Greek literature may be divided roughly into two parts, the earlier school which culminated at Athens, and the later school which culminated at Alexandria. The obvious differences between these two schools of art have often been described, and there is no need to dwell on them here; but the great, the essential difference between them has been too generally ignored.

The chief inspiring element of all art is love; and it is in their inspiration—that is to say, in their view of love—that the real difference between the two schools consists. The love of the later poetry is the love of man for woman; the love of the earlier poetry is the love of man for man.

By “love” I mean here love in the modern sense. A man of the Alexandrian Age might say “I love you” to a woman, and mean by that what a man may mean if he says as much to-day; before that time a man could only have said “I love you” in this sense to a friend of his own sex. There is no trace in literature of what we now understand by the word “love” earlier than the end of the fourth century.

This phenomenon has been noticed before—indeed, it is one that could not very well escape notice—though its true importance has not always been appreciated; and the general consensus of opinion has agreed to ascribe this great change, the greatest change perhaps that has ever come over art, to the influence of two men, Euripides and Menander. My object in writing now is to endeavour to show, firstly, that this general view is a mistaken one, arising from an insufficient appreciation of the true nature of the change; and secondly, that the real originator of that new feeling which we encounter in Alexandrian literature,—in other words, the first man who had the courage to say that a woman is worth loving,—was Antimachus of Colophon.

The commonly accepted view as to the origin of that “romantic” feeling (for so, for briefness’ sake, it will be convenient to call it)[1] which meets us in Alexandrian literature, would seem to be due to a confusion, arising from a misunderstanding of what that feeling really is. This confusion takes two distinct forms. Thus, in the case of some writers, the improved tone with regard to women which appears in Greek erotic literature from the fourth century onwards, has been confounded with that improvement in their social and intellectual position which was so marked a feature of the latest period of the history of classical Greece. In other words, romantic feelings have been spoken of as if they were identical with feelings of social and intellectual respect. That they are not, scarcely requires even to be stated. Others again, while perceiving the distinction between these two entirely different things, have yet argued as if the one were the natural and inevitable outcome of the other, and inseparably connected therewith; as if, in fact, all that was necessary to purify and elevate the feelings of men towards women had been the social emancipation of the latter. This view is of course possible, and as such is entitled to consideration rather than the previous one; but not only is it improbable in itself, but it is also in direct opposition to the teaching of history: for while no one would deny that this emancipation, if more or less simultaneous with the appearance of the romantic feeling, would serve at once to disseminate and to dignify it, how entirely independent the one is of the other is sufficiently proved by the conditions prevailing in the Middle Ages. It is surely a fact which cannot well be ignored in discussing this question, that just during that period of history when “chivalry” and “romance” were at their height, the social and intellectual position of women, both absolutely and relatively, was perhaps lower than at any time before since the creation of the world.[2]

When once the romantic element is cut clear from all extraneous entanglements, so that it is possible to recognise what it really is, it becomes, I think, immediately evident that neither Euripides nor Menander can have much to do with its origin. The leading motive of romance is the idea that pure love for a woman may justifiably form the chief interest in a man’s life. But this idea, as I hope to be able to show clearly, does not appear in literature until after the time of Euripides, while it is already to be found fully developed before the time of Menander. This being so, it seems impossible to regard either of these writers as the originators of it.

In the course of the following pages, I shall therefore endeavour to show, by a detailed examination of such parts of the contemporary literature as bear upon the subject, that low as was the social position of woman in most parts of Greece during the so-called classical period, the place which she occupied in the minds of men and in their art was even lower, and that her subsequent social emancipation did not by any means immediately lead to her being regarded with any more real respect. In the course of this argument, I purpose to dwell especially on the influence of Euripides, and hope to succeed in making it clear that though he, as judged by his works, was strongly in favour of giving women larger liberties, and firmly convinced that their capacities both for good and evil were far greater than the more old-fashioned among his contemporaries supposed, there is yet nowhere in his plays any real love-element as between man and woman, nor is it anywhere suggested that love for a woman may be a determining factor in a man’s life.

Secondly, I purpose by a similar process to show that that place which in later Greek art and in modern times is occupied by the love of man for woman, was occupied among the earlier Greeks by the love of man for man—a fact which, though it may at first sight appear foreign to the immediate subject of our enquiry, is yet of such extreme importance for a true understanding of the history of the origin of the romantic feeling, that a consideration of it can on no account be omitted from any work professing in any way to deal with that question. For it cannot be too strongly emphasised that those who wish to study the development of love, as we now know it, must commence their studies with an examination of this essentially primitive emotion. It cannot be too strongly emphasised that love, as it now exists, has been evolved, not from the sexual instinct, but from the companionship of the battle-field, that the first real lovers the world ever knew were comrades in arms. The Iliad of Homer is a love story, its heroes Achilles and Patroclus; the Ajax of Sophocles is a love story, its heroes Ajax and Teucer. To ignore such facts as these is wilfully to misunderstand the meaning of Greek poetry and the meaning of Greece in the history of the world.

Having thus cleared the ground, I hope finally to show that it was Antimachus who first taught that that love which was possible between man and man was possible also between man and woman.

Antimachus stands at the junction of the two great tendencies of his time. The influence of Sparta and of Euripides was gradually re-emancipating women, and showing that their powers and their passions were at least equal to those of men; the steady growth and development of that relation between man and man which found its highest exponent in Plato had made it clear, even to the blindest, that love was possible as distinct from lust. It was left to Antimachus to unite the two streams of thought in one, and to show that woman, with her newly-awakened capabilities, was a worthy object of pure and chivalrous devotion.

The works of Antimachus are lost, and none of the few fragments which survive are of any importance. All discussion with reference to them must therefore be based on suppositions and an examination of relative probabilities. The risks of error in entering on such doubtful ground are manifestly infinite, and conclusions can be reached only through the accumulation of a mass of evidence, the separate particles of which are often in themselves of very little weight; the veil of darkness covering all such Greek literature as does not bear the hall-mark of Athens is so thick that it is perhaps no longer possible for the real truth about it ever to be known. Ceterum, fiat justitia. It is a bold claim, I know, that I am making for Antimachus; it is a claim which, if established, would give him right to rank among the greatest poets of the world: it would give him right to rank as the founder of modern literature. How great a poet he really was we do not know. Perhaps my estimation of his importance is altogether exaggerated. His contemporaries, we know, preferred Choerilus; perhaps they were right; for myself, Malo cum Platone errare.

It is generally agreed that in prehistoric times the position of women among the Greeks was a much higher one than was the case subsequently. There seems every reason to believe that the social conditions of the Lesbians and the Dorians and the other nations which did not come under the influence of the history-writing Ionians, were but the survivals of what was originally a more or less general state. It is of considerable assistance for a proper comprehension of the earliest literature, if one remembers that at the time of its production the enslavement of women had only comparatively recently taken place.

The reason of the influence of primitive woman over primitive man is probably not very far to seek. In early times women were regarded with superstitious reverence[3]—one need only watch a woman making lace, say, to be able nowadays still to quite appreciate the feeling—and with natural woman’s wit for a time kept up the illusion, the hard head of man taking some time to come to maturity. But when man did at last wake to the fact that he was physically, and therefore, for practical purposes, generally superior, an inevitable reaction set in, and the history of early Greece shows women as occupying on the whole a very low position—a position, too, which became lower still with advancing civilisation.[4]

That the original state of women was not one of slavery is clearly shown by the early epics. The Iliad and the Odyssey are pictures of an earlier state of society than that of the poet who describes them. A man living in a society in which women were despised, had to deal with legends belonging to an earlier social condition, in which women played a prominent part. Traces of this anomaly are easy to find in both poems. The Trojan war was the work of a woman, but how very little that woman appears in the Iliad! A woman has been managing the affairs of Odysseus for twenty years in an exemplary fashion; but the hero of the Odyssey on his return prefers to associate with the swineherd. It is by this contradiction between the actual experiences of the poet and the social conditions which he was called upon to depict, that the many inconsistencies in the treatment of the Epic woman must be explained.

Another excellent illustration of this conflict between the primitive and the subsequent views of the nature and importance of women is furnished by the elaborate treatment of the Pandora legend in the Opera et Dies of Hesiod. On the one hand is the early conviction of the power of women’s influence—it is only by the help of a woman that Zeus can outwit man: on the other the later conviction that this influence must be for evil—before Pandora came

And a like contradiction runs through all the details of the description. Woman will be man’s ruin, but he cannot fail to love her all the same—

Woman will gain man’s heart by her beauty, which is like that of the immortals—

by her skill and by her charm; it is but as an afterthought that the poet adds—

And, lastly, it is through a woman that trouble comes into the world; but it is this same woman’s doing that Hope at least is left. It was Pandora herself that shut down the lid of the casket before Hope had flown; it was she that preserved this “dream of waking hours” for mankind.[5]

But if we pass from the general condition of women, as depicted in Homer or Hesiod, and come to our own more immediate subject, it must be admitted that neither in the prehistoric legends, nor in their subsequent development, is there any trace whatever of a romantic sentiment existing between men and women to be found. Considering the important position occupied by women in these poems, the absence of the love element is most remarkable.

The insignificant part played by Briseis has always struck those who have wished to regard the Iliad as an Achilleis, of which she is the heroine; nor can Agamemnon’s love for the daughter of Chryses be said to go very deep. He is distressed at losing her, no doubt, but the loss is far from irremediable. He evidently agrees with Antigone, πόσις ἄν μοι κατθανόντος ἄλλος ἦν.

Paris again had originally been a celebrated warrior, and it was to this that he owed his position and his name. But his love for Helen, instead of inspiring him, seems to have had the very opposite effect. One exception there is, no doubt, to all this—the relation between Hector and Andromache. But the relation between Hector and Andromache (as illustrated by Iliad vi. 392, seqq.) is unparalleled in all Greek literature, and it is not, perhaps, without significance that they are Trojans and not Greeks. How great was the impression that they made is visible in the way in which the later literature cites Andromache rather than any Greek woman as the ideal of a wife. At the same time, how little really sympathetic to the Greek of the period was this wonderful and unique passage is sufficiently shown by this very fact, that no attempt was ever made to imitate or develop it. It may sound strange to say so, but in all probability we to-day understand Andromache better than did the Greeks for whom she was created; better, too, perhaps than did her creator himself.

In the Odyssey, well nigh the entire action is in the hands of women. What with Athene and Leucothea, Circe and Calypso, Nausicaa and Penelope, Odysseus himself hardly comes to the fore at all; and yet it cannot be said that anywhere from beginning to end is there so much as a suggestion of a love-motive.

Nausicaa is always regarded as a charming type of woman, but, after all, how one naturally thinks of her is as a charming type of washerwoman. Penelope again is merely the ideal housekeeper: she longs for the return of her husband, no doubt, but what really grieves her about the suitors is not their suggestions as to his death, but the quantity of pork they eat.

As for any idea that her devotion requires similar constancy on the part of Odysseus, it is not so much as suggested. The Odyssey opens, it is true, with its hero longing to see even the smoke of his home rising in the air; but it must be remembered that he has been spending seven years alone with Calypso on a desert island, which for a man of his tastes was doubtless exceedingly tedious. There is no reason to suppose that he did not enjoy the first year or so of his stay quite as much as his visit to Circe or Aeolus.

An examination of other Greek myths and legends that have any claim to antiquity will furnish a very similar result. Whether in those myths of gods and heroes which found their way into literature from its beginning, or in those local legends which, though first appearing in the Alexandrian writers, are evidently in reality much older, wherever the antiquity of the story can be proved, two characteristics are very noticeable. The first is the importance of women as the originators of the action; the second is the absence of the romantic element. The capabilities of women are thoroughly recognised, though the tendency of the time is to describe their influence as for evil rather than as for good; their importance is everywhere admitted: but that a man should be really or seriously in love with a woman is a thing unknown.

This is certainly at first sight a strange anomaly, and yet it is, perhaps, capable of explanation. The developer of the myth could not fail to be confronted by a great contradiction—the traditional importance of women and their actual condition of repression. He saw in the stories the women, like Medea or Ariadne, profoundly influencing the career of their lovers, while the men, like Jason or Theseus, stood helplessly and more or less apathetically on one side. The converse of such positions he naturally did not find. His surroundings forbade his drawing the true deduction, that the stories were intended to illustrate the helplessness of men without a woman to direct them; he drew therefore the contrary deduction, that the dignity and superiority of man prevented him from taking an active interest in any matter where a woman was concerned. From this deduction, combined with all that was known of the emotional and passionate character of feminine nature, there followed that view of the relation between man and woman which is so noticeable in all the myths and legends as we find them in literature. A woman may be desperately in love with a man, but the converse is impossible.[6] Love may lead women to humiliation, to treachery, to crime, and to suicide, but never, except under the most extraordinary circumstances, men.[7]

The most cursory examination of the ordinary and most familiar Greek legends will sufficiently illustrate this.

Ἐκ Διὸς ἀρχώμεσθα. Of the many amours of Zeus, the only one of at all a permanent character, the only one which he thought it worth his while to legalise, was that for Ganymede.[8] His treatment of Minos, again, was very different from that which any of his female friends received.[9]

The goddesses suffer for their indiscretions, never the gods. Aphrodite’s pathetic confession to Anchises,[10] or her agony for Adonis, the helpless devotion of Luna to Endymion, or of Aurora to Tithonus, can find no parallels among the stories of the gods. Love may drive Apollo to tend cattle, but it is love for Admetus.

In the lower stratum of humanity, the treachery of Medea or Ariadne, the story of Scylla[11] with its dozen variants, the guilt of Stheneboea, of Myrrha, of Pasiphae, the deaths of Byblis or Phyllis,[12] are but a few of the more obvious examples.

The idea that a man could be subject to such passions is not to be found till much later in the history of the legends. The original version of the story makes Eriphanis follow Menalcas through the forest and die for his disdain;[13] that Menalcas should afterwards die of love for Euhippe is an addition by Hermesianax.[14] In the old legend, Daphnis is the companion of Artemis, and the nymph who loves him seeks him in vain by every fountain and by every grove;[15] it is Sositheus who tells of his search for his lost Pimplea,[16] and Alexander Aetolus, or whoever Tityrus may be, who sets him wandering over the mountains after Xenea.[17]

A good commentary on all this is furnished by the stories selected, apparently more or less at random, by Parthenius in his Περὶ Ἐρωτικῶν Παθημάτων, and an examination of this work (dedicated to the Roman Cornelius Gallus) may serve to show how tenaciously the original idea of the relative positions of men and women retained its hold even among the “romantic” Alexandrians.

The stories narrated by Parthenius number 36 in all.

In three cases, those of Leucophrye (5), Peisidice (21), and Nanis (22), love induces women to betray their country to the enemy; in each case the suggestion of treachery is made by them. In one case a man, Diognetus (9), is guilty of similar treachery, but here he is trapped into it by an oath to his lady to do whatever she asks him—an oath which he swears without thinking what it may imply; and, besides, he betrays, not his own countrymen, but merely his allies.

Of other sorts of treachery there is enough and to spare, and always attributed to the woman. Penelope (3), out of jealousy, induces Odysseus to kill his son Euryalus; Erippe (8), owing to her love for a barbarian, plots against her husband’s life; Cleoboea (14) tries to seduce Antheus, and, failing, murders him.

Where a man is led by love to any unnatural crime, it is invariably excused as being the result of temporary insanity or the vengeance of some deity. Leucippus (5) falls in love with his sister κατὰ μῆνιν Ἀφροδίτης; for Byblis (11) no such excuse is alleged. Clymenus (13) violates Harpalyce διὰ τὸ ἔκφρων εἶναι; Orion, Hero (20) ὑπὸ μέθης ἔκφρων; Assaon’s love for his daughter Niobe (33) is a punishment from Leto; Dimoetes’ love for a corpse (31) is brought on by a curse. The sins of Neaera (18) and Periander’s mother (17) have no such palliative. The unique case in which Alcinoe (27) is driven κατὰ μῆνιν Ἀθήνης to elope with a stranger (as a punishment for sweating her sempstress) is derived from Moero, who would naturally regard women from a peculiar point of view.

Lastly, Rhesus (36) and Leucippus (15) are, it is true, induced, like Eriphanis, to follow the objects of their affection into the hunting-field, but in each case their devotion is very promptly rewarded.

The foregoing examination of the myths and legends of early Greece has led to certain definite results; but the importance of these results has been in many cases discounted by the impossibility of assigning any even approximate date to the myth or legend from which they have been drawn. Even if, in the case of any given legend, one could determine with certainty the occasion of its first appearance in literature, one would in reality be very little nearer determining the date of the legend itself. To the stories in Homer everyone is willing to allow a respectable antiquity; but who can say how long the story of Phaedra had been current at Troezen before Sophocles adopted it? It is satisfactory therefore to be able to leave this doubtful ground, and come to something more definite, in the shape of the actual words of the subjective lyric writers, who belong to the second stage of Greek literature.

It is, perhaps, generally agreed that romantic love-poetry was not produced by the early Greek lyric writers. What is less generally appreciated is the fact that these writers, at any rate before the time of Anacreon, wrote practically no love-poetry (addressed to women) at all.[18] So little indeed has this fact or its meaning been understood, that not a few passages in the fragments of these writers have been misinterpreted or strained; but really, if one comes to think of it, this absence of love-poetry is quite capable of explanation. The subjective lyric literature of early Greece, which extends roughly over the seventh and sixth centuries, and lasts on, in a desultory sort of way, into the fifth, is chiefly Ionian, and introduces one to a very different state of society from that of the heroic age. The actual social and intellectual position of women is, in the main, a very low one; and in other respects also the place which they occupy in the interests of men is very insignificant. But this is not all. The ideal woman of the time is not one to whom love-poetry could be addressed. The Greek of this period looked upon a woman as an instrument of pleasure, and as a means of creating a family, nothing more. The comparison of marriage to cattle-breeding sounds quite natural.[19] Now such feelings as these can neither of them provide the material for love-poetry of even the most rudimentary kind.[20]

The former of these two ideals we shall have frequent opportunities of encountering in the next few pages. A striking commentary on the latter, and, of course, more general one, is furnished by that important document for the early history of women in Greece, the “satire” of Simonides. If one examines the types of women that Simonides describes, and the objections that he urges against them, and compares these with the types one encounters in Juvenal, for instance, a noteworthy fact at once becomes apparent. The faults which Simonides blames, as well as the virtues he somewhat grudgingly commends, are simply those which concern woman as a housekeeper; those faults and vices which provoke the indignation of Juvenal are but lightly touched upon, or not mentioned at all. One woman is slovenly, another talks her husband’s head off, another is always eating, another is a thief, another is too fine a lady to do any cooking or sweeping; and the only three definite virtues of the woman “like a bee” are, that her husband’s income increases, that her children are satisfactory, and that she does not waste her time gossiping with the neighbours.

Indeed, the famous lines (Fr. 6)—

might almost be translated, “There is nothing better in the world than a good cook, and nothing worse than a bad one.”[21]

Simonides grumbles a great deal, and thinks most women a great nuisance; that a woman could be more than a nuisance, or, if God were good, possibly a convenience, does not enter his head.

A century and a half later we find little change. Phocylides divides woman into four types: three bad—the flirt, the slattern, and the shrew; one good, the efficient housekeeper.[22] Another hundred years later the ideal of a wife is still unchanged.[23]

There was little reason, then, for these Greeks to address love-poetry to their women, or, indeed, to sing of “love,” otherwise than in its purely animal aspect, at all. It remains to convince oneself, by an examination of what remains of their works, that they actually did not. It is, of course, a very general opinion that Archilochus, the earliest lyric poet about whom we know anything of moment, addressed love-poetry to a woman, Neobule.

This view rests mainly on two fragments (Fr. 84, 103), which it is customary to consider as having been addressed by the poet to his lady at an early stage of their acquaintance, or as being, perhaps, recollections of this happy state.[24] Where all is uncertain, one does not like to speak with confidence, but there really seems to be no adequate reason for supposing that they are anything of the kind. There is nothing, whatever in Fr. 84

to prove that it was addressed to a woman, or, indeed, referred to one at all. It is at least as probable that it was addressed to the same person as Fr. 85

or someone similar.[25] Fr. 103 again must be taken in conjunction with those that go before and those that follow it. The whole scene described in these fragments[26] is very suggestive of the story in Proverbs vii. 6 seqq. A lady of mature charms (100) and somewhat doubtful character (101, 102) receives a youthful visitor, whose feelings are described in Fr. 103

The subsequent fragments deal with the arrival of the husband, and the change to the more rapid metre must have been very effective. This context, of course, makes it clear that φιλότητος ἔρως means simply coitus cupido, and there is no reason to suppose that this fragment ever formed part of what could properly be called an erotic passage.[27]

As a matter of fact, all that we know of Archilochus tends to make it extremely improbable that he addressed love-poetry in any sense of the word to women. There is no evidence that he addressed any poems to Neobule (or for that matter to any other woman) except satires. In these satires we know that he referred to Neobule in terms of the vilest abuse. There is no evidence in his fragments that he ever referred to her otherwise. What reason, then, is there to suppose that he did? His love for her, such as it was, was confessedly purely animal.[28] This is not the kind of love that finds consolation in reminiscences and regrets. His pride was hurt, and he determined to take vengeance on the persons who had offended him. If one of these persons happened to be a woman, that was just as much a matter of chance as the fact that one of the enemies of Hipponax was a sculptor. The woman, like the sculptor, had tried to make the poet ridiculous, and the poet proceeded to have his revenge by satirising her. The fact that she was a woman may have given the satires a certain peculiar colouring, but it certainly did not make them love-poems. Under the circumstances it was not to be expected that Archilochus should express his feelings in erotic poetry, and, as a matter of fact, on the present evidence there is no reason to believe that he did.[29]

The claims of Alcman in this respect seem at first sight somewhat stronger.[30] He has been described as ἡγεμὼν ἐρωτικῶν μελῶν;[31] this has been supposed to mean that he was the first poet who wrote love-poems, and it has been assumed that these poems were addressed to women. This is not, however, all so certain as one might at first be inclined to suppose.

It has been said that Alcman was ἡγεμὼν ἐρωτικῶν μελῶν; but in how far were these μέλη ἀκόλαστα love-poems as we now understand them? All that the words of Archytas imply is that Alcman wrote melic poems, of which “love” was the chief subject. There is nothing whatever to prove that these μέλη were personal, or addressed to any particular woman; it is a misuse of words to call them “love-poems,” and then think of them as if they were what modern love-poems are. As soon as subjective poetry came to be written at all, it is obvious that the sexual passions must have appeared in it in some form. This no one would wish to deny. But there is a great gap between singing of “love” in general, of the pleasures of

and singing of love as existing between two particular persons. It is a commonplace that every new lover loves as no one has ever done before. Until a poet speaks of himself in this way, until he emphasises the individuality of his own particular passion, he cannot be said to write real love-poetry. And certainly the fragments, at any rate, do not supply any proof that Alcman ever wrote such love-poetry. He may have been in love with Megalostrate; as far as we know, he never said so.[32]

Again, it must not be forgotten that Alcman also wrote poems addressed to boys, and it is at least possible that some of those erotic fragments which are preserved may have belonged to these.[33]

As for the Parthenia, they are not love-poems in any sense of the word. The poet is merely ὁ τῶν παρθένων ἐπαινέτης τε καὶ σύμβουλος,[34] which was possible in the happy condition of Spartan society, quite without anything further being implied.

One of these poems was written in old age;[35] perhaps all of them were.[36] Besides, they celebrate a number of girls indifferently; love-poems would not do that.[37]

Till Egypt renders up some more Alcman, it will be impossible to prove that he ever addressed a love-poem to a woman.

Strange as it may perhaps seem, it is almost an equal misuse of words to call Mimnermus a love-poet. It has so long been customary to regard him as such, that it is at first hard to realise that, in all probability, he was never anything of the kind. As a matter of fact, it seems naturally reasonable to suppose, and there is at any rate nothing in the fragments to contradict this view, that Mimnermus was, like the other elegiac writers of his age, purely didactic.[38] The philosophy which he inculcated differed from that of Tyrtaeus or Solon, no doubt, but it was none the less a philosophy. Mimnermus argued that, considering the shortness of life, and especially of youth, it was advisable to devote one’s self immediately and strenuously to sensual pleasures, before the power of enjoying them was lost. The argument was quite general. “What is life without love?” he says; he does not say, “What is life without your love?”[39] This enunciation of general principles is not love-poetry. As has already been remarked, no poetry can properly be so described until the personal element has entered into it, and of this personal element there is no evidence in the case of Mimnermus.

As for the actual poems themselves, there is no evidence that any of them were, as is generally tacitly assumed, addressed to Nanno or any other woman; and indeed, if one considers their nature, one will see that there is really no reason why they should have been. It is worthy of note, in the first place, that the only definite evidence of the existence of such a person as Nanno is that furnished by Hermesianax,[40] and that this writer’s information as to the early poets was not always very accurate, is sufficiently shown by what he says of Homer, Sappho, Anacreon, and others.[41] But granted that the story of the poet’s love for Nanno was true, that is very far from proving the fact that he addressed his poems to her. What seemed only natural in the fourth century, was by no means so in the seventh. But besides this (as it ought to be superfluous to remark, and probably is not), Hermesianax never states that Mimnermus did so; he does not even go so far as to say that the latter alluded to Nanno in his elegies. Hermesianax makes three definite statements about Mimnermus:—(1) that he invented or utilised the pentameter; (2) that he was in love with Nanno, and used often (in consequence?) to attend entertainments; (3) that he suffered from the enmity of Hermobius and Pherecles. More than this is not to be found in the passage, however one may emend or explain it. As for the supposition that Mimnermus gave to his collected elegies the title of Nanno, there is no evidence of a collection so entitled before the time of Strabo, by which time, of course, the influence of writers like Hermesianax had long been at work.[42] In short, there is no evidence whatever to lead one to suppose that the elegies of Mimnermus were anything but purely impersonal didactic moralisings on the shortness of youth, and the consequent advisability of making the best possible use of it.[43] Mimnermus was a philosopher;[44] to call him a love-poet is a misuse of words. He wrote exquisite poetry, and his service in developing the forms of art was unquestionably very valuable, but he brings us very little farther in the history of the treatment of women in literature.

It is in Anacreon that we find for the first time love-poetry addressed to women;[45] though one must never forget, as some modern writers seem inclined to do, that this writer also addressed a number of love-poems to boys, and that, in fact, these formed the bulk of his work.[46] The poems addressed to women were many of them, perhaps all, the work of the poet’s old age,[47] and their general tone is sufficiently indicated by such fragments as 55, 59, 161, etc.:[48] these two features serve, of course, to connect Anacreon with his predecessors; at the same time, the individualisation of this particular emotion, which we find here for the first time clearly indicated, was obviously a great advance in the art of the subject. Purely animal emotions, however highly developed or refined, could never lead to that feeling which we have called the romantic, and hence the direct importance of Anacreon for our immediate subject is but small; but the individualisation of these animal emotions was obviously of inexpressible importance for the development of the literature that dealt with them. The first essential of art is accurate observation, and the essence of accurate observation is attention to a definite object. By appreciating this fact, and concentrating upon a definite object the general emotions described by Mimnermus and the like, Anacreon created love-poetry as between man and woman, and thereby created that form of art in which the romantic feeling, when it arose, found the readiest means of expression. Thus, though in no sense of the word a romantic writer, or one who would have been likely to sympathise with romantic ideas, Anacreon was yet, unconsciously and indirectly, doing an unquestionable service in preparing the way for the dissemination, if not for the evolution, of this later feeling; and in so far this γυναικῶν ἠπερόπευμα deserves, at least, recognition, if not respect.

The last of the personal lyric writers on whom it will be necessary to dwell is Theognis.

On the general theory that the book of Theognis is a collection of poems by a number of writers of various dates, scholars have agreed to agree; on the details of the theory, they seem to have agreed to differ. For the present purpose, however, these details are unimportant, and it will be sufficient to assume that, while some of the poems are doubtless earlier, and others again later, the great bulk of the first book of the “Theognis” poetry belongs to the first half of the fifth century, while the second book is considerably later.[49]

It is equally indifferent for us how this heterogeneous collection arose; whether it was a chrestomathy “for the use of schools,” or whether, as has been argued with great force, it is in reality a volume of songs to be sung at social gatherings, and the forerunner of the later collections of epigrams.[50]

What is of importance for us is that, in any case, whatever theory as to its origin may be adopted, this book may be taken as presenting on the whole[51] a collection of those opinions and views of life which were generally held and generally accepted during the fifth century or thereabouts; for neither the schoolroom nor the dinner table is exactly the place where new and startling theories are welcomed.

Looking at this volume, then, as containing a collection of the ordinary and more or less commonplace views of the time, it is interesting, though, of course, not really surprising, to find that, while boy-love is universally acknowledged and forms the subject of not a few of the poems, women’s love is well-nigh entirely ignored;[52] and where the latter is mentioned, its sensual side merely is touched upon.[53]

Indeed, all the allusions of any importance to women can be very briefly dismissed.

In l. 183 seqq. marriage is compared to cattle-breeding, the folly of marrying for money being deprecated as spoiling the breed.

Ll. 257 seqq. are possibly the complaint of a woman with an unsuitable husband, though what is the nature of the objection to him, and indeed the whole allusion, is not clear.

Ll. 261 seqq. appear to deal with the behaviour of a man towards a woman on some occasion; but, what with the doubtfulness of the reading and the uncertainty as to whether the lines belong to one poem or two, the exact sense has never yet been ascertained.[54]

In l. 457 seqq. the infidelity of a young wife to an old man is tacitly assumed. “Girls will have boys.”

Ll. 547 seq. express vague disapprobation of dissolute habits.

Ll. 1063 seqq. are merely a reiteration of the philosophy of Mimnermus, the value of which philosophy for the development of love we have already discussed.

Ll. 1225 seq., “Nothing is sweeter ἀγαθῆς γυναικός.” So said also Simonides, and what he meant we know.

And this is all. The result is truly remarkable in its barrenness. Perhaps in no other literature would it be possible to find a collection of short poems on general subjects, of equal length, in which the relations of men to women are so utterly ignored.

Nor is there anything peculiar or exceptional in this. In the somewhat similar Scolia, absolutely the same is the case. The democrat sings of Harmodius, the aristocrat of Admetus;[55] the rare allusions that there are to women are regularly trivial or coarse.[56]

In the choral lyric writers, with whom it will now be necessary to deal, the character of the evidence to be examined is widely different from that of the evidence which we have hitherto been considering. The Greek choral poets were (with one notable exception) hardly ever subjective in their treatment of erotic matter. The erotic element, such as it is, consists in these writers almost entirely of erotic legends or myths, which would seem to have been recounted without special comment on the part of the poet and, in most cases, without elaborate analysis of the emotions of the characters introduced. The stories therefore that these writers tell, rather than the actual words in which they tell them, will require consideration in the present connection. The subjective lyric writers were, as we have seen, in the main Ionian. The choral writers, on the other hand, are in the main Dorian; consequently, one would naturally expect to find women occupying a more prominent place in their works. And this is, in fact, also the case. From the very beginning, already we find stories about women repeated with an interest and an appreciation which would have startled what one is generally taught to regard as orthodox Greece. At the same time, however, the true nature of this feature of choral poetry must not be overlooked. Though the efforts of these writers to re-awaken interest in women were unquestionably of importance for the ultimate development of the romantic element in literature, it is unjustifiable to suppose, as is too commonly done, that these writers were in themselves “romantic,” or, indeed, that they had any idea of what romantic feelings are. An examination of their works, as far as we know them, will show with sufficient clearness that in its essence their view of women differed little, if at all, from that of their Ionian predecessors and contemporaries. They thought more about women, perhaps; they did not think more of them.

A case in point is Stesichorus. In spite of the important part that female characters play in his poems, a result, no doubt, of his Boeotian connections and his freedom from Ionian influences, the poet’s way of regarding women is practically identical with that which we have already encountered among the Ionians. In the first place, Stesichorus appears always, professedly at least, as a misogynist. The legends in which he delights are those which relate the ruin caused by women’s influence. Besides the famous Ilii Persis, one need but mention the stories of Scylla, of Eriphyle, of Clytemnestra (in the Oresteia).[57] Even in the story of Artemis and Actaeon, he will not admit that the vengeance of the goddess was due to those feelings of outraged propriety to which it was generally ascribed.[58] As for his palinode of Helen, composed late in life, he was evidently induced to write it by strong private pressure of some kind, perhaps on the part of “Helen of Himera”;[59] but how isolated an expression of opinion this was, and how very unusual were the whole circumstances of the case, is shown by the great interest which the poem excited in antiquity.

In the more purely erotic legends again, it is striking how he conforms to those views as to the relative positions of men and women which, as has been already pointed out, were current in all Greek erotic stories of early date; the woman falls in love with the man, never, apparently, the reverse. Striking examples are the stories of Calyce, and probably also of Scylla; another, perhaps, that of Daphnis;[60] that of Rhadina seems at first sight a contradiction, but it must be noticed that Strabo (viii. 347) gives no information as to how the intrigue first began.[61]

That in addition to these poems concerned with women, Stesichorus interested himself also in the treatment of love in its more characteristically Greek aspect, may be gathered from Athenaeus xiii. 601 A, though, perhaps, no fragment dealing with this subject is preserved.[62] This side is, however, very strongly developed in his fellow-countryman Ibycus, who is again a most interesting figure in the history of the artistic development of Greek love.

Ibycus would seem to have been the first of the choral lyric poets who made use of this form of art for the expression of personal emotion. All the important fragments of him that remain seem to have belonged to passages of this kind. Two at least we know of as being addressed to particular individuals. Those who have been following the development of Greek feeling on this matter will not be surprised to find that these poems were addressed exclusively, as far as we know, to boys. It was a bold thing to introduce personal feelings at all into these choral odes, for a certain odour of sanctity was still hanging about them, and the Greeks had a natural aversion to the public expression of all violent emotions; but to have introduced anything so entirely sensual as woman’s love was then felt to be would not have been allowed. If love was to be tolerated at all, it must be that form of love which was generally recognised as dignified and ennobling. This amalgamation of ceremonial and personal poetry does not seem to have been popular or to have found imitators. The Greeks probably felt, what the modern glee-singer does not, the absurdity of a whole chorus expressing their undying devotion to one and the same person; but it is at least a very characteristic fact, and, for those that will not learn, a very instructive one, that boy-love was the only form of the passion which it was considered possible to attempt to treat in this way.

Of Ibycus’ views on women we know little.[63] That he followed the tendencies of Stesichorus, sometimes rather wildly,[64] and gave considerable prominence to love stories between women and men, is clear enough; but there is no evidence to show that these stories of his were any different in their essential characteristics to those of his predecessor.

The other choral lyric poets have remarkably little to say on this subject.

Myrtis’ story of Ochne is but one of the usual type, showing to what spretae iniuria formae may lead a woman. If Corinna tells of the heroism of the daughters of Orion, it is, after all, only what one would expect occasionally from a poetess.

Neither Pindar nor Simonides has anything of interest to say about women. For Bacchylides the climax of the charms of peace is