 64 note 1 So Burnet, on Phaedo, 60 a.Google Scholar

page 64 note 2 Cf. the prostitute Hippia in Juvenal 6. 82, LSJ IV, etc. for sexuality. In Alcman's Partheneion the horse-image is applied to unmarried girls as indicating fine limbs and energy. The most frequent horse-word applied to spirited girls is (‘filly’). Socrates is said (Diog. Laert. 2. 37) to have compared Xanthippe to a spirited horse. In Semonides 7. 57 the daughter of the is luxurious and snooty.

page 64 note 3 This may seem unlikely if she obtained this name soon after birth—but not impossible as the colouring of babies can be to some extent detected or inferred and they do differ in docility and energy right from the start. Alternatively this could be a nickname adopted later in life: cf. Plato (originally Aristocles, called ‘broad’ from his broad shoulders or forehead: Diog. Laert. 3. 4); Stesichoros (originally Teisias: Suda s.v.). Or again it might be a case of ordinary parents choosing the éclat of a high-sounding name, just as modern English parents have a liking for the glamorous names of filmstars and celebrities.

page 64 note 4 David Harvey reminds me that the woman in Republic, 8. 549Google Scholar cd may be modelled on Xanthippe (v. Adam ad loc.). She is annoyed at her man's neglect of money (this is alleged of Xanthippe in Aelian, , VH 9. 29) and social position; she finds that he is indifferent to her and she keeps grumbling about him. I find this very likely, as not only is the woman like the anecdotists' Xanthippe, but the man is in the position that Plato assigns to Socrates, and the reference to law courts (549 d) suggests an Athenian setting.Google Scholar

page 65 note 1 Or, on a sceptical view, the inventor of the anecdote.

page 65 note 2 The lack of properly defined terms for man–woman relations in Greek texts is marked. In the relation to Plangon is expressed by such vague words as She is not called and I hardly think this is because Demosthenes wants to avoid giving her any standing at all.

page 65 note 3 Such paraphrasing is clear in Theodoretus in the passage following the two wives story (Therap. 12. 174 = Aristoxenos, fr. 54 b Wehrli).

page 66 note 1 ‘The two women joined battle with each other. When they'd stopped fighting they turned on Socrates who instead of trying to separate them just laughed at them and watched them’. The (usually) imperturbable Socrates is well depicted in this story (Aristoxenos, fr. 54b Wehrli).