Importing/Exchanging Babies
Finally, the male anxiety regarding the
possible importation or exchange of babies is clearly seen in
the Thesmophoriazusae. Mnesilochus, still cataloging the
crimes of women, cites an instance of a woman faking labor pains
for ten days while the midwife searches the city for a baby which
they can fob off and then he accuses another woman of switching
her newborn daughter with a slave's son. A woman's motivation
for perpetrating a similar fraud in real life would be obvious:
her security depended on producing a male heir. The male perspective
is neatly summed up by Gardner when she suggests that, "From
the male point of view it meant, presumably, that the stranger-women
whom they had taken into their households had, merely for their
own personal ends, used trickery and deceit in order to take
advantage of the material security the oikos could offer,
and might with equal readiness betray it."11 Later, in New Comedy, the issue of foundling babies
will be dealt with happier result, but in the cynical world of
Old Comedy, the motives are always questionable at best and the
results are threatening to the male establishment.
For the Athenian man of the 5th century,
the potential dangers of marriage loomed large at the psychological
level and a lot of time and psychic energy was devoted to the
controlling of women, especially wives. Besides the reactions
of Aristophanes to these fears we have the evidence of the law
courts and such works as Xenophon's
Oeconomica.
Although we cannot imagine that any woman could have been as
depraved as the specimens found in Aristophanes, it is instructive
to analyze the comic exaggeration in order to get at the reality
behind it. In a society that so aggressively repressed its women,
it is not surprising to find fear not only on the side of the
repressed but in the very hearts and home of the repressors.
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