“Let us consider now how many ways a man may be called unjust. It is indeed clear that a man who breaks laws is unjust but so is someone who is greedy and inegalitarian—thus it is clear that the just man will be law-abiding and fair. Justice, then, is lawful and fair; injustice is unlawful and unfair.
Since the unjust man someone who is greedy, he will be selfish regarding good things, not everything, but those things upon which good fortune and bad fortune rely—those things which are universally always good but not always for the same person. People pray for these things and pursue them; it is not right, however, that they pray for things which are universally good and good for them, but that they choose things that are just good for them.
The unjust man does not always choose the larger portion;for he will choose the smaller portion of bad things. But even here he is more selfish of the good because he appears to take on less evil, which is a type of good, and for that reason he seems greedy. He should be called unfair. This also embraces the common sense.”
“Kyrnos, this city is pregnant and I am afraid she will bear a man
Meant to correct our evil arrogance.
The citizens are still sane, but the leaders have changed
And have fallen into great evil.
Good people, Kyrnos, have never yet destroyed a city,
But whenever it pleases wicked men to commit outrage,
They corrupt the people and issue legal judgment in favor of the unjust,
For the sake of their own private profit and power.
Don’t expect this city to stay peaceful for very long
Even if it is not at a moment of great peace now.
When these deeds are dear to evil men,
their profit accrues with public harm.
Civil conflicts and murder of kin comes from this,
And tyrants do too: may this never pleasure to our state.”
Abstract: Cartoon showing snake, representing monopolies involving senators, with tail wrapped around dome of the U.S. Capitol, facing personification of “Liberty”, and “Puck” asking Uncle Sam, “What are you going to do about it?” Physical description: 1 print : lithograph, color.
“Oath runs right alongside crooked judgments.
But a roar comes from Justice as she is dragged where
bribe-devouring men lead when they apply laws with crooked judgments.
She attends the city and the haunts of the hosts
weeping and cloaked in mist, bringing evil to people
who drive her out and do not practice righteous law.
For those who give fair judgments to foreigners and citizens
and who do not transgress the law in any way,
cities grow strong, and the people flourish within them;
A child-nourishing peace settles on the land, and never
Does wide-browed Zeus sound the sign of harsh war.”
Justice is a maiden who was born from Zeus.
The gods who live on Olympus honor her
and whenever someone wrongs her by bearing false witness
she sits straightaway at the feet of Zeus, Kronos’ son
and tells him the plans of unjust men so that the people
will pay the price of the wickedness of kings who make murderous plans
and twist her truth by proclaiming false judgments.
Keep these things in mind, bribe-swallowing kings:
whoever wrongs another also wrongs himself;
an evil plan is most evil for the one who makes it.
The eye of Zeus sees everything and knows everything
and even now, if he wishes, will look on us and not miss
what kind of justice the walls of our city protects.
Today, I wouldn’t wish myself to be just among unjust people
nor my child, since it bad to be a just person
If anyone who is more unjust has greater rights.
But I hope that Zeus, the counselor, will not let this happen.”
In our annual tradition, we are re-posting this list with more names and updated links. Most of the evidence for these authors has been collected only in Wikipedia. I have added new translations and new names over the past few years (especially among the philosophers). Always happy to have new names and links suggested.
I originally received a link to the core list in an email from my undergraduate poetry teacher, the amazing poet and translator Olga Broumas. The post is on tumblr on a page by DiasporaChic, bit the original author is Terpsikeraunos.
Women in ancient Greece and Rome with surviving works or fragments
PHILOSOPHY
Here is a list of Women philosophers with testimonia and fragments (with French translations and commentary).
Aesara of Lucania: “Only a fragment survives of Aesara of Lucania’s Book on Human Nature, but it provides a key to understanding the philosophies of Phintys, Perictione, and Theano II as well. Aesara presents a familiar and intuitive natural law theory. She says that through the activity of introspection into our own nature – specifically the nature of a human soul – we can discover not only the natural philosophic foundation for all of human law, but we can also discern the technical structure of morality, positive law, and, it may be inferred, the laws of moral psychology and of physical medicine. Aesara’s natural law theory concerns laws governing three applications of moral law: individual or private morality, laws governing the moral basis of the institution of the family, and, laws governing the moral foundations of social institutions. By analyzing the nature of the soul, Aesara says, we will understand the nature of law and of justice at the individual, familial, and social levels.” – A History of Women Philosophers: Volume I: Ancient Women Philosophers, 600 B.C.-500 A.D., by M.E. Waith
Melissa: “Melissa (3rd century BC)[1][2] was a Pythagorean philosopher…Nothing is known about her life. She is known only from a letter written to another woman named Cleareta (or Clearete). The letter is written in a Doric Greek dialect dated to around the 3rd century BC.[2] The letter discusses the need for a wife to be modest and virtuous, and stresses that she should obey her husband.[2] The content has led to the suggestion that it was written pseudonymously by a man.[2] On the other hand, the author of the letter does not suggest that a woman is naturally inferior or weak, or that she needs a man’s rule to be virtuous.[1]” –Wikipedia
Perictione (I and II): “Two works attributed to Perictione have survived in fragments: On the Harmony of Women and On Wisdom. Differences in language suggest that they were written by two different people. Allen and Waithe identify them as Perictione I and Perictione II. Plato’s mother was named Perictione, and Waithe argues that she should be identified as the earlier Perictione, suggesting that similarities between Plato’s Republic and On the Harmony of Women may not be the result of Perictione reading Plato, but the opposite–the son learning philosophy from his mother. On the Harmony of Women, however, is written in Ionic prose with occasional Doric forms. This mixed dialect dates the work to the late fourth or third centuries BC. The reference in On the Harmony of Women to women ruling suggests the Hellenistic monarchies of the third century BC or later. On Wisdom is written in Doric and is partly identical with a work by Archytas of the same name. This work should be dated later, to the third or second centuries BC. Both the dates of the works and their dialects mean Perictione as the mother of Plato could not have written them. We then have two Pythagorean texts, attributed to otherwise unknown women named Perictione who should be dated perhaps one hundred years apart.” –Women Writers of Ancient Greece and Rome: An Anthology, by I.M. Plant
*N.B. This account leaves out the the basic narrative from Diogenes Laertius, that Plato’s father Ariston raped his mother Perictione.
Phintys: “Phintys (or Phyntis, Greek: Φίντυς; 4th or 3rd century BC) was a Pythagorean philosopher. Nothing is known about her life, nor where she came from. She wrote a work on the correct behavior of women, two extracts of which are preserved by Stobaeus.” –Wikipedia
*Note, Stobaeus (4.32.61a) calls her the daughter of Kallikrates the Pythagorean (Φιντύος τᾶς Καλλικράτεος θυγατρὸς Πυθαγορείας). Here are some of her fragments on the prudence befitting women: part 1 and part 2.
Ptolemais of Cyrene: “Ptolemais is known to us through reference to her work by Porphyry in his Commentary on the Harmonics of Ptolemy. He tells us that she came from Cyrene and gives the title of her work, The Pythagorean Principles of Music, which he quotes. She is the only known female musical theorist from antiquity. Her dates cannot be known for sure. She clearly preceded Porphyry, who was born about AD 232; Didymus, who is also quoted by Porphyry, knew Ptolemais’ work and may even have been Porphyry’s source for it. This Didymus is probably the one who lived in the time of Nero, giving us a date for Ptolemais of the first century AD or earlier…One of the problems in dealing with this text is that it is in quotation. Porphyry does not clearly distinguish between the text he quotes from Ptolemais and his own discussion of the issues raised…A second issue is the problem of the accuracy of the quotation. Porphyry says in the introduction to fragment 4 that he has altered a few things in the quotation for the sake of brevity. We should not assume that this is the only quotation to have suffered from editing. On the other hand, where he quotes the same passage twice (fragment 3 is repeated almost verbatim in fragment 4) his consistency is encouraging. Ptolemais’ extant work is a catechism, written as a series of questions and answers. She discusses different schools of thought on harmonic theory, distinguishing between the degree to which they gave importance to theory and perception. Her text prefers the approach of Aristoxenus to that of the Pythagoreans, thus she should not be thought a Pythagorean, despite the title of her work.” –Women Writers of Ancient Greece and Rome: An Anthology, by I.M. Plant
“Kyrnos, this city is pregnant and I am afraid she will bear a man
Meant to correct our evil arrogance.
The citizens are still sane, but the leaders have changed
And have fallen into great evil.
Good people, Kyrnos, have never yet destroyed a city,
But whenever it pleases wicked men to commit outrage,
They corrupt the people and issue legal judgment in favor of the unjust,
For the sake of their own private profit and power.
Don’t expect this city to stay peaceful for very long
Even if it is not at a moment of great peace now,
When these deeds are dear to evil men,
As their profit accrues with public harm.
Civil conflicts and murder of kin comes from this,
And tyrants do too: may this never bring our city pleasure.”
“Shit.
Nothing is credible, not a good reputation
Nor that one who is lucky will not do badly in the end.
The gods churn these waters up back and forth
Mixing in confusion so that we worship them
In our ignorance. But why mourn at all?
It has no effect on our sufferings to come.”
“You haven’t paid up, but perhaps you’ll pay soon.
Like a man who has fallen into water with no harbor
You’ll fall far from your heart’s desire
And lose your life. The meeting place
Of debt to Justice and to the gods
Is a terrible, terrible place.”
“Agamemnon, it’s not right for people
To possess tongues stronger than deeds.
If someone has done good things, then they ought to speak well
If they do evil things, well, their words are rotten too,
And they are incapable of ever speaking of injustice well.
Wise are those who have become masters of precise speech!
But even they cannot be wise all the way to the end.
They all die terribly. There’s no escape from that.”
“Why does this woman abuse the god with words
And twist him up with constant riddles?
Is it because she loves the women she gets oracles for?
Is she keeping something silent because she needs to?
But why does Erekhtheus’ daughter matter to me?
She’s nothing to me! I will go to fill
The purificatory vessels with golden cups of water
I need to criticize Apollo. What’s he thinking?
He keeps ruining girls for marriage with rape
And producing children in secret only to ignore them
As they die. Don’t act this way, but since you can,
Pursue excellence. The gods punish any mortal
Who does wrong. How is it right for those who write
The laws for mortals to lead lawless lives?”
“Play your pipe, Pan
In your caves
Where some pitiful girl
Gave birth to a child with Apollo
And then exposed it as a feast
For the birds and beasts
The insult of their bitter ‘marriage’.
Never at the loom or in tales have I heard of
Mortal women having divine children and good fortune.”
For so to interpose a little ease, Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise.
—John Milton, Lycidas
Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics
1155a20-25.
Friendship seems to hold cities together. Lawgivers are more attentive to friendship than to justice because their central aim is concord (which is not unlike friendship), and they are keen to do away with discord (enmity, that is).
It seems the political community is a beneficial resource: it brings people together in the first instance, and then it keeps them together. This is what lawgivers aim to achieve, and justice is said to be that which confers universal benefits.
“Oath runs right alongside crooked judgments.
But a roar comes from Justice as she is dragged where
bribe-devouring men lead when they apply laws with crooked judgments.
She attends the city and the haunts of the hosts
weeping and cloaked in mist, bringing evil to people
who drive her out and do not practice righteous law.
For those who give fair judgments to foreigners and citizens
and who do not transgress the law in any way,
cities grow strong, and the people flourish within them;
A child-nourishing peace settles on the land, and never
Does wide-browed Zeus sound the sign of harsh war.”
Justice is a maiden who was born from Zeus.
The gods who live on Olympus honor her
and whenever someone wrongs her by bearing false witness
she sits straightaway at the feet of Zeus, Kronos’ son
and tells him the plans of unjust men so that the people
will pay the price of the wickedness of kings who make murderous plans
and twist her truth by proclaiming false judgments.
Keep these things in mind, bribe-swallowing kings:
whoever wrongs another also wrongs himself;
an evil plan is most evil for the one who makes it.
The eye of Zeus sees everything and knows everything
and even now, if he wishes, will look on us and not miss
what kind of justice the walls of our city protects.
Today, I wouldn’t wish myself to be just among unjust people
nor my child, since it bad to be a just person
If anyone who is more unjust has greater rights.
But I hope that Zeus, the counselor, will not let this happen.”
“But there’s no reason why you should pray for the gods to be hateful to someone you think deserves punishment. I say they are being punished, even if the person seems to be lucky. Put your own attention to this and examine how our lives actually go and not what they are said to be. Then you will see that evils change us more than just happen.
How many times has something first called a disaster turned out to be the cause and beginning of good fortune? How many times have advantages built steps for themselves with great thanks straight up, lifting someone who was already doing well, as if they were standing in place they could fall safely from!
Well, that guy falling has no real evil in it, if you see the way out, beyond which nature can kick no one lower! That shared end of all things is near–that’s the place where the successful person is thrown out, where the unlucky is released. We expand both boundaries, we create them with great hope and fear.
Yet, if you are wise, measure everything by the human condition. Keep both what you fear and what you take joy in reasonable. Truly, don’t take joy in anything too long so that you may not fear too long either.”
Sed non est quare cuiquam, quem poena putaveris dignum, optes, ut infestos deos habeat; habet, inquam, etiam si videtur eorum favore produci. Adhibe diligentiam tuam et intuere, quid sint res nostrae, non quid vocentur; et scies plura mala contingere nobis quam accidere. Quotiens enim felicitatis et1 causa et initium fuit, quod calamitas vocabatur? Quotiens magna gratulatione excepta res gradum sibi struxit in praeceps et aliquem iam eminentem adlevavit etiamnunc, tamquam adhuc ibi staret, unde tuto cadunt? Sed ipsum illud cadere non habet in se mali quidquam, si exitum spectes, ultra quem natura neminem deiecit. Prope est rerum omnium terminus, prope est, inquam, et illud, unde felix eicitur, et illud, unde infelix emittitur; nos utraque extendimus et longa spe ac metu facimus.
Sed si sapis, omnia humana condicione metire; simul et quod gaudes et quod times, contrahe. Est autem tanti nihil diu gaudere, ne quid diu timeas.
