Women in Hellenistic Egypt: From Alexander to Cleopatra

by Sarah B. Pomeroy

After its conquest in 331 B.C., Egypt became the center of the Hellenistic world, attracting men and women from other parts of the Mediterranean area. In this cosmopolitan and mobile society, Greek women of the ruling class had unprecedented opportunities and were able to employ some of the legal freedoms enjoyed by their Egyptian counterparts.

Using evidence from a wide array of sources including literature, papyri, inscriptions, coins, and terra-cotta figurines, Sarah Pomeroy discusses women ranging from queens such as Arsinoë II and Cleopatra VII to Jewish slaves working on a Greek estate. This edition contains a new foreword, additional information, and an updated bibliography by the author.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Egypt, Classics, Feminism, Greece

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1984

About the author

Sarah B. Pomeroy, Professor of Classics and History, Emerita, at Hunter College and the Graduate School of the City University of New York. She was born in New York City (1938) and earned her B.A. from Barnard College in 1957. She received her M.A. in 1959 and her Ph.D. in 1961, both from Columbia University. Pomeroy has been recognized as a leading authority on ancient Greek and Roman women since her book Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves: Women in Classical Antiquity was first published in 1975. Her other publications include Xenophon, Oeconomicus: A Social and Historical Commentary (1994), Families in Classical and Hellenistic Greece: Representations and Realities (1998), Spartan Women (2002), and, with Stanley M. Burstein, Walter Donlan, and Jennifer Tolbert Roberts, the textbooks Ancient Greece: a Political, Social, and Cultural History (4th edition, 2017) and A Brief History of Ancient Greece: Politics, Society, and Culture (3rd edition, 2011).[i]

Reviews

[Leen Bokken · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ondanks het feit dat sommige stellingen manifest onjuist zijn, is dit een enorm interessant boek.