It makes no difference whether youth is corrupted by a philosopher or a courtesan. – Glycera (a hetaera of the late 4th century BCE)
In my column of September 21st I mentioned that many call girls are now choosing to label themselves as “courtesans” whether they fit the definition or not, but in recent weeks I’ve encountered the exact opposite phenomenon: People (mostly men) trying to claim that courtesans in the classical world were not prostitutes. Let’s get this out of the way right off the bat with the help of Dictionary.com:
cour·te·san [kawr-tuh-zuhn, kohr-, kur-] –noun
a prostitute or paramour, esp. one associating with noblemen or men of wealth.
Also, cour·te·zan.
Origin:
1540–50; < MF courtisane < It cortigiana, lit., woman of the court, deriv. of corte court
And since a number of the claims were made specifically about Phryne:
he·tae·ra [hi-teer-uh] –noun, plural -tae·rae [-teer-ee]
1. a highly cultured courtesan or concubine, esp. in ancient Greece.
2. any woman who uses her beauty and charm to obtain wealth or social position.
Also, hetaira.
Origin: 1810–20; < Gk hetaíra (fem.) companion
You might also consult the Wikipedia article, which begins with the following sentence: “In ancient Greece, hetaerae (in Greek ἑταῖραι, hetairai) were courtesans, that is to say, sophisticated companions and prostitutes.”
Veronica Franco, 1546-1591
Those deniers who try to claim that courtesans in general or hetaerae in particular were literally not prostitutes are clearly steeped in willful ignorance, because prior to a few weeks ago I have literally never heard anyone try to claim that courtesans (with the exceptions of the Japanese geisha) did not provide sex for pay. Indeed, the Renaissance Italian term cortigiana onesta, (literally “honest courtesan”) meant a courtesan who provided real companionship and intellectual stimulation in addition to sex. “Courtesan” immediately implied sex; it was only the modifier “honest” which added the GFE aspect. But I don’t think most of the deniers believe that courtesans literally were not prostitutes; rather, I suspect that they are lawheads engaged in a process of doublethink designed to protect their minds from having to deal with the fact that the EXACT SAME profession which was legal and respected in many preindustrial cultures is illegal and demonized in ours. Remember, to a lawhead laws actually define reality; if prostitution is criminalized it must be because prostitutes are actually criminals, and therefore unlike the sophisticated hetaerae. It’s sort of like claiming that the Jews in concentration camps could not possibly be descended from ancient Hebrews because the latter had a kingdom. To admit that educated, cultured prostitutes in ancient Greece were no different from educated, cultured prostitutes of today is to admit that the law is arbitrary, and that is anathema to a lawhead.
It may be instructive to examine the way in which one of these deniers tried vainly (and pompously) to promote his beliefs; this example comes from a science fiction board called Star Destroyer on which someone posted a link to my ever-popular column on Phryne. The response appears to be from a moderator who angrily attacked my column, claiming that it “mangle[s] so much of ancient society and customs that it just reeks of ignorance.” Considering the following paragraph from his reply, I think it’s fair to label that statement as a serious case of projection:
I mean, even making a huge deal of being a well-educated woman who provided companionship (no, this was not just sex – think of more than an even higher-regarded [sic] and less sexual version of a Geisha) to men of her choosing…and saying she was a prostitute is just missing the point entirely. In fact, the blogger seems to miss the entire point, being more interested in equating Solon with a pimpmonger [sic] etc. She is making connections where none are in her quest to equate herself with Phryne and establish a parallel between prostitution in ancient Greece and today.
This is such a farrago of denial that it’s difficult to conceive that the author believes a word of it himself. “A well-educated woman who provided companionship…to men of her choosing…and saying she was a prostitute is just missing the point entirely.” How’s that again? What he accuses me of is actually what the law does: Reducing something good and noble to something tawdry. Many modern call girls (including myself) are quite educated and most of us are just as selective about our clientele as the hetaerae were. “This was not just sex…” As regular readers of my column know, it’s not just sex with us, either, and very often there is no sex at all. This recent column by Charlotte Shane talks about exactly that; if the commenter was at all informed on this subject he would have known it as well, but I guess it’s easier just to deny without proof. The next phrase (“…less sexual version of a Geisha…”) is even weirder; since (as I explained in my column of October 21st) geisha were legally forbidden to sell sex outside the walled districts since the beginning of the 19th century, and modern geisha probably don’t do it at all, I’m at a bit of a loss to understand how this writer believes the hetaerae could be any “less sexual” without being entirely celibate.
Hetaera, by Phintias c. 510 BCE
The denial continues in the next sentence, in which he accuses me of “equating Solon with a pimpmonger” (I presume he wanted to write either “pimp” or “whoremonger” and got stuck in the middle). Nothing I said about Solon was speculation; it’s all in the historical record. But this writer seems to take issue with my refusal to give Solon’s misogynistic laws and persecution of independent whores a free pass on the strength of his historical reputation. The commenter’s apparent idolization of all things classical permeates his last and most telling sentence; please, pray tell, what nonexistent “connections” I invented, and how the same profession in two different societies could somehow not be parallel? The idea that I had to “establish” such a parallel by sophistry is ludicrous in the extreme. Selling sex is selling sex, selling female companionship is exactly that, and an ethical and educated prostitute in any culture or time does both. The author blusters and fumes and accuses me of deception…yet cites no sources to refute my statements and instead makes a series of highly emotional, totally irrational and demonstrably false statements in a spastic attempt to protect his own mind from the uncomfortable truth that there are whores of all classes from brothel-slave to courtesan in every culture in history, and the only difference between modern whores of any stratum and our ancient sisters of the same level is that modern law equates us all with streetwalkers, and in “Nordic Model” regimes with brothel-slaves.
I suspect that we will see “courtesan denial” become more and more common as “Nordic Model” and trafficking propaganda seep into the consciousness of lawheads over the next few years. Since the phenomenon appears to be in its infancy, this affords us a rare opportunity to track the dissemination of a spurious idea; I therefore ask that my readers keep an eye out for arguments (whether in primary articles or in replies to them) claiming that courtesans, hetaerae, oiran, temple prostitutes, etc were somehow fundamentally different from modern call girls, and please send me a link to such statements when you spot them.
ISTR some time back (years) reading some online speculation that temple prostitutes of Babylon (or maybe Sumeria) didn’t really sell sex; they just did it with the king once a year for good crops, and danced the rest of the time. I wish I could remember where that was. I probably don’t remember the details because I wasn’t very impressed with the argument. It was obvious that his attitude was “a dirty whore is a dirty whore, and no whore was ever sacred, anywhere, anytime, in any faith!”
Like I said, I wasn’t much impressed.
I’d class that with the argument that there have never really been any cannibals. 🙁
Ah yes, The Man-Eating Myth. I read that in my early twenties, and quickly realized that it was a moral issue for the author (forget his name). He seemed to have made exactly the same assumption that the Conquistadors did, but drew a different conclusion.
Hi Maggie
I’m the person that linked to your site from Stardestroyer. I found it a delicious and refreshing read and so chose to share it.
In my own country, prostitution is a legal and licensed trade,but only in restricted areas. Of course, after working part-time in the tourist sector,I came to discover that the sex industry is rather pervasive and spreads outside of the legal areas as well, staffed by freelancers and a variety of girls from all backgrounds who for various reasons, from paying off debts to wanting a little extra cash, take part in the trade.
It’s an interesting story.Singapore no doubt has a reputation in the Western world as a nanny state but ultimately the government’s stance is simple: if it harms no one, results in minimal abuse and can be taxed, they’ll treat it like any other business.
It was legalised mostly because the government didn’t want organised crime sinking its teeth into the sector and causing abuses, they needed tax money early in our development and they acknowledge the reality and sought to control the trade rather than let it flourish, as it provided employment in peripheral industries such as hospitality, restaurants, bars, etc. Brothels are run via licensed managers who apply to the police force, healthy ministry and zoning authorities for the relevant licenses.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Singapore
An approach which would work well for the US I think,if not for the conservatives.As an outside observer your political lobbies seem intent on ignoring the basic facts of reality.
People will have sex whether you want them to or not.Ultimately,the sex industry will exist for as long as men have sexual desires or desire for companionship. To manage the spread of STDs and prevent organised crime and associated criminal behaviour, from a policy standpoint its easier to legalise it and tax it, treating them as businesspeople or tradespeople rather than inhibiting it.
However,the stigma associated with it will remain, dependent on the culture of the society that such activities take place in.
Hi, Manthor! I was rather hoping you would see this column and reply so I could thank you for the original link; I didn’t want to join Star Destroyer just to reply to that moderator (?) because it would’ve been tacky and might have made you look bad (people might have thought you invited me).
That’s the way it seems to us inside observers as well. The US government and those of the various states seem determined to criminalize as many activities as possible so as to be able to silence dissent by finding some crime with which a dissenter can be charged and arresting him for that rather than for criticizing the government. And until that philosophy is dismantled (probably forcibly), we can forget prostitution being fully decriminalized in the U.S.
Absolutely. Stripping is legal in most locations here, but there’s still a considerable stigma attached to it.
In some historical pagan cultures, temple prostitutes (holy whores, sacred prostitutes, et al) and priestesses were considered with esteem much as priests are today. Local men could go to the temple priestess, make an offering, and then the sex would follow as a religious experience bringing them closer to the divine.
I’ll need to find the reference to this as I can’t remember at the moment but it was believed that being closer to the Gods and Goddesses at the moment of climax would bring clarity and good fortune.
I’ve mentioned temple prostitutes a number of times, but I don’t believe I’ve ever actually done a full column on them; I’ll have to remedy that someday. The closest approach I could find was this one from July 13th.
Hi Maggie.
Apparently, you felt it less tacky to make up a whole blog post of what can charitably be described as character assassination instead of taking three minutes of signing up on that website.
This includes the hilarious assumption that I somehow support the american laws on prostitution, that I as a “lawhead” (whatever that means) somehow hate “dirty criminal prostitutes” and feel a need to defend the honor of the hetairai.
I wonder what, during your doubtlessly exhaustive search of my posts on that board made you come to that conclusion? Was it my signature pointing out the hypocrisy of the american right trying to (among other things) legislate sex but not gun control? Were it my posts blasting the hypocritical american politicians who hire sex workers but make a huge show of family values in public?
Or maybe, just maybe you misread a few things. First of all, I am German, though I lived in the USA for a total time period of two years. Germany follows what we call the “Entkriminalisierungsprinzip” (de-criminalisation principle) concerning prostitution. Our workers have unions, retirement benefits etc. We are pretty much following the Netherlands on that and I’ll note that during my internship with the regulating agency I never noted anything but professional behavior in their dealings with prostitutes. We are not as progressive as I would like, but we do have a fairly good system and I’d just like to note that I have defended decriminalisation in the past on both legal, practical and moral grounds.
I also do not believe that it is the function of anybody passing judgement over what consenting adults do in their own private sphere (note that the Grundgesetz also decrees the same). More to the point, during my stays in the USA and during my work with a crimal defence attorney I have seen the American system first hand and suffice to say I am not a fan.
So you might see why I am a bit astonished at being described as the great puritanical hope. I also like how you took my response out of context of the whole thread (you might have noticed how it was as much a response to the simpleminded replies that followed the original poster as to you).
For the record, I was attacking your post because it seems to me very much the work of an amateur with too much focus on one point (that Phyrne had sex for money which I’ll not dispute in the slightest) while ignoring the philological implications of the terms she is described with, treating the history of the hetairai a bit one-dimensional, oversimplicating the motivations of Solon as pimpmonger while missing the impact of democracy resulting in aristocratic traditions being adopted by the demos, ignoring that the law passed can also be easily read as scion of the principle of neutrality and a few other things. This is a pretty complex issue to be honest and I did not feel your post did it justice (neither did my reply, come to think of it).
But: hating on “dirty” prostitutes or defending the asinine american laws had nothing to do with it and I’ll thank you not to ascribe such mindsets to me. If I gave the impression of that, I apologize, but I suggest that taking one look at my avatar and at my signature should have given you pause.
Now, if you are interested in having a discussion about the issues, feel free to sign up over there. The News and politics section might interest you as well as history, seeing as how you seem to be a pretty liberal person. (Please do not try to email me, as a general rule I do not give out my email to strangers over the internet. This has nothing to do with you, even on the other board my email is not available to any member.)
Regards,
TheGuyFromThatOtherBoard
Now that we’ve both read each others’ posts, I suspect that we both may have jumped to conclusions on the other’ motivations and/or thought processes without adequate research; you’ve explained why you reacted as you did and in my own defense I must say that, as I said in the first paragraph of this column, yours was not the only post I had read that week which seemed (to me) to deny that courtesans were prostitutes.
I did indeed feel it was less tacky to do it this way, because that board is your “stomping ground” and it would’ve felt rude to me to go over there just to argue with you. I included the link to the thread in my post so that the whole thing could be read in context.
I must admit it did seem a bit self-contradictory. I accept your apology and extend one of my own for misjudging your motives. Though I’m sure you can understand that whores tend to be hypersensitive to what we perceive as attacks, at the same time I need to develop a thicker skin so as to answer such criticisms rationally rather than allowing myself to get angry.
Please, feel free to look around my blog more; I’m sure you’ll find that I know my subject fairly well, and that what may at first glance seem to be oversimplification of the issues in some of my posts is actually intended to point out the overgeneralization of the issues by prohibitionists or to create a reductio ad absurdum. One example would be my habit of referring to women who are not professional prostitutes as “amateurs”, and another my talk about parental hysteria over “sex rays” emanating from sexually experienced teachers, entertainers etc.
Thank you for taking the time to reply; it seems we both judged each other hastily on the basis of one post each, and that we’re actually more in agreement than not. 🙂
Thanks for the reply and the apology is gladly accepted.
However, if we are to go into the issues of prositutes in ancient Greece or the role of prostitutes in ancient societies, I would prefer doing it over there on the other board – I do not mind being criticised in the forum I moderate (as a scientist critique is necessary). The reason I am asking is because I do miss some options in this reply form which are IMO necessary for debate – the quote function for starters. I feel in this comment form I do not really have the tools available to make a decent argument like this one: http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?p=2982747#p2982747
Arguing over the internet is always difficult and I do not think this comment form is the best way to do it.
I appreciate the offer, but I’m afraid I’m not really much of a debater; I tend to get flustered and upset. Debate is essentially intellectual combat, and I’m no warrior; I understand many people enjoy it but I don’t. My own form of advocacy consists in writing essays which, I hope, encourage my readers to do further research on their own and thereby reach their own conclusions. I guess what I’m saying is that I feel if I present my own view on an issue my readers are intelligent enough to weigh it against all the opposing viewpoints which are readily available on the internet, without my having to “convince” them of anything. I hope that makes sense! 🙂
I’d just like to agree with you on your assessment of your debating abilities. You do get easily flustered, especially when challenged on closely held beliefs.
It’s extremely annoying to make a perfectly reasonable, adult comment only to have the response to be insults. Which means that I have to be even more polite and adult in response, all the while being seen as the bad guy. Most of the criticisms you have of my tone stem from that.
So enough, I’d wish you good luck, but frankly I think you all have a lot of problems with outreach and education, and until you fix them, luck is just a band-aid on bullet wound.
Do email me at my gmail account if you decide to make a column celebrating the demise of the horrible troll, asmallnotch.
Oh, by education, I meant educating people about sex work, not the education of sex workers.
Strangely, you’re the only person who seems to have that problem with me, but I’m sure it’s me and not you.
Hi That Guy. My first reaction was that I should stand up on my hind legs, defend Maggie, and start calling you names or some such.
Fortunately I read your whole post, her replies and your own, and it seems that such behavior would not only be rude and juvenile, but unnecessary. You seem like an OK sort of guy, and I’m glad you and Maggie have worked things out.
Could I have a link to you essay on Solon and such? Or is it here already and I’ve missed it? I miss things some times. Maybe it’s too much standing on my hind legs that does that.
If you don’t mind, I’ll just write a brief essay in the other thread then detailing my perspective on the greek hetairai and Solon. I won’t do it without your permission though as without you to respond it may look very one-sided.
I don’t mind; you can also link this comment thread if you like. 🙂