and not cause damage. Have you heard me or not? Or am I talking to a deaf woman?” (Lefkowitz and Fant, 28)This was furthered by Euripides in the Worthlessness of Women, 428 BCE. Euripides went beyond Eteocles. He said: “I hate clever women. I don’t want a woman in my house thinking more than a woman ought to think…” (Lefkowitz and Fant, 29). Euripides here degrades women as was the custom of Greek men of that time. Too often did men speak of these ideals and this perpetuated the polarization of male to female relationships But not all women were demonized. On an epitaph there is inscribed: “This dust hides Archedice, daughter of Hippias, the most important man in Greece in his day. But though her father, husband, brothers, and children were tyrants, her mind was never carried away into arrogance.” (Lefkowitz and Fant, 16) This inscription from the 5th century BCE shows how some women were remembered for good deeds done – and not just their duties as homemakers. It also recognized the humane side of the Classical Greek woman.Philosophers and philosophies were developed in the Hellenistic period that allowed women to join schools of thought that expanded their freedom. Education became available for an array of Greek women in this time. A little before the Hellenistic age came to be, the ideas of the loosening of social constructs for women were taking place that led to the foundation of other schools of thought such as that of Epicureanism and Cynicism. But these ideas came from a couple of the Classical philosophers. One example of this is a discussion between Plato and Glaucon. The topic of interest to these men was that of the education of women. The point that was made was that since there are only a couple of distinctions between men and women, i.e. physical attributes and things like pot making and bread making – although really only social constructs that forced women to be e...
