This fact will not be without its importance in considering our immediate subject. In the first place, it will cause us to find in the early Athenian comedy two distinct ways of regarding women, which, while contemporaneous, have very little else in common with one another. The comedy of the school of Cratinus,[215] being concerned with public characters and with them alone, naturally ignores women almost entirely.[216] The comedy of the school of Crates, on the other hand, is very similar in its treatment of women to the comedy of the beginning of the fourth century, except that, in so far as the position of women in Athenian society was a less important one in the middle of the fifth century than it was some seventy years later, the female element is not such a pronounced feature of these early works as it is of the later.
A detailed examination of the treatment of women in early comedy, as far as such is possible by means of the fragments, will serve to illustrate the foregoing somewhat general remarks.
III. Early Comedy.
Cratinus, in that work at any rate which is truly characteristic of his genius, is entirely engrossed in public affairs, and in attacking the characters of public men. It is not, therefore, surprising to find that in his plays women are almost entirely ignored. The one notable exception is Aspasia, who is, it is true, alluded to more than once, and that in no very complimentary terms; but this is, of course, only what one would expect of an opponent of Pericles.[217] The poet’s views of married life are sufficiently illustrated by his Pytine. It is, however, to be observed that, in those of his plays which, from legislative causes, approximated more closely to the contemporary social comedy, the female element is more apparent, though even here it is never really prominent. Thus the Cleobulinae appears to have introduced a chorus of women propounding enigmas, while both the Nemesis and the Seriphii contained at least allusions to erotic mythological incidents.[218]
The other early poets of the political school are still more barren of references to women; indeed the fragments of Teleclides, Hermippus, and Eupolis,[219] put together, do not furnish a single noticeable instance.
It is otherwise, as already remarked, with the school of Crates. The fragments of Crates himself do not indeed furnish much of interest in this connection, except, perhaps, the rather risqué remarks in Fr. Incert. 3 and 4, but from Pherecrates there is more to be learnt. In the first place, three of his plays, the Corianno, Thalatta, and Petale, are named after Hetaerae, a common enough feature in later times, but rare at this early period; while the first two of these, at any rate, were evidently devoted to a study of the life of this class of person. Thus the Corianno describes (Fr. 1, 2, 3, 4) the drinking propensities of its heroine;[220] while the Thalatta gives one even further particulars, Fr. 7 describing the arrival at Thalatta’s house of her lover[221] (perhaps the Epilesmon, the “Absent-minded Man,” from whom the piece had its second title), and Fr. 2, 3, and 5 their supper together, while Fr. 4 shows clearly that a lover’s quarrel of some sort duly found its place in the piece.[222] Of the Petale no important fragment remains. Whether the Pannychis dealt with one of those incidents which are so common in New Comedy, it is impossible to say.
IV. Aristophanes.
The remains of Pherecrates, therefore, notwithstanding their very meagre character, supply ample evidence that, at this period already, some of the most popular characters and scenes of early fourth-century comedy had found a place on the Athenian stage[223]; but a still more interesting field of study is furnished by those poets who belong to the period of transition which commences with the decline of the Athenian power, and more especially by those who began life as adherents of the personal and political school of Cratinus, and were afterwards compelled, by force of circumstances, to identify themselves with a different style of art. Foremost among these is, of course, the name of Aristophanes. The earlier plays of Aristophanes contain few allusions to women, and throughout his works it may be doubted whether he ever introduced a female character on the stage except with the ultimate intention of leading up to some form of indecency. At the same time, since the fact that his plays have been preserved affords a better opportunity of judging of his views than is to be had in the case of any other writer of the period, it will perhaps be well to examine some of his characteristics in greater detail.
The first and, perhaps, the most striking feature in the Aristophanic treatment of women—a feature which is very prominent indeed in certain plays—is the respect which the poet professes to feel for women’s judgment and powers of organisation. Thus, in the Lysistrata, the treaty between Athens and Sparta, which is admitted on all sides to be desirable, can only be brought about through the intervention of a woman. Similarly, in the Ecclesiazusae, when the government of the city has fallen into a deplorable state, it is reorganised by the women, and their scheme of reorganisation is, we are given to understand, a complete success, for the time being at any rate. Again, in the lost play of the Scenas Catalambanusae, there seems little doubt that the motive of the action was an appeal on the part of the poet from the male audience who had not appreciated him, to a female audience which he expected to find endowed with better taste.