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Dossier : Des femmes qui comptent. Genre et participation sociale en Grèce et à Rome

Onomastic Patterns of So-Called Hetaira Names in the Greek World

Modèles onomastiques des soi-disant noms de courtisanes dans le monde grec

Claire Taylor

Zusammenfassung

This article explores onomastic patterns of ancient Greek women’s names that have been associated with hetairai in literary sources. Often these have been used as source material for historians discussing prostitution in historical, rather than literary, contexts, but this is severely misguided. By examining the historical women who shared a name with a “hetaira”, this article argues that using onomastic material divorced from its discursive context (i.e. male elite literary discourses) to demonstrate the sexual behaviour and “respectability” of real women is extremely hazardous. The category of “hetaira names” is an invented one that reveals how discourses of gender, status, and power about women are constructed by both ancient and modern authors alike.

Volltext

1It is surprising that women in the ancient world have been identified as prostitutes based on little more than their personal name. Too frequently is it possible to read that historical women had names “suitable” or “appropriate” for a prostitute. But what is such a name? Literary sources, such as Athenaios (from whom fragments of fourth-century Athenian comedy are mined), Lucian, or Alciphron certainly provide names for the hetairai they discuss, and some of these names reappear in various places. In a number of cases, these names are clearly jokes, but others were names held by real women outside of these texts.

  • 1 It was written with support of the Alexander von Humboldt foundation. My thanks go to Violaine Seb (...)

2This paper1 explores onomastic patterns of certain Greek names which have been associated with hetairai. My aim is threefold: first I wish to demonstrate that prioritizing the literary evidence privileges certain kinds of ideological discourses which are not necessarily seen outside of the texts. Secondly I wish to shine a light on the historical women who shared a name with a “hetaira” in these sources in order to disconnect those names from the invented (modern) category of “hetaira names”, and thirdly, by doing so, I want to emphasize the hazardous nature of using onomastic material divorced from its discursive context to demonstrate sexual behaviour and “respectability”.

The Names of Hetairai: Some Problems

  • 2 Schneider 1913; McClure 2003, p. 64-65.
  • 3 Lewis 2002; McClure 2003; Boehringer 2015.
  • 4 See for example Castner 1982; Wrenhaven 2009, p. 380-381; Fischer 2013, p. 248; Kamen 2014, p. 151 (...)
  • 5 See also the criticisms of Boehringer 2015, p. 380-381.
  • 6 Davidson 1997; Kurke 1997; Gilhuly 2009.
  • 7 Herter 1960, p. 83-84; Davidson 1997.
  • 8 Cohen 2006, 2015.
  • 9 McClure 2006; Kapparis 2017.
  • 10 Kurke 1997.
  • 11 McClure 2003; Kennedy 2015.

3Even though the names given to hetairai in literary sources overlapped considerably with the names of other women,2 and although it has repeatedly been pointed out that it makes no sense,3 scholars persist in identifying women as prostitutes on the basis of onomastic criteria.4 There are a number of problems—conceptual and methodological—with this thinking.5 First, it ignores the ideological construction of “the hetaira” in the surviving evidence and neglects to connect the (literary) worlds in which this frequently operates with the day-to-day life of women. Research over the last couple of decades has demonstrated how hetairai are used as part of various discursive strategies by authors to think through issues of gender, consumption, or exchange.6 Whether hetairai are differentiated from pornai on the basis of their class,7 level of freedom,8 or celebrity, or whether they are conceptualized together under the umbrella of prostitute,9 it is clear that the precise meaning of the term was fluid, it changed over time, that it was a label applied to women not as a value-free descriptor of their job,10 but was used to comment on their status and behaviour, usually in a negative or derogatory fashion.11 That calling women “hetairai” was, in part, a way to slander them is clear from a number of sources, but we should not always assume that the “problem” was that they sold sex. In contrast, the term was used to position women outside of the norms of society and to comment on their respectability. The malleability of the term suggests that it could be applied to a wide range of women, whether they were actually prostitutes or not.

  • 12 McClure 2003. On the literary strategies of the texts having little to do with real women see also (...)
  • 13 Boehringer 2015, p. 384-386.
  • 14 McClure 2003, p. 7, 63.

4Secondly, there is considerable complexity in the naming patterns given to hetairai in the literary sources, which makes it difficult to characterize the names that occur there outside these texts. Frequently these names provide an architecture for puns and other jokes, sometimes aimed at the women themselves, but often aimed at men associated with them or within hellenistic or Second Sophistic elite circles.12 In some contexts, the names help to establish a literary persona; in the words of S. Boehringer, “an antonomastic character,” which has little to do with the naming patterns among real women and very much to do with complex constructions of knowledge, gender, and power.13 Indeed, L. McClure observes that the hetairai depicted by Athenaios often have multiple names, but these served not to provide historical information about actual women but to obscure it, and to commodify and fetishize them.14 These are decidedly not to be taken to be unproblematic indicators of common “prostitute names”.

  • 15 Goldhill 2015, p. 182.

5The names of hetairai in literary texts, therefore, construct a cultural discourse–and one that is predominantly rooted in Second Sophistic values and elite culture–that cannot be easily retrojected back to the classical or hellenistic Greek world or the activities of non-elite or slave women. This discourse functions in part by being deliberately depersonalizing, particularly when certain names are repeatedly reused.15 But as soon as these names are used as a guide to the activities of historical women in the ancient world, scholars fall into the trap of reproducing the discourses that paint women as either “respectable” or otherwise. That is, rather than shedding light onto the world of sex work, arguing that a woman has a name “suitable for a prostitute” depersonalizes the subjects of these inquiries further.

  • 16 See Robinson, Fluck 1937, p. 1-2; Peschel 1987, p. 74-79, 183-184, 326-327, 469.
  • 17 Lewis 2002, p. 107-110.
  • 18 Σεκλίνη (“couche-toi!” so Masson 1997, p. 58; Peschel 1987, p. 77-78): St. Petersburg B1650 (psykt (...)
  • 19 See also Hedreen 2016b, p. 263-264. Σμίκρα, he argues (p. 265-266), is a gender-inversion of the m (...)

6The problem is not confined to literary sources, however. Female names written on pottery, particularly in symposium scenes or with the description kalê, have also been taken to be hetaira names.16 Lewis highlights the dangers here: in order to read these as “real” names, depicting actual women, we have to assume that scenes are straight representations of reality when they are decidedly not.17 Some names recorded on pottery in symposium scenes are certainly held by women outside the world of the image (for example, Καλλιστώ or Ῥόδη), whereas others seem to be sending up modes of behaviour associated with sex: for example, Σεκλίνη, Ἀγάπη, or Συκώ.18 These latter examples are not names that women actually held.19

  • 20 So Robinson, Fluck 1937, p. 2, but see also Shapiro 2003, p. 96; Glazebrook 2016, p. 193.
  • 21 Kreilinger 2006, p. 232; Hedreen 2016a, p. 55-56; Hedreen 2016b, p. 262, 265. Also Kapparis 2017, (...)
  • 22 Frontisi-Ducroux 1998; Hedreen 2016a.

7Similarly, kalê names should not be seen as designating prostitutes,20 but in the same way as kalos names were used for men, reveal admiration for other women, were expressions of desire rooted in artistic conventions, or otherwise appear as jokes.21 That is, like kalos names, they do not need to be closely linked to the pictorial scenes in which they appear.22

  • 23 Hedreen 2016a, p. 66-68.
  • 24 As, for example, Masson 1990, p. 57-59.

8Names of women “in” symposium scenes, therefore, ought to be read as being just as playful as those found in literary sources, contributing to a similar range of complex discursive strategies that (e.g.) Davidson and Kurke identify.23 That is, they cannot be used as a reliable indication of the names of historical prostitutes, nor indeed their “noms de guerre”.24 These women have no agency here.

Patterns of Naming

9In what follows I will sketch the evidence for some of the names scholars have interpreted as “hetaira names” with a particular focus on the epigraphic evidence. That is, rather than being led by the jokes of comic writers, the punning playfulness of Second Sophistic authors, or the dubious suppositions of art historians in attributing status to named figures on pottery, I will concentrate on examples of real women who actually existed, as opposed to being (say) the figments of a comic poet’s imagination. I include therefore only examples of names recorded on funerary inscriptions, in dedications, or on other epigraphic material from the discussion below.

  • 25 See for example Taylor 2015.

10However, epigraphic evidence also has its own set of problems and issues; like literary texts, it does not form a singular “documentary source” or an unproblematic historical archive but–depending on the specific material–raises questions about commemoration, display, viewing practices, and materiality.25 With a few exceptions (e.g. manumission records), it is also likely to be weighted towards sections of society which were at least moderately wealthier, had a higher social standing, and were at least functionally literate or connected with someone who was. That is, it constructs its own discourses about gender, status, and power, but frequently in different ways to literary material. In much of this, the fact of recording itself preserves women acting in contexts where they seek to gain social recognition through dedication at a sanctuary, or through their memorialization in family units after death etc. That is, we might view some of this material as actively creating modes of respectability.

  • 26 Schneider 1913, col. 1362-1371: 140 of the approximately 300 names he cites are known independentl (...)
  • 27 Lewis 2002, p. 109.
  • 28 Assante 2007, p. 131.

11This is important because the notion of “respectability” is frequently gendered and has often been at the heart of discussions of ancient prostitution. One clear conclusion of K. Schneider, who published (already in 1913) a list of names held by hetairai drawn from the literary sources, was that almost half shared a name with (in his words) “respectable women.”26 But the idea of respectability is problematic, not least because it is so fluid;27 as the case of Neaira shows ([Dem.] 59), what is a “legitimate”, and therefore “respectable”, marriage in one context might not be recognized as such in another and women’s reputations (and livelihoods) were frequently attacked on the basis of their perceived behaviour. J. Assante is therefore right to point out that “a woman married according to one set of criteria may be considered a prostitute or courtesan according to another.”28

12We cannot of course, categorically say that none of the women noted here ever sold sex. However, equally we also cannot say, on the basis of this evidence, that they did. The fact is that names—suggestive, correlative, or otherwise—provide very shaky grounds for the identification of activities such as prostitution and, individually, offer no comment on the respectability, or otherwise, of women in the ancient world. The contexts in which they appear, however, do provide a counter-discourse to those that construct the actions of women as disreputable because they demonstrate the contours of normative behaviour. That is, if part of the debate about ancient prostitution is linked to discourses of gender, status, and power, then we also have to think about the different ways in which these intersect and the different contexts in which they are negotiated. Ironically, by examining the onomastic patterns of some names, we can do just this, but this tells a different story to the one some scholars have suggested.

Γλυκέρα

  • 29 Traill 2008, p. 33-45.
  • 30 His work is entirely constructed through Diogenes Laertius 2.113-20 and brief mentions in other au (...)
  • 31 Athen. 13.585c. See also Alciphr. 4.2, 18, 19. On the dubious tradition see Körte 1919.
  • 32 Athen. 13.585d.
  • 33 Athen. 13.586b. One of four fragments preserved of Hyp. 33: ΚΑΤΑ ΜΑΝΤΙΘΕΟΥ ΑΙΚΕΙΑΣ.
  • 34 Athen. 13.586c-d, 595d-596b, 605d.

13To some extent Glykera has become an almost archetypal hetaira name. Glykera is the title of a lost Menandrian play (F 96, K-A) and the name of a character in two others of his productions. In Perikeiromene, part of the plot revolves around the assumption that this character is a hetaira;29 too little of the text of Misogynes (F 240, K-A) survives to judge the role of Glykera here. In Athenaios, the name appears a number of times (and more than any other “hetaira name”): a witty thorn-in-the-side of the late fourth-/early third-century philosopher, Stilpo (of whom no work survives),30 the “girlfriend” of Menander,31 a symposiastic man-stealer,32 a woman mentioned in a lawcourt speech by Hypereides (F 121 Jensen),33 and the lover of Harpalos who was, according to Athenaios and the rest of literary tradition, better than she ought.34 It is unclear how many different women are represented here.

  • 35 Diod. 17.108.6, Str. 9.2.25. On the Alexandrian interest in hetairai, see McClure 2003, p. 44-45. (...)
  • 36 Hor. Odes 1.19. See also 1.30, 33. On 1.19 see Sutherland 2003.
  • 37 Luc. Dial. meret. 1.
  • 38 Harp. s.v. Γλυκέρα.
  • 39 Alciphr. 4.2, 18, 19, Tat. Orat. 33-4. On the latter see DeRose Evans 2009 who argues that these w (...)
  • 40 Aristaenetus I 22, Constantinus VII Porphyrogenitus De virtutibus et vitiis vol. I, p. 247, l. 5 ( (...)
  • 41 Goldhill 2015, p. 182.

14By the end of the first century BCE, there was clearly a tradition that sexualized the name, perhaps drawing from Alexandrian taxonomies of hetairai, but also from histories of famous men and the women connected with them: Diodoros mentions Harpalos’ Glykera and Strabo a Glykera of Thespiai who dedicated a statue of Eros by Praxiteles to a sanctuary there.35 Horace could even name the object of desire in some of his poems as Glycera.36 By the second century CE, Glykera emerged as a character in Lucian’s Dialogue of the Courtesans, coupled with Thais; here she has her lover stolen from her by Gorgona, setting the stage for Athenaios’ man-eater.37 Harpokration glossed the Glykera he read about in the Attic orators simply as ἑταίρα τις, and in this he is followed by Photios and the Suda.38 Alciphron invents a love affair between Glykera and Menander, and Tatian could claim, or rather complain, there were statues of prostitutes such as Glykera set up in the theatre complex of Pompey at Rome.39 Linking the name to hetairai continued into Late Antiquity and the Byzantine period too.40 Because of this long Nachleben, the name has therefore become a quasi-signifier of prostitution, not least because its meaning “sweet” is often thought to refer to a desirable characteristic of a prostitute, but in itself constructs its own discourse.41

15However, Glykera is also a common name, attested 70 times throughout antiquity, not counting those women mentioned in literary sources. It is particularly well-attested in the fourth century where it is the fourth most recorded female name and occurs especially frequently in Attica, which makes up 28 (76 per cent) of the 37 fourth-century examples (fig. 1). The name is therefore widely held by a range of women across the social spectrum.

Fig. 1: Chronological and geographical spread of the name Glykera

Terminus post quem
Region 4C 3C 2C 1C 1C 2C 3C 4C Total
Aegean islands (Aigina, Euboia, Lesbos) 2 1 1 4
Asia Minor (inland) 3 1 2 4 1 11
Attica 28 1 4 1 1 1 1 37
Boiotia 1 1
Caria 1 1 2
Crete 1 1 2
Dalmatia, Epiros 1 1
Ionia 1 1
Korinthia 3 3
Leukas 1 1
Pamphylia 1 1
S. Italy & Sicily 4 4
Thrace 1 1 2
Total 37 2 2 16 2 3 6 2 70
  • 42 Bechtel 1902, p. 44; Masson 1990, p. 132; Stüber 2009, p. 128-129.
  • 43 Names in Glyk- form 0.1% of attested male names compared with 1.0% of female names from Attica and (...)
  • 44 Γλύκων, for example is attested 148 times in Lydia (with one example each of Γλύκιππος and Γλυκωνι (...)
  • 45 Categorization follows the schemata of Stüber 2009.

16Deriving from the adjective γλυκερός “sweet”, the name Glykera alludes to a desirable character trait.42 Names in Glyk-, with a range of suffixes, occur in many places across the Greek world for both men and women (fig. 2 & 3). They are generally better attested within the sample of women’s names, particularly so in Attica and Thrace.43 In Lydia, on the other hand, names in Glyk- are actually better attested among men.44 Hypocoristic versions of these names (compare e.g. Γλύκων with Γλυκέριον, Γλυκωνίς) also appear more frequently among men (fig. 3), whereas Voll- and Kurznamen are better attested among women (fig. 2).45

Fig. 2: Names in Glyk- (Voll- and Kurznamen)

Male Female
Region Name Number Total Name Number Total Grand total
Aegean islands (Aigina, Euboia, Lesbos) Γλύκος 2 2 Γλυκέρα 3 3 5
Asia Minor inland (Dorylaion, Galatia, Kappadokia, Pisidia, Pontos) Γλύκερος Γλυκέριος 2
3
5 Γλυκέρα Γλύκα 8
1
9 1
4
Attica Γλύκερος 9 9 Γλυκέρα Γλύκη 35
14
49 58
Bithynia Γλύκερος 1 1 Γλυκεῖα Γλύκα 4
1
5 6
Boiotia Γλυκῖνος 1 1 1
Caria Γλυκωνιανός 3 3 Γλυκέρα Γλύκιννα Γλυκεῖα 2
10
1
13 16
Crete Γλυκῖνος 1 1 Γλυκέρα Γλυκεῖα 2
1
3 4
Cyclades (Amorgos, Ios, Keos, Paros) Γλυκωνίδης 1 1 Γλυκέρα Γλύκη Γλύκιννα 1
2
1
4 5
Dalmatia, Epiros Γλυκέρα Γλυκύρα Γλύκιννα 1
1
1
3 3
Dodecanese (Kos, Rhodes, Telos) Γλυκῖνος 1 1 Γλύκη Γλύκιννα 1
1
2 3
Ionia Γλύκερος Εὐγλύκιος 1
1
2 Γλυκέρα Γλύκιννα 2
6
8 10
Korinthia Γλυκύσπορος 1 1 Γλυκέρα 3 3 4
Leukas Γλυκέρα 2 2 2
Lycia Γλύκερος 1 1 Γλύκιννα 1 1 2
Lydia Γλύκιππος Γλυκωνιανός 1
1
2 Γλύκιννα Γλυκεῖα 6
17
23 25
Macedonia Γλύκερος Γλυκέριος 1
1
2 Γλύκιννα 1 1 3
Mysia Γλύκος Γλυκωνιανός 1
4
5 Γλύκιννα Γλυκεῖα 3
1
4 9
Pamphylia Γλυκέρα 1 1 1
Phokis Γλύκιννα 1 1 1
Phrygia Γλυκωνιανός Γλυκωνίδης Γλυκερῖνος 5
1
1
7 Γλυκέρα Γλύκεια Γλύκα Γλυκωνιανή 4
3
1
2
10 17
S. Italy & Sicily Γλυκερός Γλυκῖνος 1
1
2 Γλυκέρα Γλύκεια Γλύκα Γλύκη Γλύκιννα 4
1
1
1
2
9 11
Skythia/Scythia Minor Γλύκαινα Γλυκεῖα 1
1
2 2
Thessaly Γλυκῖνος 2 2 Γλύκιννα 1 1 3
Thrace Γλύκος Γλύκερος Γλυκέριος 1
1
1
3 Γλυκέρα Γλυκεῖα Γλύκιννα Γλυκυτής 2
5
2
1
10 13
Total 51 167 218

Fig. 3: Names in Glyk- (Hypocoristic)

Region Male Female
Name Number Total Name Number Total Grand total
Aegean islands (Chios, Lesbos, Thasos) Γλύκων 10 10 10
Aiolis Γλύκων 1 1 1
Asia Minor inland (Galatia, Kappadokia, Milyas, Pisidia) Γλύκων 21 21 21
Attica Γλυκίων Γλύκων 1
29
30 Γλυκέριον Γλυκανθίς 3
4
7 37
Bithynia Γλύκων 14 14 Γλυκωνίς Γλυκερία 2
1
3 17
Boiotia Γλύκων 2 2 Γλυκανθίς Γλύκυλλα 1
1
2 4
Caria Γλύκων 37 37 Γλυκωνίς 4 4 41
Cilicia Pedias Γλύκων 3 3 3
Cimmerian Bosporos Γλύκων Γλυκαρίων 9
9
18 Γλυκάριν Γλυκάριον Γλυκαρία 1
1
2
4 22
Cyclades (Delos, Keos, Melos, Tenos) Γλύκων 5 5 Γλυκερία 1 1 6
Cyprus Γλύκων 1 1 1
Ionia Γλύκων 31 31 Γλυκωνίς 4 4 35
Ionian islands (Kephallonia) Γλυκᾶς 1 1 1
Lycia Γλύκων 4 4 4
Lydia Γλύκων 148 148 Γλυκωνίς Γλυκιννίς 9
1
10 158
Macedonia Γλύκων 5 5 Γλυκερία Γλυκιννώ 1
1
2 7
Mysia Γλύκων 57 57 Γλυκωνίς 3 3 60
Pamphylia Γλύκων 2 2 2
Peloponnese (Arkadia, Lakonia, Messenia) Γλυκᾶς Γλύκων 1
9
10 10
Phrygia Γλύκων 122 122 Γλυκωνίς 18 18 140
Pontos Γλύκων 4 4 4
S. Italy & Sicily Γλύκων 6 6 Γλυκωνίς 1 1 7
Skythia/Scythia Minor Γλύκων 8 8 8
Thessaly Γλύκων 2 2 2
Thrace Γλυκίων Γλύκων 1
13
14 Γλύκερον Γλυκερίς Γλυκωνίς Γλυκερία 1
1
2
2
6 20
Total 556 65 621
  • 46 Names in Glyk- account for 0.15% of men’s names and 0.5% of women’s names compared to names derivi (...)
  • 47 Names deriving from εὐτυχής/εὐτυχία are more common for women than those deriving from γλυκύς/γλυκ (...)

17We cannot really conclude here that “sweetness” was a virtue particularly associated with women and girls because such names were held by men too, and many boys were named with this sense in mind. That is, there are regional patterns to the distribution of names in Glyk- which do not always reflect the idea that “sweetness” is a particularly desirable female attribute, although it is the case that names derived from ἡδύς are held more commonly by women than men.46 Indeed, other Wunschnamen, for example those that wish for success or fortune, are more popular among women.47

  • 48 To Artemis (Brauron): IG II2 1514.20, 1515.12, 1522.17; (Oropos): IOrop. 357. To Asklepios (Athens (...)
  • 49 IEph. 2313 (Ephesos); IG II2 11012 (Athens); IG IV (1) 140 (Aigina).
  • 50 Mothers: SEG 23.147 (Attica); SEG 38.1418 (Pergê); IMilet 1 (3) 34.12 (Miletos). Wives: SEG 54.778 (...)
  • 51 Citizens: SEG 26.279 (Athens). Metics: IG II2 9061, 9044, 8608, 8609, 9476; SEG 23.147 (Athens). F (...)
  • 52 SEG 28.353.
  • 53 SEG 40.267, 49.321.
  • 54 See also McClure 2003, p. 40.

18Women named Glykera appear in a wide range of activities: they dedicate in sanctuaries,48 are commemorated in death within family groups,49 are represented as mothers, wives and daughters,50 have the status of citizens and metics, freedwomen and new citizens.51 They are loved52 and they are cursed.53 We cannot tell, from the evidence of names alone, the sexual behaviour of these women, but the weight of this evidence suggests that this is not a “hetaira name”, but an entirely normal name commonly held by women of a variety of different statuses and in a wide array of contexts. That women named Glykera appear in fourth-century comedy as hetairai probably indicates less that this is an appropriate name for a prostitute and more that it was a common contemporary name that many women in Athens held and could therefore be mined for jokes.54 That the name developed to have sexual connotations over the course of antiquity demonstrates nothing more than the spread of a literary tradition. Unlike the epigraphic evidence, it tells us nothing about the women who held these names.

Μαλθάκη

  • 55 Cohen 2015, p. 146.
  • 56 Theophilos F 11 K-A (= Athen. 13.587f), Luc. Rh. Pr. 13.

19Like Glykera, Malthakê is, according to Cohen, a “name appropriate for a Greek prostitute.”55 Mentioned by Athenaios in a list of hetairai quoted from Theophilos’ play Philaulos (of which only 14 lines in two fragments survive) and appearing as a (probably) free, citizen character in Menander’s Sikyonians, it seems to be Lucian who originates the pairing of Glykera with Malthakê.56 They appear here together, along with Thais, as comic figures and effeminizing to men. Their names are evoked in this text, therefore, as typical hetaira names, although it is Glykera and Thais who appear together in the Dialogues of the Courtesans.

  • 57 Cohen 2015, p. 58. See also Davidson 1997, p. 331, n. 50.
  • 58 See principally Davidson 1997; Wrenhaven 2009; Fischer 2013; Cohen 2015.
  • 59 Glykera: IG II2 1558.87-9; Malthakê: IG II2 1558.66-76. On the reading of pais/paidion as “child”, (...)

20For both Wrenhaven and Cohen, the appearance of these names among the freed slaves of the late fourth-century Athenian phialai exeleutherikai inscriptions is proof of their work as prostitutes. “Glykera (‘Sweetie’) and Malthakê (‘Softie’),” E.E. Cohen says, are “typical Athenian designations for sex-workers.”57 His argument is based on the large numbers of talasiourgoi (wool-workers) who appear in these inscriptions and scholarly desires to connect wool-working with prostitution.58 This in itself shows an astonishing reluctance to view economically active women as anything other than prostitutes. Here I want to point out that this claim does not even stand on onomastic terms. From the 29 women recorded as talasiourgoi, there is actually only one named Malthakê and only one Glykera: Glykera was freed by Phylaxias son of Phanias of Anagyrous; we know nothing more about her. Malthakê, however, was a talasiourgos who was freed alongside a pulse-seller (ospriopolês) named Attas, and three children (paidia), Plangôn, Moschos, and Aristonikê. That they lived in the same deme (Keiriadai), were freed by the same owner (Menitês son of Menôn of Kydathenaion), and appear on the inscription as a unit suggests that this is a family freed together.59

  • 60 Wrenhaven 2009, p. 380.
  • 61 Vlassopoulos 2010, 2015.

21Similarly, Wrenhaven views Glykera and Malthakê, along with Ῥoδία and Χρυσίς, as “suitable [names] for prostitutes.”60 But, like Glykera and Malthakê, Rhodia and Chrysis also only appear once in these inscriptions; that is, of the 86 female slaves/freedwomen recorded here, only 4 have names which were “suitable for prostitutes”. The fact is that the women who are recorded on these inscriptions fit the patterns K. Vlassopoulos observed for slave names in general: that is, they are difficult to distinguish from names of free women and often reflect the status or profession held by that slave.61 In fact, of the female names recorded on the phialai exeleutherikai inscriptions, 10 appear in the top 40 most frequently attested names of fourth-century Athens (fig. 4); note in particular how popular Glykera and Malthakê are. If anything, then, these names demonstrate–as K. Vlassopoulos has shown–strategies of integration developed by slaves and freedwomen in Athens. This suggests that the identification of these women as prostitutes on the basis of their names is seriously off the mark.

Fig. 4: Most attested female names, Athens, fourth century BCE

Not including the phialai exeleutherikai inscriptions Including the phialai exeleutherikai inscriptions
Rank position Name Number attested Number attested Total Rank position
1 Ἀριστομάχη 38 38 1
2 Ἀρχεστράτη 35 35 3
3 Φιλουμένη 34 2 36 2
Μυρρίνη 34 34 4
4 Εὐκολίνη 32 32 5
Καλλιστώ 32 32 5
5 Δημοστράτη 31 31 6
6 Φίλη 30 30 7
7 Σωστράτη 29 2 31 6
8 Γλυκέρα 27 1 28 8
Καλλιστράτη 27 27 9
Χαιρεστράτη 27 27 9
9 ῾Ηδύλη 25 25 11
Ἀρχίππη 25 25 11
Μαλθάκη 25 1 26 10
10 Δημητρία 24 4 28 8
11 Λυσιμάχη 22 22 12
Λυσιστράτη 22 22 12
12 Καλλιστομάχη 21 21 13
13 Ἀριστονίκη 19 1 20 14
Μνησιστράτη 19 19 15
14 Ἀρισταγόρα 18 18 16
Νικοστράτη 18 18 16
Φαναγόρα 18 18 16
Φανοστράτη 18 18 16
15 Παμφίλη 17 1 18 16
16 ῾Ηδίστη 16 1 17 17
Μέλιττα 16 1 17 17
Νικομάχη 16 16 18
17 Νικαρέτη 15 15 19
18 Πλαγγών 14 2 16 18
Πλαθάνη 14 14 20
Χαιρίππη 14 14 20
19 Εὔκλεια 13 13 21
Εὐφροσύνη 13 13 21
Φιλία 13 13 21
20 Ἀριστόκλεια 12 12 22
Θεανώ 12 12 22
Μνησαρέτη 12 12 22
Ναυσιστράτη 12 12 22
Τιμοστράτη 12 12 22
  • 62 Bechtel 1902, p. 45: “der Name rühmt die weiche Haut”. See also Stüber 2009, p. 128: “ ‘weich’, wo (...)
  • 63 Names that describe physical characteristics do indeed occur fairly regularly. See for example the (...)
  • 64 See also McClure 2003, p. 64.

22The name Malthakê derives from the adjective malthakos (“soft,” “mild,” “gentle”), and has been read since Bechtel as an example of a corporal name, describing the physical attributes of a woman’s body.62 But whilst corporal names that describe physical characteristics are relatively well-attested (albeit not as common as theophoric or composite names), no other Athenian name (to my knowledge) exudes tactile, as opposed to visual, properties.63 In literary texts that make jokes about sex, punning on the double meaning of malthakos is no doubt all part of the fun and the fact that few male names exist that derive from either malthakos or malakos suggests that it evoked certain aspects that were typically associated with femininity. But surely, for parents naming their daughters, it can equally refer to the gentleness or tenderness of a character–a highly desired attribute in a child.64 In this sense it is a Wunschname denoting character, much like Glykera, rather than a corporal name evoking physicality.

  • 65 Of the 33 attested examples, only two are non-Athenian: IG XII Suppl. no 263 (Andros, first half o (...)
  • 66 Brauron: IG II2 1515.12-13, 1529.316, 1517.9; Asklepieion: IG II2 1533.96, 110, 113, 1539.14; IG I (...)
  • 67 IG II2 1529.316. See Davies 1971, p. 343: her husband was a trierarch.
  • 68 IG XII (5) 946. On the family see further Stavrianopoulou 2006, p. 146-149.
  • 69 IG II2 1515.12-13. Could they be the same woman? It is possible but perhaps less likely than the a (...)
  • 70 IG II2 2682. On dotal horoi see now Harris 2013, p. 136 who argues that the horoi reflect a broade (...)

23Like women called Glykera, women named Malthakê are a particularly Athenian, and predominantly fourth- or early third-century phenomenon.65 They are recorded making dedications at Brauron and the Asklepieion at Athens.66 At least one—Malthakê, daughter of Moschos and wife of Leôsthenês—was a member of the Athenian elite, which indicates that this name is not just for the marginalized.67 She dedicated a chitoniskos with a purple border at Brauron, no doubt an expensive dedication given the cost (and status) of purple dye in the ancient world. Another was a member of one of the richest families on Tenos in the first or second century CE, active in making financial donations to the citizens of the island.68 But there is also evidence that other women called Malthakê were not poor. Another (probably different) Malthakê at Brauron dedicated a purple chitoniskos, patterned all over in a case together with Thyain[ê?], who is presumably a relative.69 Leôstratos of Alôpekê raised money for his daughter Malthakê’s marriage, by mortgaging some of his property.70 Even if these are not the actions of the highest echelons of the elite, these are families with disposable property and/or a position in society to maintain.

  • 71 Reliefs attached to tablets: IG II3 (1) 898.67 (dedicated by Malthakê, wife of Lyandros. See also (...)
  • 72 As pointed out by Aleshire 1989, p. 67.
  • 73 See in general Goff 2004, p. 44-51.
  • 74 Citizens: see nn. 66 and 67 above; also IG II2 7231: the daughter of Dêmokratês of Pithos and wife (...)
  • 75 IG II2 11029, 11342, 12171 (with two men), 11118 (with a man and a woman), 11585 (with a woman), 1 (...)

24The dedications at the Asklepieion include reliefs attached to tablets, a model finger, a cup, and something weighing 20 dr.71 There is nothing unusual about these dedications and there is no reason to think that they come from hetairai.72 Rather, they are dedications made by women fulfilling acts of piety.73 There are, therefore, women named Malthakê who have high social standing and who are citizens as well as women with lower status and who were slaves, freedwomen, or metics.74 They are frequently recorded as being part of families.75

25That is, rather than providing evidence for disreputable behaviour, the activities recorded of the large number of women named Malthakê, in fact, in themselves construct the parameters of respectability.

Ἀφροδισία

  • 76 Cohen 2015, p. 52; Cohen 2016, p. 722.

26Aphrodisia is among the top 15 most attested female name in the corpus of Greek onomastics (fig. 5) yet still considered by E.E. Cohen to be “appropriate to prostitutes”.76 It is particularly well documented in the late hellenistic/Roman period which accounts for 108 of the 228 examples and is commonly attested in Attica (40 examples, about a quarter of which are fourth century), Caria (14 examples, 10 of which are from Miletos), and Southern Italy (16 examples, half of which are from Puteoli). The recent publication of IG XII (4) shows it is also well attested in Kos (12 examples). It also appears 17 times in inland Asia Minor.

Fig. 5: Top 15 most attested female names in Antiquity

Rank position

Name

Number attested

1

Ἀμμία

450

2

῎Αρτεμις

380

3

Ἐλπίς

358

4

Ζωσίμη

334

5

Στρατονίκη

319

6

Νίκη

297

7

Δόμνα

285

8

Δημητρία

236

9

Ἀρτεμισία

235

10

Κλεοπάτρα

232

11

Ἀφροδισία

228

12

Εἰρήνη

219

13

Ἰουλία

217

14

Εὐτυχία

215

15

Τύχη

212

  • 77 IBouthrot. 19.7 where Aphrodisia manumits Nikolaos along with Artemôn and Artemô (a family group?) (...)
  • 78 IBouthrot. 17.30, 26.4, 43.36, 48.8; possibly also IBouthrot. 40.12. See also IBouthrot. 15.17 for (...)
  • 79 IBouthrot. 30.11: with Parmeniskos; IBouthrot. 25.19-21: with two women (Erôtis, Sôtêris) and four (...)
  • 80 FD III 3.287.

27Aphrodisia is the most frequently attested name among the female slaves freed at both second-century BCE Bouthrotos and on the Delphi manumission inscriptions. This probably reflects the general popularity of the name during this period rather than being a name particularly relevant to slaves given that it also belongs to slave owners in both places too.77 At least four of the freedwomen in Bouthrotos were individual slaves freed by families,78 but women named Aphrodisia are also freed as part of bigger groups too.79 In Delphi a woman named Aphrodisia frees a slave of the same name.80

  • 81 That is, more than 200 times more than would be expected if the sample was evenly distributed.
  • 82 Parker 2000, p. 64. Figure 6 adjusts for sample size in each century. Artemisia is consistently be (...)

28Aphrodisia is a theophoric name and, as noted, these are fairly common; Demetria, Artemisia, and Dionysia are all among the best documented female names across the ancient Greek world and are frequently attested in Asia Minor in particular. Together they account for 2 per cent of all the female names recorded.81 Although theophoric names are generally more common among men than women, Parker was correct to speculate that Aphrodisia was more common than Aphrodisios in the late hellenistic period; during this time it is the third most frequently attested female name whereas Aphrodisios is better attested in the Roman period (fig. 6).82 The diminutive Ἀφροδιτώ, by contrast, is attested most frequently in Macedonia in the Roman period (11 out of 14 examples come from that region).

  • 83 Pirenne-Delforge 1994.

29It would be a mistake to associate the name Aphrodisia with the sexual aspects of the goddess Aphrodite given that Aphrodite worship encompassed a great deal more than this.83 Indeed, the name does not appear in Athenaios as one of the 142 names he gives to hetairai. In fact, it does not appear anywhere in Greek literature in any obvious connection with hetairai. That is, although it might seem to modern audiences that the name Aphrodisia is connected with sex, it is not at all clear that ancient audiences would have found the same (and singular) resonance.

Ῥοδῶπις and Νέαιρα

  • 84 There is a Νεαρά recorded on a funerary inscription of the second half of the fourth century: IG I (...)

30Two of the most famous hetairai from the literary sources, Neaira ([Dem.] 59) and Rhodôpis (Hdt. 2.134-5), have names that are barely—if at all—attested outside of the world of the imaginary. Outside of the famous law court speech, Νέαιρα is attested only three times throughout antiquity, not before the second century BCE, and never—[Demosthenes] 59 aside—in Athens.84 This makes it as common a name as Κακίς, Ζαικα, or Γαμέτη. No doubt this made her seem all the more foreign to the Athenian jurors.

  • 85 Pace McClure 2003, p. 67 who claims it is found in Asia Minor. Compare Ῥόδιον, Ῥοδώ, Ῥόδη/-α, Ῥοδί (...)
  • 86 With kalê: Para. 336: late sixth-century red figure cup; NY20.246: early fifth-century red figure (...)

31Ῥοδῶπις on the other hand is never attested as the name of a real woman (contrary to other names deriving from ῥόδον (“rose”) which are fairly common).85 Outside of Herodotus’ famous Thracian in Egypt, who built a pyramid and made dedications at Delphi, the name appears on pottery, both accompanied by kalê and standing alone, but Guy M. Hedreen persuasively argues that this name should not be connected too closely with the literary tradition.86 Rather than being the name of a hetaira, in fountain house scenes where it predominantly occurs, it is instead the name of a nymph.

  • 87 Str. 17.1.33.
  • 88 Athen. 13.596bc. Lidov 2002, p. 216-217.
  • 89 Lidov 2002, p. 227-230.
  • 90 Lidov 2002, p. 227; Boehringer 2015 pace Schlesier 2013.

32By the first century BCE a tradition had developed to associate the woman of Herodotus with Doricha in the poems of Sappho.87 Strabo, for example, links the two women, but it is unlikely that he (or Athenaios) was using Sappho as a source; Lidov demonstrates that the tradition that connected the names is rooted in Hellenistic scholarship, perhaps a commentary on Herodotos.88 Herodotos himself was perhaps drawing on a comic tradition that was punning on the dual meaning of the word hetaira.89 Again we see the development of a literary tradition surrounding hetairai that is independent of the lives of women themselves.90 Neither Rhodôpis nor Doricha is attested outside the literary texts. It is hardly, therefore, a nom de guerre.

33The fame of these women in modern times, therefore, is inversely proportional to the preponderance of these names in the ancient world which demonstrates, if nothing else, the different worlds that are covered by the literary and epigraphic sources.

Δίδραχμον and Ὀβόλη

  • 91 Davidson 1997, p. 118-119.
  • 92 McClure 2003, p. 74, 213, n. 43. See also Cohen 2015, p. 52 who also views Obolê as a name “approp (...)

34Δίδραχμον and Ὀβόλη are names noted by Davidson in his discussion of the politics of exchange embedded within the discourses surrounding hetairai.91 On the surface, these “names based on economic transactions” seem to represent the commodification of women;92 in Davidson’s argument they are emblematic of commodity exchange particularly associated with currency, as opposed to gift-exchange. However, both of these names are figments of scholarly imagination.

  • 93 Henderson in the Loeb (2011, p. 15) comments: “The wit is not obvious, and a second nickname has p (...)

35Didrachmon is a restoration made to the text of Athenaios by the 18th-century Dutch philologist Lodewijk C. Valkenaer, which is not followed by the Loeb and only mentioned in the notes of the Teubner:93

Στρατοκλῆς δ᾽ ὁ ῥήτωρ ἐρωμένην εἶχε τὴν ἐπικληθεῖσαν Λήμην ἑταίραν, τὴν καλουμένην Παρόραμα <καὶ Δίδραχμον> διὰ τὸ καὶ δύο δραχμῶν φοιτᾶν πρὸς τὸν βουλόμενον, ὥς φησι Γοργίας ἐν τῶι Περὶ ἑταιρῶν.

The orator Stratoklês had the hetaira named Lêmê [“Eyesore”] as his lover, she was called Parorama <and Didrachmon> because she would visit anyone who wanted her for two drachmas, as Gorgias says in his On Hetairai. (Athen. 596f)

  • 94 Pace McClure 2003, p. 73-74.

36Gorgias’ On Hetairai does not survive outside of its paraphrase here so we have no way of knowing whether Valkenaer’s restoration is correct. It is better, therefore, to remove the name completely from discussions. Put simply, there is absolutely no evidence to suggest the name Didrachmon existed, even as a “nom de guerre”. It is not a comic name, nor a slave name, nor a nickname.94

37Ὀβόλη is a name ostensibly recorded on a red figure cup by the Ambrosios Painter. However, this is also a dubious reading. The scene is discussed by Williams (and quoted also by Davidson):

  • 95 Williams 1983; Davidson 1997, p. 88; Cohen 2016, p. 722. See also Fischer 2013, p. 231: “There is (...)

two hetairai [are] packing away full spindles of wool into a basket. That these women are hetairai is made very clear by the names the painter has given them–Aphrodisia and Obole.95

  • 96 Immerwahr 1984, p. 11.
  • 97 See Immerwahr 1984, p. 11, n. 11. “Quite rare” is even an over-statement: the three examples cited (...)
  • 98 On “nonsense” inscriptions generally see Immerwahr 2007.

38There are two problems with this. First, even if the readings of the names are accepted, one can only really argue that “Aphrodisia” is packing away spindles; “Obolê” appears as a label between a woman playing the aulos and a man listening to her–and the label appears closer to the man than to the aulêtris. However, “Aphrodisia” is, in fact, restored from ΑΦΡΟ[Δ]Ι and “Obolê” is also far from certain; Immerwahr thinks it more likely to be the end of a name in -βο[ύ]λη than “a pun on word obol.”96 Another possibility, he suggests, is that it is “perhaps ὦ Βούλη” but, he points out “Boulê as a woman’s name is quite rare.”97 Immerwahr also notes the “poor spelling” of the Ambrosios Painter and the fact that he often includes “nonsense” inscriptions as part of his decorative schemes, including, it would seem, elsewhere on this cup.98 This should perhaps caution us against taking these names seriously as examples of women’s names.

39The fact is that there is no woman named Obolê actually attested. The name Didrachmon is an 18th-century restoration. These names might make good jokes (though that is also a matter of perception), but they are modern jokes. They are not real names.

Βουβάλιον

  • 99 Ault 2016, p. 93.

40The name Βουβάλιον, accompanied by a kalê inscription, appears on a graffito in Building Y in the Kerameikos in Athens (SEG 44.241). Because of its close proximity to Building Z a structure sometimes–and erroneously in my view–identified as a brothel, it is taken to refer to a prostitute.99 However, kalê names should not be seen as indicative of prostitution, rather as appreciation of a woman, much like kalos names were. In this sense, then, the name is more similar to acclamatory graffiti that appeared elsewhere in Athens and less like material from the so-called brothel in Pompeii.

  • 100 Stüber 2009, p. 144; García Ramón 2007, p. 55. Ault 2016, p. 93: “Scratched into a fragment of wal (...)
  • 101 Hesychios s.v. βουβάλιον· γυναικὸς κοσμάριον καὶ ἄγριος σικυὸς παρὰ Ἱπποκράτει. See also Etym. Mag (...)

41The name Boubalion, probably derives from the feminine form of βούβαλος “antelope”, however B.A. Ault suggests it is from βουβάλιον, a type of cucumber (ἄγριος σικυός).100 The lexicographers, on the other hand, thought it was also some kind of jewellery.101

  • 102 IG II2 11611: Ἡροξένη. Βουβάλιον, mid 4C.
  • 103 IBouthrot. 17.3-5, 38.12-13, 48.12-13, 50.12-13.
  • 104 IBouthrot. 31.73-6. See Cabanes et al. 2007, p. 102.

42It occurs only one more time in Athens, on a grave monument together with a woman named Heroxenê.102 The only other attestations of this name are in Bouthrotos, where it appears on the manumission inscriptions of the second century BCE. Here a Boubalion appears as part of a family unit, most likely the daughter of Menoitas and Deinomacha, and the sister of Deinomacha and Boiskos. The family are recorded as manumitting five slaves in total, three women and two men so are presumably of relatively high social standing or wealth.103 Another Boubalion appears to be a freed slave, manumitted along with Simakos by a group of three people.104

  • 105 See in general Réveilhac 2017.
  • 106 IBouthrot. 22.28, 43.36, 93.5.
  • 107 SEG 26.344, IG IX (1) 595, (2) 562.

43Βουβαλίς is a little more common (8 examples), from which Boubalion is likely a shortened version.105 No slaves are attested with the name, but three, perhaps different, women named Boubalis are recorded as manumittors in Bouthrotos, though the inscriptions could also refer to the same woman active in different contexts.106 The name is found elsewhere, where they are the daughters of Philoxenidês (in Athens), Epigenês (in Leukas), and Hippotês (in Larisa).107

Λέαινα

  • 108 Athen. 253a, 577c. The name is milked for its innuendo: 577d.
  • 109 Athen. 596f, Plut. Mor. 505e-f, Paus. 1.23.2, Polyainos, Strat. 8.45.
  • 110 Thuc. 6.54-9, Ath. Pol. 18.2.
  • 111 Kapparis 2017, p. 99-100.
  • 112 Luc. Dial. meret. 5, Alciphr. 4.12

44The connection of the name Leaina to hetairai is predominantly a Second Sophistic phenomenon, but one that seems to draw from the traditions surrounding a prominent man. Leaina is seemingly described by Machôn and the Hellenistic perigetic writer, Polemôn of Ilion, as a lover of Dêmêtrios Poliorketês; at least this is the tradition preserved by Athenaios.108 Leaina was also named –although only in the Second Sophistic period– as the lover of the Athenian tyrant-slayer Harmodios, who died under torture after refusing to give up the plotters.109 However, this element of the story does not appear before Plutarch: neither Thucydides nor Ath. Pol. mention any Leaina in connection with this episode.110 It appears to have emerged as an aetiological myth connected to a bronze lion sculpture, missing its tongue, that stood at the entrance to the Athenian Acropolis.111 The name is also given to a (fictional) hetaira by Lucian and by Alciphron.112

  • 113 Freed slaves: IBouthrot. 53.4; 119.3. Manumittors: IBouthrot. 14.39, 41; 17.28; 27.10; 29.28; 30.4 (...)

45The largest concentration of women named Leaina appears on the Bouthrotos inscriptions of the second century CE, but in contrast to Aphrodisia it is, for the most part, held by slave-owners rather than the freed slaves themselves. There are only two examples of the latter, compared with (probably) 13 of the former.113 This makes it the third most frequently attested female name in these inscriptions after Φιλίστα and Φιλωτέρα. A male equivalent, Λέων, is the fourth most frequently attested male name here suggesting that leonine names were of particular significance or fashion at this place and time.

46Outside of second-century Bouthrotos, Leaina is attested in Lycia, but it is not massively common there: there are 6 attestations of this name, but it never appears in the 30 most frequently attested names in this region. Λεοντίς/Λεωντίς and Λεοντία are found most commonly in Asia Minor (Leontis in Caria especially, Leontia in Cilicia), whereas Λεόντιον is better attested in Attica.

  • 114 Dubois 2017, p. 322-324.
  • 115 McClure 2003, p. 71-73.
  • 116 IG II2 11893 is the single exception (Κορώνη). For Korônê on pottery see Hedreen 2016a, p. 56-58; (...)

47One of the patterns McClure notes among the hetairai of Athenaios is the prevalence of names derived from animals or plants. However, although these names rarely feature in the top ten most attested names, they are not uncommon and occur both as men’s and as women’s names.114 That Athenaios’ hetairai held such names should not therefore not be seen as particularly significant, except for the fact that these are the secondary names given to women and in this sense are intended to be derogatory, amusing or both.115 Names such as Hys (“sow”) or Korônê (“crow”) are clearly meant to be insulting, but they are almost never attested in reality,116 whereas Leaina (“lion”) or Choirinê (“pig”) are regular names that can be supplied with euphemism within an erotic context (see, e.g., English Fanny).

Hetairai and onomastics

48If we step back from over-reliance on the tropes of the literary source material and examine the patterning of other evidence, we see traces of historical women performing normal activities. These are not “everyday” activities in the sense that food preparation, spinning and weaving, or childcare were everyday activities for large numbers of women, but they are actions that women (and men) undertook regularly, that formed an important part of their lives, and that were–for the most part–considered entirely normal. That is, the onomastic evidence, drawn from the activities of real–rather than literary–women pushes back against the idea that certain names are “appropriate” or “suitable” for prostitutes. There is no such thing as a “hetaira name” and efforts to deduce the sexual behaviour of women on the basis of their name are dead ends. Rather, the evidence reveals the contours of discourses of gender, status, and power, and how these are constructed around women by those looking back in time.

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Assante 2007: Julia Assante, “What makes a ‘prostitute’ a prostitute? Modern definitions and ancient meanings”, Historiae 4, p. 117-132.

Ault 2016: Bradley A. Ault, “Building Z in the Athenian Kerameikos: House, Tavern, Inn, Brothel?”, in Allison Glazebrook, Barbara Tsakirgis (ed.), Houses of Ill Repute: The Archaeology of Brothels, Houses, and Taverns in the Greek World, Philadelphia, p. 75-102.

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— 2015: Edward E. Cohen, Athenian Prostitution: The Business of Sex, Oxford.

— 2016: Edward E. Cohen, “The Athenian businesswoman”, in Stephanie Lynn Budin, Jean MacIntosh Turfa (ed.), Women in Antiquity: Real Women Across the Ancient World, London, p. 714-725.

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Kapparis 2017: Konstantinos Kapparis, Prostitution in the Ancient Greek World, Berlin.

Keesling 2006: Catherine M. Keesling, “Heavenly bodies: monuments to prostitutes in Greek sanctuaries”, in Christopher Faraone, Laura K. McClure (ed.), Prostitutes and Courtesans in the Ancient World, Madison, p. 59-76.

Kennedy 2015: Rebecca Futo Kennedy, “Elite citizen women and the origins of the hetaira in Classical Athens”, Helios 42-1, p. 61-79.

Körte 1919: Alfred Körte, „Glykera und Menander“, Hermes 54-1, p. 87-93.

Kreilinger 2006: Ulla Kreilinger, “To be or not to be a hetaira: female nudity in Classical Athens”, in Silvia Schroer (ed.), Images and Gender: Contributions to the Hermeneutics of Reading Ancient Art, Fribourg, p. 229-337.

Kurke 1997: Leslie Kurke, “Inventing the ‘Hetaira’: Sex, politics, and discursive conflict in Archaic Greece”, ClAnt 16-1, p. 106-150.

Lewis 2002: Sian Lewis, The Athenian Woman. An Iconographic Handbook, London.

Lidov 2002: Joel B. Lidov, “Sappho, Herodotus, and the ‘hetaira’”, CP 97-3, p. 203-237.

Masson 1990: Olivier Masson, « Remarques sur les noms de femmes en grec », MH 47-3, p. 129-138.

— 1997: Olivier Masson, « Nouvelles notes d’anthroponymie grecque », ZPE 119, p. 57-75.

McClure 2003: Laura K. McClure, Courtesans at Table: Gender and Ancient Greek Literary Culture in Athenaeus, New York.

— 2006: Laura K. McClure, « Introduction », in Christopher Faraone, Laura K. McClure (ed.), Prostitutes and Courtesans in the Ancient World, Madison, p. 3-20.

Parker 2000: Robert C. Parker, “Theophoric names and the history of Greek religion”, in Simon Hornblower, Elaine Matthews (ed.), Greek Personal Names: Their Value as Evidence, Oxford, p. 53-79.

Peschel 1987: Ingeborg Peschel, Die Hetäre bei Symposion und Komos in der attisch-rotfigurigen Vasenmalerei des 6.-4. Jh. v. Chr., Frankfurt.

Pirenne-Delforge 1994: Vinciane Pirenne-Delforge, L’Aphrodite grecque, Kernos Suppl. 4, Liège.

Réveilhac 2017: Florian Réveilhac, « Les anthroponymes grecs en -ιον: étude morphologique et sémantique », in Alorac Alonso Déniz, Laurent Dubois, Claire Le Feuvre, Sophie Minon (éd.), La suffixation des anthroponymes grecs antiques (SAGA), Genève, p. 379-417.

Robinson, Fluck 1937: David M. Robinson, Edward J. Fluck, A Study of the Greek Love-Names, Baltimore.

Rosivach 1989: Vincent J. Rosivach, « Talasiourgoi and paidia in IG II2 1553-78: A note on Athenian social history », Historia 38, p. 365-370.

Schlesier 2013: Renate Schlesier, “Atthis, Gyrinno, and other ‘hetairai’: female personal names in Sappho’s poetry”, Philologus 157, p. 199-222.

Schneider 1913: Karl Schneider, “Hetairai”, in Pauly-Wissowa, Real-encylopädie der classichen Altertumwissenschaft 8-2, col. 1331-1372.

Shapiro 2003: Alan H. Shapiro, “Brief encounters: women and men at the fountain house”, in Berhard Schmaltz, Konrad Schauenburg (ed.) Griechische Keramik im kulturellen Kontext, Münster, p. 96-98.

Stavrianopoulou 2006: Eftychia Stavrianopoulou, Gruppenbild mit Dame. Untersuchungen zur rechtlichen und sozialischen Stellung der Frauen auf den Kykladen im Hellenismus und in der römischen Kaiserzeit, Stuttgart.

Stüber 2009: Karin Stüber, „Griechisch“, in Karin Stüber, Thomas Zehnder, Ulla Remmer (ed.), Indogermanische Frauennamen, Heidelberg, p. 101-148.

Sutherland 2003: Elizabeth Sutherland, “How (not) to look at a woman: bodily encounters and the failure of the gaze in Horace’s c. 1.19”, AJP 124-1, p. 57-80.

Taylor 2015: Claire Taylor, “Epigraphic evidence”, in Esther Eidinow, Julia Kindt (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Greek Religion, Oxford, p. 97-111.

Thompson 1974: Wesley E. Thompson, “Tot Atheniensibus idem nomen erat...”, in Donald W. Bradeen, M.F. McGregor (ed.), Phoros: Tribute to Benjamin Dean Meritt, New York, p. 144-149.

Todd 1997: Stephen C. Todd, “Status and gender in Athenian public records”, in Gerhard Thür, Julie Vélissaropoulos-Karakostas (ed.), Symposion 1995, Cologne-Vienna, p. 113-124.

Traill 2008: Arianne Traill, Women and the Comic Plot in Menander, Cambridge.

Vlassopoulos 2010: Kostas Vlassopoulos, “Athenian slave names and Athenian social history”, ZPE 175, p. 113-144.

— 2015: Kostas Vlassopoulos, “Plotting strategies, networks and communities in classical Athens: the evidence of names”, in Claire Taylor, Kostas Vlassopoulos, Communities and Networks in the Ancient Greek World, Oxford, p.  101-127.

Williams 1983: Dyfri Williams, “Women on Athenian vases. problems of interpretation”, in Amelie Kuhrt, Avril Cameron (ed.), Images of Women in Antiquity, London, p. 92-105.

Wrenhaven 2009: Kelly Wrenhaven, “The identity of the ‘wool-workers’ in the Attic manumissions”, Hesperia 78, p. 367-386.

Anmerkungen

1 It was written with support of the Alexander von Humboldt foundation. My thanks go to Violaine Sebillotte for her invitation to the Eurykleia workshop and the audience there for suggestions. Laura McClure and Jamie Curbera read a draft and provided useful comments for which I am grateful, as did the anonymous readers for the press. All mistakes are my own.

2 Schneider 1913; McClure 2003, p. 64-65.

3 Lewis 2002; McClure 2003; Boehringer 2015.

4 See for example Castner 1982; Wrenhaven 2009, p. 380-381; Fischer 2013, p. 248; Kamen 2014, p. 151-152; Cohen 2015, p. 58, 146; Ault 2016, p. 93; Glazebrook 2016, p. 191-193.

5 See also the criticisms of Boehringer 2015, p. 380-381.

6 Davidson 1997; Kurke 1997; Gilhuly 2009.

7 Herter 1960, p. 83-84; Davidson 1997.

8 Cohen 2006, 2015.

9 McClure 2006; Kapparis 2017.

10 Kurke 1997.

11 McClure 2003; Kennedy 2015.

12 McClure 2003. On the literary strategies of the texts having little to do with real women see also Kurke 1997, p. 107.

13 Boehringer 2015, p. 384-386.

14 McClure 2003, p. 7, 63.

15 Goldhill 2015, p. 182.

16 See Robinson, Fluck 1937, p. 1-2; Peschel 1987, p. 74-79, 183-184, 326-327, 469.

17 Lewis 2002, p. 107-110.

18 Σεκλίνη (“couche-toi!” so Masson 1997, p. 58; Peschel 1987, p. 77-78): St. Petersburg B1650 (psykter, c. 550-500, Cerveteri); possibly also Brussels Musees Royaux R351 (hydria, c. 525-475, Vulci): Σεκ̣λινε. See Immerwahr 1990, p. 64, n. 24. Ἀγάπη “love”: St. Petersburg B1650 (psykter, c. 550-500, Cerveteri); this is not attested as a name until the Christian era. Συκώ (“fig”; apparently a slang term for vulva): Munich, Antikensamm. 8935 (calyx krater, c. 525-475). Cf. Ἰσχάς “dried fig”, the name of a hetaira character in Menander’s Kol. F 4, K-A, and Hedreen 2016b, p. 242-243 on the likelihood that Συκώ is an artistic invention (indeed, almost all these examples appear within the work of Euphronios). Also Παλαιστώ (from palaistra): St. Petersburg B1650 (psykter, c. 550-500, Cerveteri); Οἰνοφίλη (“wine-lover”): BM 1922,1018.1 (lekythos, c. 510-500, Gela). Ὀβόλη might also fall into this category–if indeed it exists at all: see below.

19 See also Hedreen 2016b, p. 263-264. Σμίκρα, he argues (p. 265-266), is a gender-inversion of the male name Σμίκρος.

20 So Robinson, Fluck 1937, p. 2, but see also Shapiro 2003, p. 96; Glazebrook 2016, p. 193.

21 Kreilinger 2006, p. 232; Hedreen 2016a, p. 55-56; Hedreen 2016b, p. 262, 265. Also Kapparis 2017, p. 351-352.

22 Frontisi-Ducroux 1998; Hedreen 2016a.

23 Hedreen 2016a, p. 66-68.

24 As, for example, Masson 1990, p. 57-59.

25 See for example Taylor 2015.

26 Schneider 1913, col. 1362-1371: 140 of the approximately 300 names he cites are known independently.

27 Lewis 2002, p. 109.

28 Assante 2007, p. 131.

29 Traill 2008, p. 33-45.

30 His work is entirely constructed through Diogenes Laertius 2.113-20 and brief mentions in other authors, such as Athenaios here: 13.584a.

31 Athen. 13.585c. See also Alciphr. 4.2, 18, 19. On the dubious tradition see Körte 1919.

32 Athen. 13.585d.

33 Athen. 13.586b. One of four fragments preserved of Hyp. 33: ΚΑΤΑ ΜΑΝΤΙΘΕΟΥ ΑΙΚΕΙΑΣ.

34 Athen. 13.586c-d, 595d-596b, 605d.

35 Diod. 17.108.6, Str. 9.2.25. On the Alexandrian interest in hetairai, see McClure 2003, p. 44-45. Machon’s Chreiai, preserved by Athen. 13.582c-f, mentions a Glykerion.

36 Hor. Odes 1.19. See also 1.30, 33. On 1.19 see Sutherland 2003.

37 Luc. Dial. meret. 1.

38 Harp. s.v. Γλυκέρα.

39 Alciphr. 4.2, 18, 19, Tat. Orat. 33-4. On the latter see DeRose Evans 2009 who argues that these were merely statues of women, looted from Greece and repurposed as poets in their new context.

40 Aristaenetus I 22, Constantinus VII Porphyrogenitus De virtutibus et vitiis vol. I, p. 247, l. 5 (162) (following Diodoros), Eustathius Comm. on Hom. Il. vol. I, p. 406, l. 13 (following Strabo). See n. 35 above.

41 Goldhill 2015, p. 182.

42 Bechtel 1902, p. 44; Masson 1990, p. 132; Stüber 2009, p. 128-129.

43 Names in Glyk- form 0.1% of attested male names compared with 1.0% of female names from Attica and 0.2% of male names and 1.2% of female names from Thrace.

44 Γλύκων, for example is attested 148 times in Lydia (with one example each of Γλύκιππος and Γλυκωνιανός), accounting for 1.7% of all male names from the region. In comparison, Γλυκεῖα is the best attested female name (in Glyk-) with 17 examples, followed by Γλυκωνίς, Γλύκιννα, and Γλυκιννίς with 16. These account for 1.4% of female names attested from the region.

45 Categorization follows the schemata of Stüber 2009.

46 Names in Glyk- account for 0.15% of men’s names and 0.5% of women’s names compared to names deriving from ἡδύς (῾Ηδεῖα, ῾Ηδίστη, ῾Ηδύλος, ῞Ηδιστος etc.) which account for only 0.03% of men’s names compared with 0.67% of women’s names.

47 Names deriving from εὐτυχής/εὐτυχία are more common for women than those deriving from γλυκύς/γλυκερός: they account for 0.9% of the sample compared to 0.5% of women’s names that derive from γλυκύς/γλυκερός, but appear to be predominantly held by slaves and/or freedmen and -women.

48 To Artemis (Brauron): IG II2 1514.20, 1515.12, 1522.17; (Oropos): IOrop. 357. To Asklepios (Athens): IG II3 (1) 898.57, 60, 70, 71; IG II3 (1) 1010.146 (see also Glykerion: IG II3 (1) 1010.159, 168, 174; Glykê: IG II3 (1) 1010.182, 194; Glyker- IG II3 (1) 1010.162).

49 IEph. 2313 (Ephesos); IG II2 11012 (Athens); IG IV (1) 140 (Aigina).

50 Mothers: SEG 23.147 (Attica); SEG 38.1418 (Pergê); IMilet 1 (3) 34.12 (Miletos). Wives: SEG 54.778 (Kos); SEG 57.240 (Attica). Daughters: SEG 26.279 (Athens); SEG 25.309 (Athens).

51 Citizens: SEG 26.279 (Athens). Metics: IG II2 9061, 9044, 8608, 8609, 9476; SEG 23.147 (Athens). Freedwomen: IG II2 1558.87-9 (Athens); CIL X 2867 (Dikaiarchia/Puteoli). New citizens: IMilet. 1 (3) 34.12 (Miletos).

52 SEG 28.353.

53 SEG 40.267, 49.321.

54 See also McClure 2003, p. 40.

55 Cohen 2015, p. 146.

56 Theophilos F 11 K-A (= Athen. 13.587f), Luc. Rh. Pr. 13.

57 Cohen 2015, p. 58. See also Davidson 1997, p. 331, n. 50.

58 See principally Davidson 1997; Wrenhaven 2009; Fischer 2013; Cohen 2015.

59 Glykera: IG II2 1558.87-9; Malthakê: IG II2 1558.66-76. On the reading of pais/paidion as “child”, rather than “prostitute” see Todd 1997, p. 122-123; Rosivach 1989, p. 368-369.

60 Wrenhaven 2009, p. 380.

61 Vlassopoulos 2010, 2015.

62 Bechtel 1902, p. 45: “der Name rühmt die weiche Haut”. See also Stüber 2009, p. 128: “ ‘weich’, wohl mit Bezug auf die Haut”. Only Réveilhac 2017, p. 406 moves away from this explanation “avec le sens de ‘doux, tendre’ ”.

63 Names that describe physical characteristics do indeed occur fairly regularly. See for example the lists in Bechtel 1902 and/or Stüber 2009. But these fall into the following categories: (i) height or size (e.g. Μεγίστη, Μίκη), (ii) perceptions of beauty, youth, health, or age (e.g. Καλλισθένεια, Αἴσχρα, Σίμη, Θάλλουσα), (iii) colours (e.g. Μέλαινα, Κιλλώ, Ξάνθη, Λεύκη). Bechtel 1902, p. 45 also notes the name Ῥυσίς as deriving from the term for wrinkly skin; but this again is a visual –not a tactile–perception.

64 See also McClure 2003, p. 64.

65 Of the 33 attested examples, only two are non-Athenian: IG XII Suppl. no 263 (Andros, first half of fourth century) and IG XII (5) 946.25 (Tenos, Roman period). Three women named Μάλθιον are attested in late-hellenistic Paros. The name is not attested before the fourth century.

66 Brauron: IG II2 1515.12-13, 1529.316, 1517.9; Asklepieion: IG II2 1533.96, 110, 113, 1539.14; IG II3 (1) 898.67, 69, 83, 96. See also the hypocoristic form Malthakion: IG II3 (1) 1010.90, 93, 102 (this name does not appear in LPGN).

67 IG II2 1529.316. See Davies 1971, p. 343: her husband was a trierarch.

68 IG XII (5) 946. On the family see further Stavrianopoulou 2006, p. 146-149.

69 IG II2 1515.12-13. Could they be the same woman? It is possible but perhaps less likely than the alternative: IG II2 1515 records Malthakê without patronymic or husband, whereas IG II2 1529 does both these, but admittedly there is no obvious pattern as to when this information is recorded or left out. It is just possible that a single Malthakê made two dedications of similar objects throughout the course of her life, one with her sister/mother/daughter, and another where it was important to display her husband’s and father’s names, but it seems more dangerous to assume homonymity here than not (see, e.g., Thompson 1974). Thyain[ê] could also be restored Thyain[is]. It is an otherwise unknown name.

70 IG II2 2682. On dotal horoi see now Harris 2013, p. 136 who argues that the horoi reflect a broader swath of society than Finley 1985 thought. Nevertheless, these were still landowners.

71 Reliefs attached to tablets: IG II3 (1) 898.67 (dedicated by Malthakê, wife of Lyandros. See also line 69 for another dedication by her), IG II3 (1) 898.83, IG II2 1533.113 (see also the reliefs dedicated by Malthakion: IG II3 (1) 1010: 90, 93). Finger: IG II3 (1) 898.96 (see also IG II3 (1) 1010.90, 93: legs and eyes from Malthakion). Cup: IG II2 1533.110. Something weighing 20 dr: IG II2 1539.14. There is also an unknown dedication by a Malthakê recorded at IG II2 1533.96.

72 As pointed out by Aleshire 1989, p. 67.

73 See in general Goff 2004, p. 44-51.

74 Citizens: see nn. 66 and 67 above; also IG II2 7231: the daughter of Dêmokratês of Pithos and wife of Kallias of Eleusis; IG II2 7784: either the daughter or wife of Dionysios of Cholargos; IG II2 11118, 12023: the daughter of Dêmotelês of Prasiai; IG II2 5271: the daughter of a man from Hagnous and wife of Theoxenês. Slaves/metics/freedwomen: see n. 59 above; also IG II2 12026: Μαλθάκη Μαγάδιδος χρηστή; IG II2 12024: Μαλθάκη. Νικίππη χρησ[τή]. A woman cursed on DTA 87 evidently prefers the name Malthakê to her (presumably) given name Glykanthis.

75 IG II2 11029, 11342, 12171 (with two men), 11118 (with a man and a woman), 11585 (with a woman), 11766/7, 12025 (with a man).

76 Cohen 2015, p. 52; Cohen 2016, p. 722.

77 IBouthrot. 19.7 where Aphrodisia manumits Nikolaos along with Artemôn and Artemô (a family group?). In Delphi 5 women named Aphrodisia are recorded as manumittors: FD III 3. 287, 3.353, 3.401, 6.133, SEG 36.518.

78 IBouthrot. 17.30, 26.4, 43.36, 48.8; possibly also IBouthrot. 40.12. See also IBouthrot. 15.17 for an Aphrodisia freed alone by a single manumittor.

79 IBouthrot. 30.11: with Parmeniskos; IBouthrot. 25.19-21: with two women (Erôtis, Sôtêris) and four men (Agathôn, Alkaios, Dêmêtrios, and Diodoros); IBouthrot. 168: with Aristonika, Aristopatra and Epikrateia; IBouthrot. 133.4-5: with Leontis, Philôtas, and Leon.

80 FD III 3.287.

81 That is, more than 200 times more than would be expected if the sample was evenly distributed.

82 Parker 2000, p. 64. Figure 6 adjusts for sample size in each century. Artemisia is consistently better attested than Artemisios, which is unknown until the second century BCE, whereas Dionysios is always better attested than Dionysia. Dêmêtria is better attested than Dêmêtrios in the fourth century BCE.

83 Pirenne-Delforge 1994.

84 There is a Νεαρά recorded on a funerary inscription of the second half of the fourth century: IG II2 12242 but no other Νέαιρα in Athens and McClure 2003, p. 68 suggests it is a nickname in order to account for its scarcity. Νέαιρα is, however, attested on IBouthrot. 31.87-93 (part of a (family?) group that manumits a slave, second century BCE, Bouthrotos); IAph. (2007) 13.301 (funerary honours for Neaira Ammia, daughter of Meneklês and wife of Mêtrodoros Dêmêtrios, first century CE, Aphrodisias); TAM II 919.6 (Νέαιρ̣α̣ Ἀ̣ρ̣ρια̣ν̣[οῦ?], second century CE?, Rhodiapolis).

85 Pace McClure 2003, p. 67 who claims it is found in Asia Minor. Compare Ῥόδιον, Ῥοδώ, Ῥόδη/-α, Ῥοδία, or Ῥοδόπη. Mastrokostas’ restoration (SEG 13.364) of a dedication at Delphi as [- - - ἀνέθε]κε Ῥοδ[ο͂πις - - - -] could be any of these names (although Keesling 2006, p. 61-63 argues that is it the Herodotean character).

86 With kalê: Para. 336: late sixth-century red figure cup; NY20.246: early fifth-century red figure cup. Name only: BM 1843.11-3.49: sixth-century black figure hydria; Naples Museo archeologico nazionale 86331: sixth-century black figure hydria; Louvre G33: late sixth-century red figure calyx krater. See Hedreen 2016a, p. 58-62.

87 Str. 17.1.33.

88 Athen. 13.596bc. Lidov 2002, p. 216-217.

89 Lidov 2002, p. 227-230.

90 Lidov 2002, p. 227; Boehringer 2015 pace Schlesier 2013.

91 Davidson 1997, p. 118-119.

92 McClure 2003, p. 74, 213, n. 43. See also Cohen 2015, p. 52 who also views Obolê as a name “appropriate to prostitutes”.

93 Henderson in the Loeb (2011, p. 15) comments: “The wit is not obvious, and a second nickname has perhaps fallen out of the text.” Kaibel (in the Teubner, p. 315) states: “cuius praeter duo cognomenta Λήμη et Παρόραμα, tertium fuisse videtur velut Δίδραχμον.” The second nickname need not be Didrachmon but something related to sight or vision (i.e. her appearance). As Henderson says, we don’t know where the joke is.

94 Pace McClure 2003, p. 73-74.

95 Williams 1983; Davidson 1997, p. 88; Cohen 2016, p. 722. See also Fischer 2013, p. 231: “There is no other vase that provides, with such certainty, a glimpse into the life of prostitutes (in this case most likely ἑταῖραι).”

96 Immerwahr 1984, p. 11.

97 See Immerwahr 1984, p. 11, n. 11. “Quite rare” is even an over-statement: the three examples cited by LGPN include this one (V2-13272), SEG 1.98, a statue base from Megara of indeterminable date which is probably a name ending in -boule: -βουλὴ Σωσικράτην (V3b-37314), and a sixth-century red figure cup dedicated at Delos (V1-79018) where the letter β appears in an epichoric alphabet (IDelos 33.10).

98 On “nonsense” inscriptions generally see Immerwahr 2007.

99 Ault 2016, p. 93.

100 Stüber 2009, p. 144; García Ramón 2007, p. 55. Ault 2016, p. 93: “Scratched into a fragment of wall plaster recovered from Room A [of Bau Y], a ‘dining room’, was the graffito BOYBALION KALH... Rather like Building Z, this informal scrawl can be variously interpreted ‘Gazelle is lovely’ or ‘Squirting Cucumber is beautiful’. Take your pick.”

101 Hesychios s.v. βουβάλιον· γυναικὸς κοσμάριον καὶ ἄγριος σικυὸς παρὰ Ἱπποκράτει. See also Etym. Mag. s.v. βουβάλιον.

102 IG II2 11611: Ἡροξένη. Βουβάλιον, mid 4C.

103 IBouthrot. 17.3-5, 38.12-13, 48.12-13, 50.12-13.

104 IBouthrot. 31.73-6. See Cabanes et al. 2007, p. 102.

105 See in general Réveilhac 2017.

106 IBouthrot. 22.28, 43.36, 93.5.

107 SEG 26.344, IG IX (1) 595, (2) 562.

108 Athen. 253a, 577c. The name is milked for its innuendo: 577d.

109 Athen. 596f, Plut. Mor. 505e-f, Paus. 1.23.2, Polyainos, Strat. 8.45.

110 Thuc. 6.54-9, Ath. Pol. 18.2.

111 Kapparis 2017, p. 99-100.

112 Luc. Dial. meret. 5, Alciphr. 4.12

113 Freed slaves: IBouthrot. 53.4; 119.3. Manumittors: IBouthrot. 14.39, 41; 17.28; 27.10; 29.28; 30.49; 31.54, 58, 66, 99; 37.10; 43.20, 24; 50.12; 69.8; 105; 152.4.

114 Dubois 2017, p. 322-324.

115 McClure 2003, p. 71-73.

116 IG II2 11893 is the single exception (Κορώνη). For Korônê on pottery see Hedreen 2016a, p. 56-58; Hedreen 2016b, p. 272-273.

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