'A woman should cast off her shame together with her clothes': What women in ancient times really thought about sex
A new book tells the history of the ancient world through women. Here author Daisy Dunn explores what they had to say about their own sexuality – flying in the face of misogynist male stereotypes.
According to Semonides of Amorgos, a male poet working in Greece in the 7th Century BC, there are 10 main kinds of women. There are women who are like pigs, because they prefer eating to cleaning; women who resemble foxes, as they are peculiarly observant; donkey-women, who are sexually promiscuous; dog-women, marked for their disobedience. There are stormy sea-women, greedy Earth-women, thieving weasel-women, lazy horse-women, unattractive ape-women, and – the one good kind – hard-working bee-women.
Of all the women described in this list, which pulsates with the misogyny of the time, those so-called sexually promiscuous "donkey-women" are perhaps the most mysterious.
Historical accounts from the ancient world tend to reveal the cloistered nature of women's lives. In Greece, women were usually veiled in public, and in Rome, they had "guardians" (ordinarily their father or husband) to supervise their movements and handling of property. Was the concept of the lusty woman pure male fantasy? Or were women of the ancient world more interested in sex than is generally believed?
