Slave-Wives, Single Women and "Bastards" in the Ancient Greek World

Morris Silver

• Publisher: Oxbow Books
• Year: 2018
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9781785708640
• Subtopic: Ancient History
• Index: History

Greek scholars have produced a vast body of evidence bearing on nuptial practices that has yet to be mined by a professional economist. By standing on their shoulders, the author proposes and tests radically new interpretations of three important status groups in Greek history: the pallak?, the nothos, and the hetaira.It is argued that legitimate marriage – marriage by loan of the bride to the groom – was not the only form of legal marriage in classical Athens and the ancient Greek world generally. Pallakia – marriage by sale of the bride to the groom – was also legally recognized. The pallak?-wifeship transaction is a sale into slavery with a restrictive covenant mandating the employment of the sold woman as a wife. In this highly original and challenging new book, economist Morris Silver proposes and tests the hypothesis that the likelihood of bride sale rises with increases in the distance between the ancestral residence of the groom and the father's household. Nothoi, the bastard children of pallakai, lacked the legal right to inherit from their fathers but were routinely eligible for Athenian citizenship. It is argued that the basic social meaning of hetaira (companion) is not 'prostitute' or 'courtesan, ' but 'single woman' – a woman legally recognized as being under her own authority (kuria). The defensive adaptation of single women is reflected in Greek myth and social practice by their grouping into packs, most famously the Daniads and Amazons.

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List of abbreviations

A&A

Antike und Abendland

Acta Jurid.Hung.

Acta juridica Hungarica

AHB

Ancient History Bulletin

AJA

American Journal of Archaeology

AJP

American Journal of Philology

AntCl

L’Antiquité classique

CJ

Classical Journal

AntK

Antique Kunst

BICS

Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, University of London

BMCR

Bryn Mawr Classical Review

BMFA

Bulletin of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

BSA

Annual of the British School at Athens

BSAS

British School at Athens Studies

ClAnt

Classical Antiquity

CP

Classical Philology

CQ

Classical Quarterly

CR

Classical Review

CW

Classical World

EchCl

Echos du monde classique. Classical Views

ELR

Legal Roots, The International Journal of Roman Law, Legal History and Comparative Law

EuGeStA

Eugesta: Journal of Gender Studies in Antiquity

ExClass

Exemplaria Classica

GaR

Greeece and Rome

GRBS

Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies

Historia

Historia. Zeitschrift für alte Geschichte

HSCP

Harvard Studies in Classical Philology

ICS

Illinois Classical Studies

IGForsch

Indogermanische Forschungen

IncidAntico

Incidenza dellAntico

JAOS

Journal of the American Oriental Society

Jahrb.f.cl.Philol.

Jahrbuch für classische Philologie

JESHO

Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient

JHS

Journal of Hellenic Studies

JJurP

Journal of Juristic Papyrology

JNES

Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Studies

JRS

Journal of Roman Studies

Klio

Klio. Beiträge zur alten Geschichte

MAAR

Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome

MBAH

Marburger Beiträge zur Antiken Handels-, Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte (Formerly Münstersche Beiträge zur Antiken Handelsgeschichte)

PP

La Parola del Passato. Rivista di Studi Antichi. Naples, Italy

QUCC

Quaderni Urbanati di Classica, Rome

RhM

Rheinisches Museum für Philologie. Frankfurt am Main: Sauerländer.

SO

Symbolae Osloenses

SyllClass

Syllecta Classica

TAPA

Transactions of the American Philological Association

TC

Trends in Classics

T.v.R.

Tijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis / Revue d’Histoire du Droit / The Legal History Review

WS

Wiener Studien

ZPE

Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik

ZRG

Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte: Romanistische Abteilung

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Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Plates
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• In the Interests of Disclosure
• I. Overview and Summary of Main Conclusions
• II. Socioeconomic Foundation of the Pallakē Institution
• III. Pallakē-Wife as Privileged Slave: Central Texts
• IV. Constructing the Greek Wife: Legal Aspects
• V. Constructing the Greek-Wife: Ritual Aspects
• VI. “Wife” as a Multidimensional Status in Ancient Greece: Supplementary Evidence
• VII: “Wife” as a Multidimensional Status in Ancient Greece: Testimony of Euripides’s Electra
• VIII. Path to Pallakia
• IX. Single Woman as Hetaira as Suppliant
• X. Wealth Transfers in the Greek Marriage Market with Emphasis on the Roles of Distance and Single Woman Status
• XI. Wealth Transfers in the Greek Marriage Market: The Spinning Hetaira
• XII. Companionship as an Adaptation to the Dangerous Life of the Single Woman
• XIII. Role of Cults in the Marriage of Single Women
• XIV. Hetaira as Textile Worker
• XV. Legal Status of Nothoi
• XVI. Share the Wealth? Not with (Foreigner) Nothoi
• XVII. Case Studies in Pallakia: Homer’s Penelope as Pallakē
• XVIII. Case Studies in Pallakia: Hera as Zeus’s Pallakē
• XIX. Case Studies in Pallakia: Classical Athens
• Summary of Main Findings and Problems for Future Research
• Bibliography