Euripides, fr. 137 (Andromeda)

 

“Best of all riches is to find a noble spouse.”

 

τῶν γὰρ πλούτων ὅδ’ ἄριστος

γενναῖον λέχος εὑρεῖν.

 

This might be one of the few positive comments about marriage from Classical Greece. But, then again, it comes from a woman in a play about a girl rescued from a sea monster…And the positive comment is really about class…

 

The following is much more typical:

 

Euripides, fr. 78 (Alcmeon)

 

“A wife brings her husband

The greatest aid and the greatest

Sickness.”

 

γυναῖκα καὶ ὠφελίαν

καὶ νόσον ἀνδρὶ φέρειν

μεγίσταν….

 

Every sickness contains its own cure?