More handpicked essays just for you.
The roles of Greek women through gender
The roles of Greek women through gender
The roles of Greek women through gender
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
It can easily be said that in the Greek culture, epic poetry was considered to be “male poetry.” The Greeks lived in an overtly patriarchal society in which women kept to the home doing more feminine tasks such as cooking and weaving, whereas the men did not have the same constraints. This left few if any opportunities for women to have their own aristeia worthy of an epic poem. In the Iliad, we are only exposed to a handful of women; however in the Odyssey, many more women become integral parts in the story but with little character development. This is expected because in times of war, the only women that these men were exposed to were concubines or their wives which both had little significance because they were preoccupied with battle. When the men returned to their homes, women began to have a larger role because the men were not solely focused on war. Many of the women have either a negative or positive connotation associated with them with little variation between the two. We have the vengeful seductresses Calypso and Circe to the unfaithful wives Helen and Clytemnestra. These women represent the traits that were abhorred by the society …show more content…
They allow the listener to become more sympathetic to the heroes. Seeing men interact with women brings out their gentler side and the audience is able to relate to the intimate humanity that only a woman can stir. Thetis clutching Achilles head and weeping over him as he has his spiritual death is a much more powerful image than if the bard were to use a simile to liken the experience to a dove being wounded in the air and taking its last look at the world as it hurtled towards its death. When you see powerful emotion emitted by a character because of their adoration toward another character, you begin to commiserate with their love. Homer capitalizes on this phenomenon to leave a lasting impression on the
Before we delve into the traits of individual characters, it is important to understand certain assumptions about women that prevailed in the Homeric Age. By modern standards, the Ancient Greeks would be considered a rabidly misogynistic culture. Indeed, the notoriously sour Boetian playwright Hesiod-- who wrote about fifty years before Homer-- proclaimed "Zeus who thunders on high made women to be an evil to mortal men, with a nature to do evil (Theogony 600)." While this view may have been extreme even for the Greeks, they were convinced of the physical and intellectual inferiority of women. Thus, they believed that it was better for all--...
Like in Gilgamesh and the Iliad, women help encourage and influence the protagonists to be the heroes and protectors they are meant to be. Adventures and wars
The women presented throughout The Odyssey provide a respectable representation of women in ancient Greece in general. There are several women introduced in The Odyssey, all of various backgrounds and social classes. The most notable women or type of women in this epic include goddesses, Penelope, and the housemaids and servants.
Sexism has occurred throughout history and has impacted women significantly.The Odyssey follows the narrative of a man and looks at love from the perspective of a man. The famed poem was written by an ancient greek man and until recently, has always been translated by a man. For these reasons, The Odyssey provides a great example of how love, women, and marriage have been perceived by society, especially men, in the past. By examining the sexist undertones and the perception of women and love from the men in the epic and comparing those to criticisms made today we can truly understand how far we have come as a society.
The Odyssey by Homer tells the account of the celebrated king Odysseus and of his great feats on his way back to Ithaca, much like the Epic of Gilgamesh expresses the feats of the great king Gilgamesh and his friend Endiku. These male characters are exemplified in their incredible feats and capabilities. However, many of these deeds would not be possible without the help of the female characters. The seemingly perfect male characters have their greatest weakness in women and many of their pitfalls are a result of encounters with women. The female characters in both the Odyssey and The Epic of Gilgamesh show how even though women both mortal and immortal are subservient to men in society, whenever women are pitted against men, women almost
In the Homer's epic poem the Odyssey, there are many themes that serve to make a comment about the meanings of the story. The theme of women in the poem serves to make these comments but also establishes a point of view on women in the reader. From this point of view, a perspective is developed into the "best" and "worst" in women. Achievement of this is through the characterization of many women with single notable evil qualities. Similar to the biblical story of Adam and Eve, Eve like the many women in the Odyssey brings about pain and suffering for mankind. Contrary to the depicting of women as roots of evil, the reader sees the other traits of women that are most desirable. The roles of these women are achieved by their portrayal throughout the poem. This in return has a significant affect on how the poem and the message that is conveyed.
As a result, these characters have significant religious meanings and serve as a form of inspiration to other women. This would mainly apply to those women who were in attendance. This would include women of all classes that simply wanted to watch a play. Their limitations amongst society can also be noticed by the amount of education that they are entitled to. Plato’s Republic mentions how the role of women is determined by the status of their spouse.
In considering the relationship between the meanings of myths and their representation of women, we learned that the major role in shaping the narratives was played by men. Myths reveal to us the experiences of women living in the patriarchal society and we gain the symbol value accorded to women and we come to realize what the term "Woman" meant to the ancient Greek man. Reading through the various stories on Goddesses and queens, monsters and more. Princesses, we learn that there are three major levels of women in Greek mythology. The first level is composed of the divine beings known as the goddesses.
There are many stereotypes of women, which existed hundreds of years ago and continue on today. Although ideas change, such standards have been heavily enforced on the female characters in The Odyssey by Homer. In this story, and during this time, there is a heavily enforced stereotype of women. They are supposed to be kind, smart, and cunning, and this is displayed with how they represent females and their roles in the story.
Throughout ancient times and even recent times, women weren 't always treated equally or fairly by men. A good example of women 's unfair treatment is presented in "The Iliad of Homer". Men ruled and made all the decisions and choices, while women weren 't as important. Women had no voice or action. Women were treated like materials and were even traded as such. Women were disposable and only useful when they needed to be by the men. Although at times the women in the Iliad were fought for and considered prized, they were still looked down on and unappreciated, because they were treated like objects, were looked at materialistically and as trophies, and their voices and actions had no value or importance.
This present scale is very vast, and this scale is directly proportional to the amount of times that each female character speaks in The Iliad. In the case of Briseis and Chryses, they have the most “spotlight” in Book One, and thereafter they do not have any more momentous appearances, except for the small mention of Agamemnon giving Briseis back to Achilles as a sign of submission to Achilles to persuade him to join forces with him again. Homer’s The Iliad gives the audience a mix of images of Helen to represent many of the gender roles and expectations of women in Greek society of that time, as well as to display why Helen as a character was so significant in the Trojan War. We see many interesting moments between Helen and other characters such as Paris and Aphrodite in The Iliad, and many of Helen’s characteristics give a certain twist to the generic Greek woman, contributing to the overall attitude that Homer has towards The Iliad.
The ancient Greek world was a male dominated society where plays were both written and performed by men, and women enjoyed little of the freedoms that men experienced. In spite of this many Greek tragedies portray woman as strong, powerful, intelligent, virtuous and noble. These qualities are especially exemplified in the plays written by Euripides and Sophocles and the rich characters they created. Works like “Alcestis”, “The Medea”, and “Antigone” all feature titular characters who show and embody the nobility and power of women.
In The Odyssey, the poem seems to be a man world and have women portrayed as a muse or siren that lures men “When Calypso, that lovely Goddess, tried to keep me with her in hollow caves, longing for me to be her husband, or when, in the same way, the cunning witch Aeaean Circe held me in her home filled with keen desire I’d marry her, they never won the heart here in my chest” (Bauschatz, 22). In the Iliad, it has similar connections when it comes to portraying women compared to the Odyssey, but not quite. The Iliad has women like trophies or prizes. Agamemnon was threatening Achilles of taking Briseus from him “but I shall take the fair-cheeked Briseis, your prize, I myself going to your shelter, that you may learn well how much greater I am than you, and another man may shrink back from likening himself to me and contending against me” (Bauschatz, 6). In Works and Days, the Women have a duty in the household and getting married “Don’t put things off to tomorrow and then to the next day; no sluggish worker f ills up his barn, and neither does a man who delays. It is care that prospers the work; Do-it-tomorrow wrestles with ruin (Bauschatz,
The poem “Iliad,” by Homer, is known for its violence between men during a war, but under that violence, is the different type of women who play a significant role in the poem (Homer 189). This poem’s narrative seems to show a male dominated world between the Greek commanders. This male dominated world cannot happen on its own, thus the different background roles of women are needed in order to make sense of all this rage. As the University of Michigan article How Do Women Make Their Way Into This Cycle states, “They are seen as the objects of both lust and domesticity, yet they are also used to excuse war, cause conflict, and display the power of men” (www.umich.edu). The focus in this poem steers towards the rage between the men, but this rage most of the time is inspired and initiated by a woman. The women of Iliad play a significant role in the poem such as war prizes, male hero partners, and women gods.
One does not need to go into deep, critical analysis to see that women are portrayed as very weak and servile in the Iliad. We have seen them being humiliated by their husbands, brothers, and even owners. They are often charged with tasks others would find demeaning if left to someone else. The chauvinism is everywhere and it is very clear that the role of women in the Iliad was that of a woman who needs a man to take care of her and keep her lying, twisted heart in check.