Ladies of Bygone Times

Chapter III examines the treatises on marriage and women’s duties that pose as the work of Pythagoras’ direct disciples, but which were composed between the 1st centuries BCE and CE. The treatises appear to formulate a rather conservative program in dialogue, not only with Plato but also with the Stoics Antipater, Musonius Rufus, and Hierocles. Close readings of three treatises attributed to male Pythagoreans (Ocellus, Callicratidas, and Bryson) and two attributed to female Pythagoreans (Perictione and Phintys) reveal a striking consistency of expectations: the spouses must live in harmony, but the husband must always be in charge, and the wife must gladly embrace her inferior position and in fact welcome abuse (Bryson and Perictione). Nonetheless, the Pythagorean author-figure’s capacity for philosophical inquiry is demonstrated in these treatises on women virtues. The position of the female intellectual capable to comment on a variety of topics is further affirmed in treatises on knowledge (Perictione), music (Ptolemais), and human nature (Aesara). The figures of Pythagorean women are thus used both to assert the need for women to accept their traditional subordinate role—in contrast to some Stoic writings—and to acknowledge their intellectual potential.

Prologue

The Prologue considers early testimonies to Pythagoras’ teachings which present him as particularly interested in different subjectivities. Three strands of the tradition emerge. The first shows Pythagoras as a compassionate sage, who, according to a tradition (possibly humorous) recorded by disciples of Aristotle, might himself have once inhabited the body of a beautiful hetaera. The second shows Pythagoras as a man proficient in different kinds of knowledge, and an orator able to offer appropriate advice to diverse groups of people, including women. In the third strand of the tradition, women become subjects, rather than objects of knowledge, and Theano appears as Pythagoras’ counterpart.

Theophylact Simocatta, Theano to Eurydice

Zanetto 3 Θεανὼ Εὐρυδίκῃ‎ Ὁ φυσικός σοι κόσμος παρῴχηκε‎, καὶ ῥυτίδων ἐγγὺς ἡ εὐπρέπεια‎· σὺ δὲ παραχαράττειν ἐπιχειρεῖς τὴν ἀλήθειαν ἐπιπλάστῳ κόσμῳ τοὺς ἐραστὰς φενακίζουσα‎. πειθάρχει τῷ χρόνῳ‎, γραΐδιον‎· οὐ γὰρ εὐπρεπεῖς οἱ λειμῶνες ἐν μετοπώρῳ τοῖς ἄνθεσι‎. ...

Note on Text and Translations

Part III features the Greek texts and English translations of two treatises and nine letters attributed to Pythagorean women. Fragment I of Perictione’s On Woman’s Harmony presents a theory of harmony and gives specific instructions on how a woman may achieve it. Phintys’ On Woman’s Self-Restraint engages with the question of whether virtues are gender-specific and, indirectly, whether women should practice philosophy. Two fictitious Doric letters feature practical advice for a virtuous woman. In To Cleareta, Melissa teaches that a wife’s duty is to accommodate her husband’s wishes and refrain from excessive adornment. In To Phyllis, Myia offers instructions on how to hire a wet-nurse who will be able to bring up a healthy infant. Three fictitious letters of advice by Theano argue that women must show exemplary self-restraint. To Euboule chastens a mother for indulging her children; To Nicostrate advises a wife to tolerate her husband’s philandering; To Callisto instructs her addressee how to treat slave-women. Four playful late antique notes ventriloquizing Theano, To Rhodope, To Eucleides, To Timonides, and To Eurydice, engage with the earlier letters; as does Theano to Eurydice, composed by the historian Theophylact Simocatta.

Conclusion

The Conclusion brings together the views on the gender of knowledge as found in Pythagorean texts. The texts repeatedly consider the possibility that philosophy is a female as well as male endeavor. Because female philosophizing is always contingent, it is crucial to approach these testimonies with a mixture of suspicion and belief. Pythagorean women philosophers exist not as textual representations of discrete historical figures, but as tangled entities, straddling history and fiction. From ancient fragments we may create modern narratives of exclusion or inclusion. However, the persistent presence of women in representations of Pythagorean history bears witness to the Greek writers’ conviction that women have the capacity to contribute to philosophical knowledge and have done so in the past.

Ipsa Dixit

Chapter IV analyses five fictitious letters of advice from the early Imperial period by Melissa, Myia, and Theano. These letters (like Platonic epistles) remain in tension with theoretical discourses. The chapter offers close readings of each of them to demonstrate that Pythagorean women offer a subtle critique of medical and philosophical texts on a number of topics, including infants, the education of children, and relationships with slaves. This strategy is particularly prominent in Myia’s letter about hiring a wet nurse, which goes against the advice of medical writers and Stoic philosophers, but corresponds to the practice and advice preserved in Greek letters from Egypt from this period. More clearly than the treatises, the letters are concerned with women’s interest, while expressing confidence in the intellectual potential of both elite and non-elite women, making a strong case for women’s knowledge based on lived experience.

Pictures from an Exhibition

Chapter II collects and analyses the Greek sayings that circulated under Theano’s name, and briefly discusses the Syriac collection. It situates Theano in the gallery of sages and clever women whose personae were represented and repeatedly performed through chreiai. Theano articulates her program within a greater network of sayings and anecdotes, including sayings of clever courtesans, Sappho, Diogenes, Herodotus, and Spartan women, to then be deployed in intellectual games by men—and women. The chapter draws attention to the tactics of appropriation, allusion, and citation that connect Theano’s aphorisms to that network. The sayings allude to tensions between the Pythagorean and Cynic ideas about sex, marriage, and women’s education; they reveal a debate on women’s role as defined by the teachings of the two schools. The extensive Syriac collection is linked to a group of Greek sayings that present Theano as a universal sage whose pronouncements matter to men as much as to women.

Notes from Vaticanus Graecus 578

S 178 ᾽Επιστολαὶ πρός τινας τῆς σοφωτάτης Θεανοῦς‎ Letters to women from wisest Theano S VIII 178, 180; T 197; Hercher 606 No. 7 <Θεανὼ‎> Εὐρυδίκῃ τῇ θαυμασίᾳ‎. Τίς λύπη κατέχει τὴν‎ <σὴν‎> ψυχήν‎; ἀθυμεῖ‎<ς...

Letters of Advice

S III 160, 162; T 115–16; Hercher 607 Μέλισσα Κλεαρέτα‎ [χαίρειν‎]. 1. Αὐτομάτως ἐμὶν φαίνῃ πλέονα τῶν καλῶν ἔχεν‎· τὸ γὰρ‎ ἐσπουδασμένως ἐθέλεν τὺ ἀκοῦσαι περὶ γυναικὸς εὐκοσμί‎- ας καλὰν ἐλπίδα διδοῖ ὅτι μέλλεις πολιοῦσθαι κατ‎’ ἀρε‎-...

Treatises

T 142.17–145.6; Stob. Anth. 4.28.19 Hercher p. 688 (Mullach 2 p. 34) Περικτιόνης Πυθαγορείας‎ ἐκ τοῦ Περὶ γυναικὸς ἁρμονίας‎. 1. 1Τὴν ἁρμονίην γυναῖκα νώσασθαι δεῖ‎ φρονήσιός τε καὶ σωφροσύνης πλείην‎· κάρτα γὰρ ψυχὴν πεπνῦσθαι‎ δεῖ εἰς ἀρετήν‎, ὥστ...