Midterm Review
Women in Ancient Greece and Rome

Exam Overview

The midterm will consist of (I) a multiple choice section (40%) , and (II) an essay (60%).  Six essay questions are listed below.  On the actual midterm, I will give you a choice between two of them, and you will write an essay on ONE topic.  You may prepare however you like for the exam (study groups are fine) but no books or notes are allowed at the test.  Bring your own paper; no need to bring scantrons.

Multiple Choice Pool

Essay Topics

1.  Young girls or maidens are celebrated in a number of Greek works, notably in Alkman’s Maiden Song, in Sappho’s poetry, and in the portrayal of Nausicaa in the Odyssey.  Artemis offers another image of the life of a maiden, as does Persephone in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter.  What are the ideal characteristics of maidens, in the Greek view?  What sorts of things do they do, or what sorts of things “happen” to them?  Do different visions of maidenhood appear in our different sources, or do they show agreement of what a maiden is and does?  Explain how and, to the extent possible, why these similarities and differences exist.

2.  In Archaic poetry, Semonides and Hesiod have left a humorous and a serious invective against women's faults -- or the faults of bad women since both acknowledge that a very few can be good.  In classical Athenian drama, as well as in legal arguments such as L&F 87, we also see women criticized or portrayed on stage in a way that seems to be "bad" by the culture's standards.  How are the perspectives on women of these two periods alike?  In what ways do they differ?  Use parallel perspectives from the archaic poets and the passages we have studied from drama to prove your point.

3.  In what ways were the laws of Athens protective of the rights and safety of women?  In what ways were they destructive of those rights?  Bear in mind that "protective" and "destructive" are relative terms, defined differently by different cultures -- so be sure that you are specific in saying they ways in which Athenian laws would have helped and/or caused problems for Athenian women.  Use examples from lawsuits and/or references to particular laws, and consider things such as the position of the epikleros, the uses of the dowry,etc.

4.  Penelope and Andromache are ideal wives in archaic poetry.  What are the elements of their characters and actions that make them so ideal?  How do they compare to an “ideal wife” as indicated in the evidence we have from Classical Athens?  Has the ideal changed, or is it largely the same?  Discuss, with attention to the different kinds of evidence (i.e. primary sources) each time period leaves us.

5.  Amazons as described by the Greeks are mythic, whereas Spartan women were real; nevertheless they both functioned in Athens as opposites to the values and virtues expected of Athenian women.  In what ways are Spartan women and Amazons portrayed differently?  In what ways are they seen as alike?  How do these two types of women define Athenian women by contrast?

6.  Solon in Athens (early 5^th century BCE) and Lycurgus in Sparta (8^th ? century BCE) were political reformers whose laws had an effect on women.  Both have been described as creating laws that subordinated the individual to the state (or, to the household and then to the state).  Describe ways in which the reforms of Solon and Lycurgus worked with respect to women.  Were there ways in which these reforms benefited women, even while privileging the concerns of the polis over them?

Rubric