Covering a broad chronological and geographic range and a great variety of source types, this volume examines the presence and activities of ancient women in the public domain, for example as rulers, patrons, priestesses, wives, athletes and pilgrims.

Time and Ancient Medicine is the first monograph to explore, on the one hand, how the introduction of new timekeeping technologies (namely, sundials and water clocks) affected the practice, rhetoric, and philosophy of ancient medicine and, on the other hand, how medical timekeeping practices affected engagement with time elsewhere in society. The study seeks, first, to offer a chronological narrative of how timekeeping technologies and medical practices evolved and influenced one another in ancient Greece and Rome, with consideration of relevant Pharaonic Egyptian and Assyro-Babylonian precedents. Kassandra J. Miller turns to a series of case studies, drawn from the Roman Imperial period, to investigate thematic questions, asking how debates over medical timekeeping interacted with debates over proper scientific methodology, the status of medicine as a formal art, and the relationships between medicine and other disciplines like mathematics, astronomy, and astrology. Throughout, this study places epigraphic, artistic, and other material evidence for hourly timekeeping in dialogue with selections from medical literature, some of which has not previously been published in modern-language translation. Ultimately, this study reveals that time and timekeeping played fundamental roles in ancient medical debates and practices and challenges the traditional narrative that the social history of “clock time” only begins with the invention of the mechanical clock in the Medieval period. It offers new insights into the specific ways that physicians of the ancient Mediterranean engaged with their evolving temporal landscapes and raises questions about the relationships between time and medicine in the modern day.

This book offers the first comprehensive study of drawing lots as a central, ubiquitous institution of ancient Greek society. Led by an egalitarian mindset, Greeks drew lots as a matter of course to distribute inheritance, booty, sacrificial meat, and lands, to mix groups, select individuals, and set turns. Lot-oracles were used for divination; otherwise, the gods guarded the justice of the procedure but rarely determined the outcome. When drawing lots was gradually applied to polis governance, classical Athens made sortition the basis of the first democracy in human history. A Greek innovation, drawing lots for governance inspires new democratic politics today.

This collection of essays explores the lives and roles of women in antiquity. A recurring theme is the relationship between private and public, and many of the essays find that women's public roles develop as a result of their private lives, specifically their family relationships. Essays on Hellenistic queens and Spartan and Roman women document how women exerted political power--usually, but not always, through their relationship to male leaders--and show how political upheaval created opportunities for them to exercise powers previously reserved for men. Essays on the writings of Sappho and Nossis focus on the interaction between women's public and private discourses. The collection also includes discussion of Athenian and Roman marriage and the intrusion of the state into the sexual lives of Greek, Roman, and Jewish women as well as an investigation of scientific opinion about female physiology. The contributors are Sarah B. Pomeroy, Jane McIntosh Snyder, Marilyn M. Skinner, Cynthia B. Patterson, Ann Ellis Hanson, Lesley Dean-Jones, Natalie Boymel Kampen, Mary Taliaferro Boatwright, and Shaye J.D. Cohen.

This highly acclaimed collection, the first sourcebook on ancient women and now in its fourth edition, provides a unique look into the public and private lives and legal status of Greek and Roman women. The texts represent women of all social classes, from public figures remembered for their deeds (or misdeeds), to priestesses, poets, and intellectuals, to working women, such as musicians, wet nurses, and prostitutes, to homemakers. The editors have selected texts from hard-to-find sources, such as inscriptions, papyri, and medical treatises, many of which have not previously been translated into English. The resulting compilation is both an invaluable aid to research and a clear guide through this complex subject. The brand new design of the fourth edition integrates the third edition's appendix and adds many new and unusual texts and images, as well as such student-friendly features as a map and chapter overviews. Many notes and explanations have been revised with the non-classicist in mind. Its readings cover women's legal status, domestic conditions, health issues, and relations with other people. The emphasis throughout is not so much on what ancient writers thought about women, as on what women actually did, both within the home and outside it, from their intellectual achievements, benefactions, and religious roles, to humble jobs and acts of physical and moral courage.

Examines women whose influence was positive, as well as those whose reputations were more notoriousSupremely well researched from many different historical sourcesSuperbly illustrated with photographs and drawings Women in Ancient Greece is a much-needed analysis of how women behaved in Greek society, how they were regarded, and the restrictions imposed on their actions. Given that ancient Greece was very much a man’s world, most books on ancient Greek society tend to focus on men; this book redresses the imbalance by shining the spotlight on that neglected other half. Women had significant roles to play in Greek society and culture – this book illuminates those roles. Women in Ancient Greece asks the controversial question: how far is the assumption that women were secluded and excluded just an illusion? It answers it by exploring the treatment of women in Greek myth and epic; their treatment by playwrights, poets and philosophers; and the actions of liberated women in Minoan Crete, Sparta and the Hellenistic era when some elite women were politically prominent. It covers women in Athens, Sparta and in other city states; describes women writers, philosophers, artists and scientists; it explores love, marriage and adultery, the virtuous and the meretricious; and the roles women played in death and religion. Crucially, the book is people-based, drawing much of its evidence and many of its conclusions from lives lived by historical Greek women.

This collection of essays represents research currently being undertaken on women's lives and their representations in various ancient societies. It provides a forum for the exchange and development of ideas and methods at a crucial period in the growth of women's studies in the UK.