CHAPTER V.
CONDITION OF MARRIED WOMEN.
From the spirit pervading the foregoing ceremonies it will be seen, that married women enjoyed at Athens numerous external tokens of respect. We must now enter the harem, and observe how they lived there. Most, perhaps, of the misapprehensions which prevail on this subject arise out of one very obvious omission,—a neglect to distinguish between the exaggeration and satire of the comic poets, much of which, in all countries, has been levelled at women, and the sober truth of history, less startling, and therefore, less palatable. To comprehend the Athenians, however, we must be content to view them as they were, with many virtues and many vices, often sinning against their women, but never as a general rule treating them harshly. Indeed, according to no despicable testimony, their errors when they erred would appear to have lain in the contrary direction.[[93]]
Certainly the mistress of a family at Athens was not placed above the necessity of extending her solicitude to the government of her household, though too many even there neglected it, degenerating into the resemblance of those mawkish, insipid, useless things, without heart or head, who often in our times fill fashionable drawing-rooms, and have their reputations translated to Doctors’ Commons. Of female education I have already spoken, together with the several acts and ceremonies, which conducted an Athenian woman to the highest and most honourable station her sex can fill on earth. In this new relation she shares with her husband that domestic patriarchal sovereignty, pictures of which abound in the Scriptures. How great soever might be the establishment, she was queen of every thing within doors. All the slaves, male and female, came under her control.[[94]] To every one she distributed his task, and issued her commands; and when there were no children who required her care, she might often be seen sitting in the recesses of the harem, at the loom, encircled, like an Homeric princess, by her maids,[[95]] laughing, chatting, or, along with them, exercising her sweet voice in songs,[[96]] those natural bursts of melody which came spontaneously to the lips of a people whose every-day speech resembled the music of the nightingale.
Xenophon, in that interesting work, the Œconomics, introduces an Athenian gentleman laying open to Socrates the internal regulations of his family. In this picture, the wife occupies an important position in the foreground. She is, indeed, the principal figure around which the various circumstances of the composition are grouped with infinite delicacy and effect. Young and beautiful she comes forth hesitating and blushing at being detected in some slight economical blunders. The husband takes her by the hand; they converse in our presence, and while the interior arrangements of a Greek house are unreservedly laid open, we discover the exact footing on which husband and wife lived at Athens, and a state of more complete confidence, of greater mutual affection, of more considerate tenderness on the one side, or feminine reliance and love on the other, it would be difficult to conceive.
Ischomachos, I admit, is to be regarded as a favourable specimen; he unites in his character the qualities of an enterprising and enlightened country gentleman, with those of a politician and orator of no mean order, and his probity as a citizen infuses an air of mingled grandeur and sweetness into his domestic manners. Describing a conversation which, soon after their marriage, took place between him and his youthful wife, he observes:—“When we had together taken a view of our possessions I remarked to her that, without her constant care and superintendence, nothing of all she had seen would greatly profit us. And taking my illustration from the science of politics, I showed that, in well-regulated states, it is not deemed sufficient that good laws are enacted, but that proper persons are chosen to be guardians of those laws, who not only reward with praise such as yield them due obedience, but visit also their infraction with punishment. Now, my love,” said I, “you must consider yourself the guardian of our domestic commonwealth, and dispose of all its resources as the commander of a garrison disposes of the soldiers under his orders. With you it entirely rests to determine respecting the conduct of every individual in the household, and, like a queen, to bestow praise and reward on the dutiful and obedient, while you keep in check the refractory by punishment and reproof. Nor should this high charge appear burdensome to you; for though the duties of your station may seem to involve deeper solicitude and necessity for greater exertion than we require even from a domestic, these greater cares are rewarded by greater enjoyments; since, whatever ability they may display in the improving or protecting of their master’s property, the measure of their advantages still depends upon his will, while you, as its joint owner, enjoy the right of applying it to whatever use you please. It follows, therefore, that as the person most interested in its preservation you should cheerfully encounter superior difficulties.”
Having listened attentively to the somewhat quaint discourse of the Economist, Socrates felt anxious, as well he might, to learn the result; for the lady, expected thus wisely “to queen it,” was as yet but fifteen. His faith, however, in womanhood was great; and Xenophon, who but reflects from a less brilliant mirror the Socratic wisdom, delivers, under the mask of Ischomachos, the mingled convictions both of the master and the pupil. The moral beauty of the dialogue, and its truth to nature, would have been lost had the lady at all shrunk from the duties of her high office. But her ambition was at once awakened. The obscurity to which, in the time of Pericles, women were, by the manners of the country, condemned, now no longer seemed desirable, and the love of fame was urged upon her as a motive to extraordinary exertions.[[97]] Her reply is highly characteristic. Running, with the unerring tact of her sex, even in advance of her husband, she desired him to believe that he would have formed an extremely erroneous opinion of her character, had he for a moment supposed that the care of their common property could ever have proved burdensome to her: on the contrary, the really grievous thing would have been to require her to be neglectful of it!
Men always conceive they are complimenting a woman when they attribute to her a masculine understanding, and they thus, in fact, do place her on the highest intellectual level known to them. Socrates adopted this style of compliment in speaking of the wife of Ischomachos. And I may here remark, that we need no other proof of how differently the Athenians felt on the subject of women from the Orientals with whom they have been compared, than the mere circumstance of their conversing openly with strangers respecting their wives. In the East, a greater affront could scarcely be offered a man than to inquire about his female establishment. The most an old friend does is to say, “Is your house well?”—whereas at Athens, women formed a never-failing theme in all companies; which proves them to have been there contemplated in a different light. In fact, the sentiments of Ischomachos, every way worthy the most chivalrous people of antiquity, could only have sprung up in a society where just and exalted notions of female virtue prevailed; for, under the word “high-mindedness,” we find him grouping every refined and estimable quality which a gentlewoman can possess.
But, perhaps, the reader will not be displeased if we introduce dramatically upon the scene an Athenian married pair discussing in his presence a question closely connected with domestic happiness. There is little risk of exaggeration. The picture is by Xenophon, a writer whose subdued and sober colouring is calculated rather to diminish than otherwise the poetical features of his subject.
By Heaven! exclaimed Socrates, according to this account, your wife’s understanding must be of a highly masculine character.